Saints Row: The Third

Saints Row: The Third is an open world action-adventure game played on Backseat Gaming and featured on Why We're Single.

Game Information
Saints Row: The Third is a 2011 open world action-adventure game developed by Volition and published by THQ. It is the third title in the Saints Row series. As in the previous games, the player-character leads the Third Streets Saints gang in a turf war against three rival gangs using a variety of weapons and vehicles in single-player and co-op play.

The game received generally favorable reviews. Reviewers noted its general zaniness and praised its customization options. Critics thought the setting was insipid and that its humor occasionally fell flat, and others thought the game perfected the Saints Row formula. It was a nominee for Best Narrative at the 2012 Game Developers Conference, an IGN Editor's Choice, and a recipient of perfect scores from GamesRadar and G4. A complete edition including the three DLC packs was released a year after the original release, and its planned Enter the Dominatrix expansion became the game's sequel, Saints Row IV.

Setting
Similar to the premise of the previous games, the player's goal is to lead the Third Street Saints gang to overtake its rival gangs in the city turf war. While the protagonist is the same, the game introduces a new setting, the city of Steelport, with its new gangs: the Morningstar, Luchadores, and Deckers, together known as the Syndicate. Once The Syndicate is defeated, the government's Special Tactical Anti-Gang unit (STAG) is summoned to quell the Saints. The Third is the first in the series to intertwine the narratives of its three-gang structures, and also presents the player with story-altering decisions.

Gameplay
Saints Row: The Third is a third-person open world action-adventure game. In combat, players select weapons from a weapon selection wheel, including regular pistols, submachine guns, shotguns, and rocket launchers alongside special weapons such as UAV drones and fart-in-a-jar stun grenades. Melee attacks include running attacks such as DDTs and a purple dildo bat called the Penetrator. Players may use vehicles to navigate the city, including a hover jet (called the F-69 VTOL) and a pixelated retro game tank, which are unlocked through story missions. Once special vehicles are unlocked, they are in unlimited supply and can be delivered directly to the player-character's location. Player actions are intensified with awesome button, where for example the player will divekick through the windshield into the driver's seat of a car. The main story campaign missions can be played alone, or cooperatively either online or via System Link offline. Some elements are added to the campaign for the second player. There is no competitive multiplayer, but a "wave-based survival mode" called Whored Mode that supports up to two players.

Players customize their characters after the introductory mission. Bodies, dress, and vehicles can be customized, as well as home properties. Apart from the main story missions, there are optional diversions to make money and earn reputation, such as Insurance Fraud, where players hurt themselves in traffic to maximize self-injury before a timer expires, or Mayhem, where players maximize property destruction before a timer expires. Activities serve the plot and are positioned as training the player or damaging the Syndicate. Players are free to make their own fun by purchasing property, shopping for items, finding hidden sex doll and money cache collectibles, and wreaking unsolicited havoc. There are also "flashpoint" gang operations that grant respect when disrupted. Attacking others increases the player's notoriety level, as depicted with stars.

Saints Row: The Third introduced experience levels and weapon upgrades to the series. Most actions in the game come with incentives in the form of money and respect (reputation). Money buys land, weapons, and other upgrades, and respect is a kind of experience point that can unlock player abilities like "no damage from falling" or "infinite sprint", as well as upgrades to the player's CPU gang member support. In turn, players receive further incentive to nearly miss car collisions, streak naked through the streets, shoot others in the groin, blow up Smart cars, and kill mascots in ambient challenges to earn more respect. Lack of respect does not hinder story progress, as it has in previous games. Progress and unlocks are managed by an in-game cell phone menu that also lets the player call for vehicle deliveries and NPC backup.

DLC
For more information, see the list of all DLC on the Saints Row Wiki.