Prerelease:Saints Row

This page details prerelease information and/or media for Saints Row.

This article is a work in progress. ...Well, all the articles here are, in a way. But this one moreso, and the article may contain incomplete information and editor's notes.

To do: A ton of things. More of this [in the GDC 2015 one! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL5x0dOujQY] X05 event footage Developer Diaries. https://ubm-twvideo01.s3.amazonaws.com/o1/vault/gdc07/slides/S3741i1.pdf April 2006 interview, even though the link is dead. This interview from September 2005 [1] Post these. Behind the scenes video

Saints Row was an extremely ambitious title for Volition Games' spin on the usual Grand Theft Auto clones of the mid-2000s, whereas they wanted to redefine the open-world genre by giving the player a new sense of freewill in terms of environmental interaction and customization. It was also an extremely tough challenge for the team themselves due to not creating such a feat like this before.

Despite the developmental team's concern of Saints Row not doing well, the game ended up being a success, which also played a major part on making Volition grow as a company and allowing development of the sequel.

Development Timeline

2003

• Spring - Development on the game starts, beginning Phase 1.

2004

2005

• Spring - Stilwater, the city's setting begins to be built.
• May 18-20 - The game is shown off at E3 2005, as a "launch window" title for the Xbox 360.
• Sep. 9 - Select journalists were invited to see more gameplay of Saints Row at Gamer's Day 2005 event, and the game was said to be "50% complete"
• Oct. 7 - A slightly later build of the game was shown off at X05 event in Amsterdam, including some new features.
• ??? - The game is announced for a March 2006 release.
• Nov. 25 - The Xbox 360 is released.

2006

• Feb. 7? - The game is delayed to August.
• Mar. 22 - More footage of Saints Row was shown off at GDC 2006.
• Apr. 12 - Volition Inc. announces a coming demo of Saints Row.
• May 10 - The game is shown off again at E3 2006.
• Jun. - Late build gameplay.
• Jun. 23 - The demo of Saints Row is announced for a release on August 1.
• Aug. 1 - The demo of Saints Row was released, containing a few differences from the final game.
• Aug. 29 - Saints Row is released in North America.

Phases

• Phase 1 - Spring 2003
• Phase 2 - Late 2003?
• Phase 3 - April 2004 (The Bling Bling video)
• Phase 4 - June 2004
• Phase 5 - November 2004
• Phase 6 - 2005
• Phase 7 - Early 2006?
• Phase 8 - Mid 2006?
• Phase 9 - Late 2006?

2003

Early Development

Saints Row started development on the PlayStation 2 as Bling Bling in early 2003, which was Volition's first foray into the open-world genre.

One of the earliest goals in development was to give the player a bigger sense of freedom in the open world by creating different story missions based around activities as the core towards progressing the game, rather than just restricting the player to a singular storyline. They wanted to implement a reward system the player usually does in freeroam, so it could count as progress. The idea was rather tricky to balance with the two, but three separate stories were decided on in the end so the player can do them in any order they wish.

It started at a time when hip-hop culture was just starting to gain popularity, but they hoped that the game would sell while that trend started to rise over the coming years. They did some research by taking inspiration from fashion magazines while they also took note from underground rap artists in terms of picking music for the game. Instead of designing a serious gritty crime setting, they decided to look at it in a satirical edge, using hip-hop music videos as a source of influence.

The Third Street Saints originally wore green, before it would be eventually changed to purple. Contrary to popular belief, the change in the Third Street Saints' gang colors was decided before Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas was announced. Likely to avoid any forced comparisons, it would eventually be changed late in development.

Concept Art

The very first pieces of conceptual art were drawn for some main characters, where it appeared in a slight comical style as opposed to a realistic look.

2004

April

Bling Bling: Jackass

To do: Cut the video into the Bling Bling part?

On the 10th Anniversary livestream, a VERY early build of Saints Row when it was still being developed on the PlayStation 2 was shown. It was created around April 2004, which was near the end of Phase 3.

• The minimap was different it was square-shaped rather than circular, with a very basic outline of the map and green star circles representing objects.
• The psychics were a lot more bouncy and basic, where the player could allow themselves to fall like a ragdoll. It would accidentally end up being the basis of the Insurance Fraud Activity.
• The health bar was at the top-right corner.
• Weapons were represented with text rather than icons.
• All pedestrians had the same model, which is notable with the baggy jeans.
• There was a text prompt for whether the player managed to pick up a weapon, using the basic Lucida Sans Unicode font.
• The map was rather basic in this stage of development, where a few of the assets would make it into the final game.
• Rim Jobs were originally called the "Stop and Chop".
• There was originally a model for a subway link, which ended up being cut.
• The Five-O looked almost exactly the same, save for some missing badge details on the grille.
• The Mule also looked exactly the same, and made it's way into the final game without any major cosmetic changes.
• A cut red car can be seen.

Summer-Fall

Move to Xbox 360

Development was moved to the Xbox 360, because they wanted a more powerful system for creating an open world. The team wanted to further emphasize the open world freedom by not having to make the player wait at loading screens when coming and entering districts or buildings like in some of the 3D Universe Grand Theft Auto games.

The upgrade to a next-generation console proved to be a small burden for Volition, because the system had technology that hadn't been fully taken advantage of at that time especially for a small development team. Despite that, the transition was smooth and Microsoft helped Volition by giving them the necessary tools for further development.

Vertical Slice

A newer map, with more detail was used for Phase 5 of development, where it apparently focused on combat and missions. It was shown off at the Game Developer's Conference 2015.

• At the beginning, a tow truck can be seen which was obivously cut from the final and would later reappear in Saints Row 2.
• There was basic red graphics that likely represented blood when people got ran over.
• The gunfires were a lot more drastic and had flashing effects, which was likely removed to reduce lag, and would not blend in with the realistic style.
• The rival gang pedestrians all used the same model with minor alterations.
• The voice clips for pedestrians getting shot were also different and were obviously placeholder.
• The Lucida Sans Unicode font from the Phase 3 build makes its final appearance here.
• The notice now correctly says "You picked up (sic) baseball bat" rather than the weapon's internal name.
• The blood particles on the player were red circles rather than realistic droplet triangles.

2005

Creating Stilwater

Stilwater was developed around Phase 6, which began in early 2005. It designed before the story was created, where the districts were initially decided before they went on to be created. One of the key inspirations of the city were of cities like Chicago and Detroit, notably for the latter so it can have a run-down feeling. However, creating the city wasn't that of an easy task for Volition because they never created anything this big before.

When Stilwater was created in the game's engine, the team thought it was too small so they quadrupled the size. It would end up being too big for the team to build a city that large, so it was scaled back down to its original resolution. They eventually started working on the buildings and road layouts after the estimated size was decided on, where it would go through many different layout changes due to balancing the activities and story missions in several areas.

Concept Art

The first conceptual art of Stilwater's skyline, looking different.	A slightly later piece, resembling more of the Downtown seen in the final.

Two paintings of the cityscape of Stilwater were painted to get a rough idea of what the skyline would look like. Interestingly, two of these can be found as painting textures in the final game as an easter egg.

Initial Map Draft

Initial Map Draft	Artist's Render

When the map draft was put together, it was initially a bit bigger in comparison to the final. Some of them would eventually appear in Saints Row 2, in new locations;

• Though a trailer park isn't present in the final game, it was downgraded to a singular trailer where it is used for the Westside Rollerz Snatch Activity.
• Around the area of the mall's initial location is a small shopping district, where it may have been a leftover of the original plan.
• The junkyard and train station doesn't appear in the final. The latter was likely reworked into the King Plaza Station, found in Downtown district in Saints Row 2.

The map was later drawn out by an artist, showing a rough layout of what the city would be like.

• There was a wide river area on the top left of the map, which doesn't appear in the final.

Spring

Stilwater Elevation

In the GDC 2007 presentation, some images from a Pre-E3 2005 build can be seen where it has a lot of differences;

• Many of the buildings appear to be unfinished and untextured, while some of them don't even make an appearance in the final.
• Stilwater had a lot of elevated ramps, many of which weren't present in the final.
• The circular minimap was completely different;
  • It was simpler in design, where it was somewhat reminiscent of the one in Saints Row: The Third.
  • The red swirls likely represented gunshots.
  • Gang or Police Noriety was represented at the top right, in the form of either a skull or a star respectively.
  • Icons for shops didn't have diamond borders.
• The numbers above the weapon HUD likely represented increasing respect.
• There was a yellow "R" on the top left side of the HUD, which may have counted respect.
• Some of the vehicles received minor changes;
  • The Bootlegger had a different bumper design.

May

E3 2005 Trailer

A trailer was released that shows off the general feeling of what the gameplay might be like. Though the trailer is fully pre-rendered CGI, it shows off part of an early map of Stilwater at the end, which looks drastically different from the final;

E3 2005	Final

• There was no highway going through the Saints Row district.
• The cut trainyard and trailer park district can be seen.
• There was originally a racetrack circuit area near the Ultor Dome. A similar place would appear in Saints Row Undercover.
• A third cut district was originally present notably near the bottom-left corner, but most of it looks overlapped.
• The highway originally had an incomplete connection to a scrapped western district.
• Chinatown and the Barrio wasn't present.
• There wasn't a park near Chinatown.
• The Factories had more occupied space.
• There was no bridge leading to Saints Row district from the Factories.
• Sommerset had the same layout, but seemed to be a bit more barren.
• Sunnyvale Gardens was incomplete and had less buildings.
• There was no sewage grates.
• The train tracks originally ended near Prawn Court rather than going into a tunnel.
• The construction site near the top of the Saints Row district wasn't there.
• There was a harbor with a freight ship instead of an abandoned foundry.

E3 2005

To do: Find a "complete" version of the demonstration video.

The game was revealed and shown off at E3 2005. It was in a rather rough state, where Microsoft ended up doubling the Ram size of the Xbox 360 for the game to run properly, even though the framerate issues were still present.

Since a ton of footage and images were shown off, only one video will be displayed on the article.

Main Changes

• The HUD has received some minor changes:
  • The Gang symbols for the Vice Kings and Westside Rollerz now display on screen rather than just one gang, even though the Los Carnales aren't present. The respect meter from the top-left screen in an earlier build was moved to there.
  • The respect numbers now uses the Compacta Black font, where the font would make it to the final game.
  • The Minimap now has a metallic grey border, along with a grey map rather than a satellite view in the final.
• The Text font for mission objectives were placed at the right side, using a lowercase Compacta Black font.
• There were no foot or hand symbols that represented open-able doors.
• There is a cut radio station called 101.5 WPMP, which played songs which aren't found in the final game.
• The Vice Kings gang symbol was different.
  • It is worth noting that the songs likely didn't make it to the final game because they were too expensive to license.
• The mission is of a Stronghold which was likely retooled as Aisha's Favor.
• The mission accomplished screen for completing a Stronghold wasn't there.

Location Differences

• The majority of the gameplay in this build takes place around Rebadeaux and Prawn Court, which look drastically different other than the layout.
• There was originally a Sloppy Seconds store located there, but it was changed to an On The Rag store.
• There were notably a lot of elevated areas which were not present in the final.
• The interior of Sloppy Seconds looks almost the same.
• The place for the mission in the build remains unchanged (which would be the Raykins Hotel), except that there are red banners present.

Vehicle Differences

• Cars had no unique names when entering them.
• Some of the cars looked different:
  • The Compton had a slightly different grille.
  • The Hammerhead had a different-looking trunk.
  • The Fer de Lance looked almost exactly the same, save for a changed detail on the front of the trunk.
  • The Mockingbird had different rear lights and side windows, and didn't have a badge at the grille of the vehicle.

• The Fer de Lance could be found on the road or summoned when a Homie is called. In the final game, it is bought exclusively from Foreign Power instead.
• It seems that license plates couldn't be knocked off of cars when they get damaged in some way.

June

Post-E3

After the game was shown off at E3 2005, the team needed a more realistic approach to how the Xbox 360 was going to support the game after they had mixed results surrounding the expensive RAM usage and unstable framerate. The environment artists checked through every building in each districts they have completed thus far, which were of 400 blocks in three days. Their target towards completing the general basis of the city was January of 2006, but it was estimated to a rather lengthy completion date of January 2007.

As of a result, Stilwater had to be downgraded in terms of size and unique buildings, along with "flattening" some of the ramped hills that were once present. Much of the environmental work also had to be outsourced more in terms of interiors, while the primary interior work was moved towards creating exterior ground creation. The team had also increased in size due to the immense scale of the project, eventually ramping up to over a hundred employees on the job compared to 30-40 at the beginning of development.

Summer

Later Concept Art

Characters

Johnny Gat

An earlier design for Johnny Gat, where he had a more basic design.	A slightly later design, this time with an added rougher appearance.

Exteriors

Conceptual artwork for the Saints Row Church, which is located in the middle of a park rather than in the neighborhood.

Interiors

Concept art for the Lopez Mansion, where it looked different.		Concept art for Julius' office in the church	Concept art for Dex's office in the church.

July?

Punisher 2: Sandbox Punishment Vertical Slice

Volition had originally considered a sequel to The Punisher back in 2005, where they originally used a prototype build of Saints Row for the vertical slice trailer. This trailer seems to be dated from some time after the E3 build, and when Stilwater was going through some elevation downgrades and started to take the shape of the final product.

• Rebedaeux is now starting to look close to the final.
• The JSS Shipping Co brand can be seen from the Phase 5 build.
• The takedown animations that the player could do was likely scrapped, and partially reappeared in Saints Row 2.
• Many of the character models appear to be ported from The Punisher, which can be notably be told from the detail and lighting in comparison to the generic Saints Row pedestrian models.
• The Tombstone weapon now uses its final appearance.

September

Gamer's Day

Volition invited several gaming companies over to their offices to check out a special build of Saints Row for preview purposes. This is also the point where Volition said that the game was "about 50% complete".

https://www.ign.com/videos/2005/09/12/saints-row-xbox-360-gameplay-gameplay-footage-no-audio

• The map appears to have been modified from the Phase 5 stage of development, likely because Stilwater was still undergoing drastic renovations.

October

X05 Event

To do: there must be more videos of this build.

The game was shown off again at the X05 event on October 2-4, featuring slightly later build. This would be the point where the game starts to overall resemble the final product.

• This footage shows the Saints' iconic purple gang color for the first time.
• Many of the textures appear to be incomplete and have less detail.
• The minimap near the police station appears to be paved over and doesn't match the road shown in the footage.
• There were a lot less streetlights.
• The song that plays in the video is featured in the final game.
• An icon of a wooden crate can be seen in the map, where it was likely an earlier icon for the Chop Shop Activity due to a later build having it located near the Westside Rollerz location for it. A Chop Shop activity does not appear in the Saints Row district and was likely moved to the Factories, likely because it wasn't associated with a rival gang.
• The minimap and respect icons now use a gauge-like design rather than a tattoo motif, closely resembling the final.
• The bus billboard advertisments were different, notably showing the Marshal Winslow campaigns.
• The Vice Kings icon now uses their final design.

Saints Row 10th Anniversary Stream Build

A build slightly later to the one shown was shown off in the first part of the Saints Row 10th Anniversary Stream, where the employees describe it as "Milestone 6 out of 9" of the game. It is later than the one shown at the X05 event.

Main Differences

• The player could originally be named. It was taken out due to it being hard to implement.
• Many of the cutscenes are completely unfinished, despite having the camera angles.
• Much of Stilwater appears to be unfinished in some parts, most notably in Nob Hill and Misty Lane.
• This build now uses the final generic menu font instead of the lowercase Compacta Black.
• The Map in the Pause Menu started to take shape of the final layout, except that the gang territory originally covered an earlier version of it.

Gameplay Differences

• Though some of the missions are playable, many of them are incomplete.
• The Homies system seem to be newly implemented at this point in development, as calling different Homies would always have the placeholder model of Lin.
• The Emergency 911 ambulance wasn't correctly implemented at this point, where a pedestrian of Lin would appear in place of a paramedic.
• This build now uses the final generic menu font instead of the lowercase Compacta Black.
• When the player enters a car, the name of the car is shown in the generic text font instead of a graphical logo on the side.
• Much of the Districts don't have names, such as Misty Lane being named "Suburbs District" in this build.
• The Waypoint feature didn't have much use and just marked the location on the map with a green "X".
• Nob Hill was originally called "Lakeview".
• The liquor store icon appears to have a square border around it, which may have been a test for the diamond-shaped icons in the final.
• Some of the cars had different names:

Early	Final
Machete	Stiletto
Beefeater	Nordberg
Snidewider	Fer De Lance

2006

January

Later 10th Anniversary Stream Build

• Missions now work properly.

February

Delay

On February 7, 2006, Saints Row was delayed all the way to August/September for polish.

April

Developer Diary trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLD66N-2zYQ

The Developer Diary shows two near-final builds of the game:

• The Minimap is glitched in some areas, meaning that it isn't fully implemented yet.

Cancelled Ports

After the massive success of Saints Row, it was planned to be ported to other consoles.

Nintendo Wii

After the game was released, a port was developed for the Nintendo Wii by Mass Media, outsourced from THQ. Little was known about the port when goneisgone blog posted few images of it, until more information would not see the light of day until April 27, 2021 where a YouTuber emailed a former employee about it and was sent footage of it along with some additional information. The port was canned five months after development due to THQ facing legal trouble from Nintendo and requested development to a halt.

Leftover footage of the port showed the game to be in an incomplete state, where many of the things had not been completely ported over yet despite looking overall the same. Curiously, there was an option to watch cutscenes on the main menu and waypoint lines on the map uses those seen in late builds.

A 2008 Destructoid interview with Volition about Saints Row on the Wii, they said that a game for the system would be "too controversial", due to the Wii Remote's ability to use melee weapons in a similar vein to Manhunt 2. Despite that, a Saints Row game for a Nintendo system would eventually be released in 2019 as Saints Row The Third: The Full Package.

PlayStation 3

In February 2007, a PlayStation 3 port of Saints Row was confirmed to be in development. More information about the port was released in the March 2007 issue of PSM magazine, where it stated that it would have new multiplayer maps and clothing which were likely implemented from the Xbox 360 DLC. It would also have other quality-of-life improvements like new pedestrians and reworked online play.

At the point of the port's near completion, it was eventually cancelled at THQ's press conference in May 2007, due to the initial poor sales of the PlayStation 3, and so that Volition could fully focus on Saints Row 2.

Resources

• The Creation of Saints Row's Open World Cityscape: Stilwater - GDC 2007
• The Secret History of Volition Inc. - GameInformer
• [2]
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsNYJZVyfVo
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL5x0dOujQY