Volition revived the Saints Row franchise in 2022, launching a reboot that was intended to reset the series and propel it to new heights. That didn't happen, and now a new report has claimed the developers working on the game didn't want to reboot the series. They wanted to continue it with the original characters and make up for past mistakes in the process.

That's according to an in-depth video created by mrsaintsgodzilla21 (thanks, SynthPotato). The YouTuber paid a visit to Saints Row studio Volition in 2019, three years before the launch of the reboot that has likely killed the series. They claim that, back then, the devs were working on a very different game from the one that was eventually released.

Saints Row's Reboot Was Never Supposed To Be A Reboot At All

In fact, it sounds as if between that visit and Saints Row's release three years later, the Volition team was effectively told to start over by executives. According to the video, the game shown in 2019 was dubbed Saints Row Cinco, and it was a sequel to the original games, not a reboot. Not only that, but it would have directly followed on from the events of Saints Row: The Third, erasing the events of Saints Row 4 in the process.

There were also plans to handle Johnny Gat's "death" more creatively than revealing he was alive all along and had just been abducted by aliens.

Development for the original vision of Saints Row 5 was so far along that Pierce's actor had recorded new lines. That voice work ultimately went unused as Pierce never returned. The changes were brought about after THQ Nordic acquired Deep Silver, which, according to the report, led to Volition's new bosses rejecting the idea of a direct sequel and ordering the team to start over.

Volition then presented a full Saints Row reboot to THQ Nordic that retained the series' original cast, but again, that pitch was rejected. The report includes information on various cut features that likely would have helped prevent the reboot from becoming such a big flop that it led to Volition's closure. Criminal Ventures, which would have allowed you to customize the city, crib customization, and body shields, which were apparently deemed too violent by THQ Nordic so wound up being left on Volition's cutting room floor.

The poor performance of 2022's Saints Row reboot, combined with Embracer's financial issues, led to Volition shutting down a year later after three decades of game development. With the studio behind the series now dead, the original vision for Saints Row 5 will almost certainly come to fruition.

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Saints Row 2022

Open-World Action-Adventure Third-Person Shooter Adventure Systems OpenCritic Reviews Top Critic Avg: 63/100 Critics Rec: 37% Released February 25, 2022 ESRB r Developer(s) Volition Publisher(s) Deep Silver Engine proprietary engine Multiplayer Online Multiplayer, Local Multiplayer
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