At the unveiling of the game in London, developer Volition’s Greg Donovan (producer on Saints Row 2) said Saints Row 2 will more than hold its own in the battle of the sandbox games when it goes head to head with Grand Theft Auto 4 this year. BothTo quote: “The only thing I know about GTA is what I’ve read. From what I’ve read it seems like they’re going in a more realistic direction. For us it’s more about almost a hyper-realistic quality, over-the-top, all about these memorable moments, very compelling gameplay and frankly we wouldn’t be releasing this year if we didn’t think it would be competitive.”
He added: “I think co-op is a huge distinguishing factor. Unless they [Rockstar] are really holding something [back about Grand Theft Auto 4], I don’t think they are. I think that’s a big step, a plus for us. We also remember that Saints Row 1 was the first one to do competitive multi play – we’re going to continue to blow that out as well.” Adding that fans shouldn’t expect “your typical deathmatch!”
He closed off on the subject by saying: “We’re not releasing finite details on that (online multiplayer) yet, What we are saying is that [the original] Saints Row showed us where we needed to go and we’re going in that direction. Successful competitive multi play is taking elements of the single-player and applying them to the competitive multiplayer. For us that means elements like activities and missions, ambient systems, so that’s kind of the direction we’re going. It isn’t your typical deathmatch, put it that way!”
Saints Row received positive review scores when it was released on the Xbox 360 in September 2006, and as of November 2006 had sold more than 1 million copies! This, despite many claiming it simply copied Grand Theft Auto 3 being the only next-gen game similar to that available at the time, reports Videogamer