Volition is going to fix Saints Row 2’s lousy PC port after 11 years
Volition comes with a performance update for the 11-year-old Saints Row 2, which is considered the worst PC port of all time. The game will also receive support for Steamworks, and will receive DLC packs that were previously only available on consoles.
The update was announced during the Saints Row 2 11th Anniversary stream, and should finally fix the appalling performance and crashes that plague the PC version. Gamespy will also be replaced by Steamworks, making online multiplayer in Saints Row 2 possible again. The game also gets better draw distances, improved audio quality and support for more screen resolutions. The developer will also add DLC packs that were previously only available on consoles. The new version of Saints Row 2 will be made available for free to all Steam users, but will be released under a new Steam ID. So the game will appear as a separate game in users’ Steam libraries.
Saints Row 2 came out about 11 years ago and is still regarded as one of the worst PC ports of all time. Another development studio was responsible for the port, which meant that Saints Row 2’s source code was untraceable for a long time after the bankruptcy. This made it impossible to solve the technical problems, but after a long search, the code ‘mysteriously’ resurfaced. For this, Volition contacted developers who contributed to the PC port. After eleven years, Volition can finally handle the PC version of Saints Row 2. For this, the studio has put together a two-man team, consisting of community developer Mike Watson and freelancer Thomas Jepp. It’s unclear when the update, which Watson calls a “labor-of-love,” should be released. “It’s done when it’s done.”
Saints Row 2 is kind of a crazy take on GTA and came out right after the release of the more introspective and dramatic GTA IV. While the game was clearly less successful than GTA IV, the console versions were well received by critics on Metacritic. Unfortunately, the PC variant received less praise for its woeful performance. The game requires several community-created fixes and mods to be playable. An official update is therefore more than welcome, even if it comes eleven years too late.