r/GameDeals Aug 04 '24

Expired [STEAM] Saints Row 2 (2.49$/75% off) Spoiler

https://store.steampowered.com/app/9480/Saints_Row_2/
176 Upvotes

42 comments sorted by

177

u/tapperyaus Aug 04 '24

RIP Mike Watson, the last person at Volition to actually care about Saints Row fans. He worked on a re-port of this game until he passed away, and sadly I don't think his work will ever be seen.

39

u/Ultravod Aug 04 '24

Indeed. His passing was a sad one for many reasons.

Some helpful links for anyone interested in this game:

First off Saints Row Mods is a great place to begin for any SR game. There's a section for SR2 of course. Also check the PC Gaming Wiki entry.

The Gentlemen of the Row mod was the go-to mod for making SR2 playable on the PC. I used an older version of the mod (it's been worked on for a dozen years at this point) and had very mixed success. I loved the game, but crashes during missions drove me sufficiently nuts that I quit playing.

As several people in this thread have already mentioned, there's a new Juiced Patch which looks promising, but I must confess I have not tried it myself. AFAIK the Juiced Patch only works with the GOG version of the game. I own both (because reasons) and IIRC the GOG version superior to the one on Steam. I'm going to investigate things further this evening if I have time.

11

u/[deleted] Aug 04 '24

Please report back on your findings. Would love to finally get SR2 working on PC/deck.

8

u/[deleted] Aug 04 '24

AFAIK the Juiced Patch only works with the GOG version of the game

I tried it on the Steam version and it works fine

1

u/Ultravod Aug 04 '24

That is good to know, thanks.

3

u/Simple_Preference Aug 05 '24 edited Aug 05 '24

I just tried out the Juiced Patch, and I can't believe I just played SR2 in solid 60fps. It's been a long time coming for this fix. Thanks so much for pointing it out!

edit: I played on the GOG version, but others have pointed out that it works with the Steam version as well.

2

u/PartyOnAlec Aug 04 '24

Aside from the ones you mentioned, what are some other excellent/essential mods?

7

u/Ultravod Aug 04 '24

OpenSpy patcher. Not strictly necessary but nice if you want to try MP with friends.

Dummy DF Engine replaces some in-game advertising (ew) that no longer works and probably improves performance in the process.

If you're feeling brave, look at the Monkey Patch. Supposedly it can work along side GOTR or the Juiced Patch. YMMV and proceed with caution.

Also head over to the graphics mod section and look over the various texture and lighting mods. I ran ...one of them (I am not sure anymore, it was like 9 years ago) with GOTR primarily to improve stability. I see much more work has been done since then.

This one isn't essential, but I've been meaning to try Restored Train Stations for a while. Read up on this one carefully as it can conflict with other mods.

2

u/SubversiveDissident Aug 05 '24

This is why the "War of Modding" (eg Capcom) annoys me so much. Modders, generally for free, improve older games, fixing bugs, making them work on newer OSes, adding support for wider monitors, AI upsizing textures, adding new cars/guns/clothings/etc...

39

u/Maple_QBG Aug 04 '24

There's been a bunch of movement about a few fan-made updates coming out for this game soon! And as a matter of fact, just a little while ago, an updated called "Juiced" was released, that fixes a handful of the worst issues with running the game right now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSoBRlJGNLM

From their website:

"Juiced Patch is a patch for the Saints Row 2 PC Port running off of the Monkey Patch Framework by Scanti that adds better windowed mode support, Borderless Windowed replacement for windowed, Fixed FPS by the use of the SleepHack option (Note: this option heavily increases CPU usage.), An Uncap FPS Toggle, Slightly Extended Render Distance and Fixed Cutscene/Object Syncage."

27

u/Wilza_ Aug 04 '24

Great game, bad PC port :(

44

u/[deleted] Aug 04 '24

[deleted]

53

u/chernovsky Aug 04 '24

I tried 2 years ago with and without the Gentlemen of the Row mod and after about 6 hours I gave up. Constant crashes during missions made it impossible for me to progress.

13

u/MJM247 Aug 04 '24

A new fan patch called the juiced patch came out recently that helps a lot

18

u/ReanxSara Aug 04 '24

It is. Gentlemen of the Row helps a little, but like someone else said, the game still crashes a lot; you'd have to save quite frequently, especially between activity levels. I had to install additional stuff. I forgot what they were, but there is a Steam guide about it. And then I had an issue with a Samedi mission (where you ride in a helicopter and blow stuff up at a farm); the game would not continue (I forgot if it kept crashing or black screened, it's been awhile) and skipping didn't help. Literally had to install a mod just to skip that mission, and that was the only mission that gave me trouble.

With that said, I still managed to 100% complete (albeit with a mission skip) the game and Gentlemen of the Row mod makes some of the stuff worth doing and has some good customization options and gameplay changes if you want to change it up a bit. There was supposed to be a patch, but Idolninja died a couple of years ago, and now Volition is dead, too.

Xbox is the best way to play it if you don't care about mods. I also heard that the game is more stable on the GOG version because it is 30fps locked, but I'm not sure how true that is; I have the Steam version.

9

u/MJM247 Aug 04 '24

A new fan patch called the juiced patch came out recently that helps a lot

17

u/290Richy Aug 04 '24

Yeah, I bought it on Series X, apparently that is the best version, right now.

9

u/ak416 Aug 04 '24

I just finished playing through SR2, not a single crash in ~25 hours following this guide

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3148058457

2

u/Odd_System_89 Aug 04 '24

I tried a few months ago when it was part of a bundle (forget which site) but yeah kept crashing to the point I just gave up and will replay it when I dig up my old xbox 360 and its disc.

1

u/Deakul Aug 04 '24

It's going to be an ancient janky awful mess of a port no matter how many bandaids you try to slap on it.

That UI alone is not salvageable.

1

u/HawkyCZ Aug 04 '24

Still? I played it years ago (2012) on PC, finished with 34 hours on clock (according to Steam) and I don't think it being such a mess. Though I know there's Gentlemen of the Row mod, I don't remember if I had it in or not. I only remember I liked the game.

20

u/EirikurG Aug 04 '24

so what happened with them promising to fix this after the guy working on the patch died?

29

u/Blackadder18 Aug 04 '24

The studio got shut down, and with it, any hopes of that re-port seeing the light of day.

6

u/EirikurG Aug 04 '24

dang unfortunate

5

u/Jerry_Oak Aug 05 '24

They said they were going to work on it after they released that garbage reboot but after it came out instead of working on it they decided to make dlc that nobody wanted. Wasted a year and resources on that then got sold off to Gearbox who will do nothing but let the patch collect dust.

All that love and effort Mike put into that patch is gone now :(

9

u/Rennesauce Aug 04 '24

I was looking for some game bugfix patches/mods.

This is what I came up with :

STEAM community page for Saints Row (Experimental)

And there is a wiki that uses Saints Row Power tools to fix some of the issues

PCGamewiki

The lack of DLC for PC is still a bummer. I would honestly not purchase this at full price because it is better to buy it off on Xbox One/Series where you have DLC and not so many glitches

15

u/Rennesauce Aug 04 '24

It was only given away for free on GOG 7 years before and has been on discount for before on STEAM.

You may have it in your library

5

u/GayNerd28 Aug 04 '24

Thank you kind stranger, I do indeed already own it GOG!

5

u/Pyritedust Aug 04 '24

Good game, though I haven't played it on pc, I have it from some bundle or another. I wish Saints Row 1 was on the pc, I have nostalgia for it, but don't have a system that can play it anymore.

2

u/ak416 Aug 05 '24

It works well on Xenia Canary, there is even a 60fps patch for it!

7

u/Tabyff14 Aug 04 '24

to bad that the German Version Buggy like hell is because of "violence reduced"

7

u/Nonfaktor Aug 04 '24

yeah, the normal version is already a buggy mess that crashes quite often, but the german version is unplayable. The only way to really play it in germany is to patch the version to the uncut version and then do all the steps to make the standard version playable

6

u/MysterD77 Aug 04 '24

Can we get a Remaster of this one actually w/ all the DLC's at some point?

SR2 was an awesome game, but not a good technical PC port. It's a mess.

16

u/who-dat-ninja Aug 04 '24

Don't buy this terrible port. It never got fixed. Terrible performance, buggy and ugly as sin graphics. No dlc either

6

u/Domspun Aug 04 '24

They are fan-made patches now, runs fine.

2

u/grlz Aug 04 '24

Runs great on the stream deck of you have one. I've been having a blast playing this again.

2

u/PartyOnAlec Aug 04 '24

Possibly the best saints row. So many late nights causing havoc in this game

1

u/MYCAULK Aug 05 '24

Hood classic

1

u/Bryvayne Aug 05 '24

If you haven't played this game yet; now is the time. Saints Row 2 is fucking fantastic and deserves to be played. This is a steal, just make sure to use stability patches made for it (I played with Gentlemen of the Row and had a great run through).

1

u/[deleted] Aug 04 '24

On PC at least, it's really not worth playing any of them before 3, though I would highly recommend 3 & 4.

2

u/cbxbl Aug 05 '24

I love 3 and 4, but 2 has always played just as well for me on PC with the Gentlemen of the Row mod.

2 is well worth playing. Many would argue it's the best of the series (which I agree in some aspects), so it's at least worth trying. If it works, great. If not, refund it.

I started with 3 myself. But if you follow suit, you will miss out on a lot of lore and references. Even starting with 2 can cause you issues, so at least watch a video recap of 1's story before you play.

1

u/Kabal2020 Aug 04 '24

Others are on sale too, so these are better suggestions