Saints Row The Third pushes the formula into full delirium with Steelport, wild gadgets and humour that owns pop culture like never before. The pacing is frantic, co-op hilarious, and the franchise hits its perfect balance between parody and tight action.
Your verdict
Category
Action Adventure1 player18+
Description
Open-world action by Volition and THQ, November 2011. The Saints Boss takes Steelport with his gang in a delirious war against the Syndicate and various criminal groups. Unbridled absurd humour, crazy activities like Insurance Fraud, total character and gang customisation. Saints Row The Third abandons realism for a completely crazy sandbox.
Saints Row - The Third review
4/5
Art direction
★★★★★
"Striking"
4/5
Music
★★★★★
"Excellent"
4/5
Story
★★★★★
"Captivating"
Steelport abandons all plausibility: purple neon on the skyscrapers, giant gang statues planted in mid-street, opponents in Mexican wrestling outfits or bluish digital bodysuits. The weapons follow suit, from the inflatable fist to the shark cannon, and the whole city seems designed as a show set rather than a habitable place.
The game builds its set pieces around a song chosen in advance: a parachute assault to a German rock track of the eighties, a costumed escapade to a pop hit of the decade, the music arriving before the action to announce its register. This staging by hit single, borrowed from action cinema, here replaces any original score.
The Saints are no longer a gang but a brand: action figures in their likeness, an energy drink, a film in development, and it is precisely that fame that attracts an international criminal syndicate. The story draws from this an unexpected comment on the commercial co-opting of a rebellion, while owning a chain of situations each trying to outdo the last in absurdity.
Gameplay
"Excellent"
Fun
"From the very first seconds"
Excess taken to its peak: impossible stunts, absurd weapons and missions each crazier than the last in an open city devoted to chaos. The over-the-top humour and total freedom turn every joyride into a gleeful festival of nonsense. Snappy, generous and hilarious, an open-world that fully embraces its madness and guarantees unbridled fun, especially two-player.
North American (NTSC-U) edition of Saints Row The Third, a Volition open-world action game that fully embraces its excess and humor, marking the series' deliberately over-the-top turn. Very widespread, its collector interest is modest, its desirability resting on its uninhibited tone and a lasting demand rather than scarcity. An accessible piece for an action set on the console, valued by fans of unwinding mayhem.
A questionable morality
Running a gang that becomes a commercial brand and then frankly presidential lets you get away with just about anything: heists, deranged urban destruction and weapons each more absurd than the last. The tongue-in-cheek tone is so heavy that you quickly forget the lengthening rap sheet, savoring this grand criminal playground as an avowed parody rather than a thug's handbook.
Is Saints Row - The Third still worth playing in 2026?
Released in 2011 on Xbox 360, Volition's Saints Row The Third fully embraces its madness by turning the criminal sandbox into an unhinged, over the top playground where the ridiculous is never a limit. Charging in a tank, fighting with a giant dildo or skydiving from a plane delivers an immediate, hilarious pleasure. The driving and nervy shooting sustain a frantic pace. Seriousness and coherence are not the point here. But the pure catharsis is gleeful, especially in co op. For fans of unbuttoned sandboxes and absurd humour, this title keeps a strong appeal today.
