Saints Row: The Third — The Trouble With Clones DLC Review

After the release of Saints Row: The Third last year, Volition promised buyers a continuous supply of DLC. A majority of this add-on content came in the form of new costumes, weapons and vehicles. However, the pieces of downloadable content that many longed for were the three planned mission packs that were announced shortly after the game’s debut. As of today, the third and final mission pack has been released. With the last two story add-ons receiving less-than-favorable scores, can The Trouble With Clones break the cycle and provide players with a wacky experience worth purchasing?

HOT

A True Saints Story

GenkiBowl VII and Gangstas in Space suffered from several issues, but one of the major problems with each is that, although they captured the insane attitude of Saints Row, neither one included familiar Saints faces. For this reason, both DLC packs never truly felt like an extension of the story, which is what we were promised. Depending on the ending players went with, certain members may not have survived, but there were still those that lived no matter what. Luckily, Volition threw in two very memorable faces in The Trouble With Clones to make it feel like a real Saints experience. Loyal follower Pierce and Johnny Gat (not as you remember him) are back. *SPOILERS AHEAD* After Johnny Gat was killed(?) on the plane by the Morning Star at the start of the game, the Saints were missing a huge part of themselves. Thanks to the nerdy Gat-obsessed fan Jimmy Torbitson, Johnny Gat has been cloned, but the result was disastrous. Johnny Gat has taken on a form much like the Brute enemies found in the game and now he is running around terrorizing Steelport. The Saints leader and Pierce head out to find their old friend. This leads to a few wacky missions that sports the signature Saints Row vibe. Although the campaign is extremely short, the missions actually add on to the main campaign’s story, unlike the past two DLC offerings.

Additions to the Arsenal

The Trouble With Clones introduces some interesting new ways to dispatch enemies. In the second mission, Jimmy hands the player a weapon custom-tailored for crowd control. Upon fully charging the weapon, it fires a swarm of distracting and pesky bees. The only thing better than the bee gun are the powers that come with the irradiated Saints Flow. At the beginning of the third mission, your character consumes a specially-formulated can of Saints Row which endows him/her with super powers. Remember the beginning of the game where the Saints Flow commercial aired and showed Pierce perform a move similar to a hadouken? During this mission, the leader of the Saints can launch those explosive fireballs as well as run at superhuman speeds. Your character becomes an unstoppable, lightning-fast tank that can dish out unrivaled amounts of damage and destruction. It is extremely satisfying to sprint through a police car, blow up a humvee by simply punching it (more damage than the Apoca-Fists bare-handed) or firing the purple ball of energy at helicopter overhead. It’s too bad that these weapons don’t transfer into the main game once you’ve completed the DLC.

NOT

Content Restrictions

Those wonderful superpowers and the odd bee gun don’t make their way into Steelport after the DLC has been finished. The only pieces of the DLC that you’ll see after beating it are two new homies and a truck with a huge horn on top. Volition missed out on a huge opportunity here. Running around at break-neck speeds while firing Saints Flow-charged balls of death at rival gangs or friends online would have been hilariously entertaining, but that is only a dream now. The problem has to do with memory. Volition stated that they simply ran out of space to fit more weapons. If that’s the case, then they should have thought of that before filling the game with pointless weapons like the Bling Shotgun (a variant of a shotgun already found in-game). To think that pointless additions like that beat out the Saints Flow fireball is very disappointing. Another reason this is terribly depressing is that each of these unique and fun weapons are only introduced for one mission each. The bee gun is only available in mission two and the Saints Flow powers appear in mission three. Just when you start enjoying them, they’re gone.

Extremely Short Campaign

Just like the other two downloadable mission entries, The Trouble With Clones clocks in at under an hour of game time. The content is made up of three missions and they’re even shorter than the ones found in Gangstas in Space. The themes for each mission are as follows: locate, contain and protect. The premise of the campaign is exciting, but the execution is sloppy. This is the return of Johnny Gat (sorta). He’s been a part of the Saints since the first game. Volition should have spent more time crafting a longer experience that details the return of their iconic character. Instead, we’re left with a half-baked story that is crunched into three short missions.

Overpriced

The Trouble With Clones costs $6.99 or 560 MSP. That would be an acceptable price tag for most DLC, but with this one coming in at well under an hour, it’s just too much to ask for. It should be $2.99 at most because this isn’t really the mission pack many had believed/hoped it would be when Volition first announced the campaign add-ons. It is a short-lived distraction that is over all too soon. Chances are if you were disappointed by the length and amount of content in GenkiBowl VII and Gangstas in Space, then you’ll feel the same this time around.

Verdict

Saints Row: The Third has received its final mission pack and it is, unsurprisingly, a letdown. While the story is more rooted in the Saints Row: The Third campaign than past DLC, it is still underwhelming due to its short length and lackluster content. Although being a super Saint is fun, it doesn’t last nearly long enough. That wouldn’t be an issue if the latest additions carried over to the main game, but as I have already stated, Volition couldn’t make that happen with current space restrictions, or so they claim. The Trouble With Clones will only be purchased by those looking for one last go at Saints Row: The Third before shelving the title, assuming no more DLC is in the works. It definitely isn’t worth $7 and Season Pass owners should feel cheated seeing the paltry offering all three mission packs provided. Johnny Gat’s return should have been glorious, but instead it acts as a poor final entry in a disappointing DLC trilogy.

[Editor’s Note: The Trouble With Clones was reviewed on the Playstation 3 platform. The DLC was provided to us by the publisher for review purposes.]