GAMINGtruth

The inevitable has finally come - Saint’s Row has recieved the patch that makes multiplayer worth the price of admission. Anyone who’s played the otherwise great GTA-like game has come to enjoy the single-player portion… while simultaneously hating the online gameplay more than the heat of a thousand suns.

What does this mean? The online portion of the game should be playable. Here’s the best info about the updates:

General

• Enabled 4xAA anti-aliasing for 480i standard-def and 480p resolutions was 2xAA.
• Enabled 4x anti-aliasing during initial player creation screen.
• Added player options to enable v-sync during cutscenes and/or gameplay, with warning that it will affect framerate.
• Fixed widescreen formatting issues in certain resolutions.
• Fixed issue where button icons would sometimes not appear during tagging activity.
• Fixed problem where camera could rapidly rotate around player when exiting vehicle.
• Added dialog reminding player to save before final mission in the game.
• Fixed rare crash bugs due to variants and fast shader constants.
• DLC - Car dealership now skips paint selection for car if the car has no color data.
• Fixed issue when signing out of a gamer profile on The Wheel Woman unlock screen.
• Added missing audio tracks to music stores, including “Pickin’ Boogers.”
• Added long sideburns and four other missing hairstyles to Shear Intensity salons.

Multiplayer

• Improvements to the way the game handles packet loss and bandwidth management between players. This addresses issues commonly cited as “lag”, and general synchronization problems between the players’ clients vehicles/players warping around, etc.
• Various bandwidth optimizations.
• Fixed connection issues with gang servers done server-side, update not required.
• The system for rating a player’s quality-of-service has been improved, and made less conservative. This means you’ll see many more matches with 10-12 player limits.
• Fixed “clothes stealing” exploit. Stolen clothes will be deleted, legit clothes will be unharmed.
• Various changes to Matchmaking phase, to get players in the game faster.

With that much updated, I have no qualms with placing Saint’s Row in the “Must-Own” category. It sure took the update long enough though… I haven’t played it in close to a month due to newer online games hitting stores.

I shudder to consider what’ll happen to online shooters (and my wallet, of course) when the Gears of War / Rainbow Six: Vegas combo hits within the next three weeks…

Saints Row Title Update on Xbox Live [via Saint's Row Developers!]