The 6 craziest Saints Row IV mods: Developer Volition picks its favorites

Jeff Grubb @jeffgrubb September 13, 2013 3:00 PM

Sandbox+ mod for Saints Row IV enables players to explore just about any map in the game.

Saints Row IV is out now, and unlike some other open-world crime games that shall go unnamed, developer Volition released the game on PC and is planning to fully support that platform’s active modding community.

Volition is still working on the official mod tools for Saints Row IV, and it plans to release them soon. That delay, however, didn’t stop dedicated Saints Row fans from already releasing a handful of awesome mods.

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“Personally, I think one thing that has been particularly exciting is that the modding community was able to take information we have provided for Saints Row 3 and use it to release several mods for Saints Row IV on the launch day,” Volition studio director of programmers told GamesBeat. “This includes a mod that provides 51 additional cheats to the game.”

And PC Saints players are craving more mods. The unofficial — but Volition-approved — Saints Row Mods website reported a 30 percent increase in registrations following the release of Saints Row IV. Activity on its message boards also increased by 292 percent.

With all that in mind, we’ve gone ahead and asked Volition to help us pick the best mods so far. We’ve collected our favorites combined with Volition’s in the gallery below:

Sandbox + opens up more of the game to sandbox play. This enables players to explore the Washington D.C. and Zero Dark Thirty levels at their leisure.

It’s still a work in progress. The mod’s creator, IdolNinja, is still adding functionality, but you can install it and use it to instantly teleport to all kinds of different locations.

And yes, you can run up the side of the Washington Monument.

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Volition studio director of programmers Jeff Thompson:

“A modder named Hoeward is working on a ride-able tiger inside Saints Row IV. This is exciting as it’s adding something really unique into the game that pays homage to the tiger from Saints Row 3. Crazy over-the-top experiences like this are exactly the sort of thing we hope to continue to empower our modding community to create.”

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Developer Volition based a large part of Saints Row IV’s aesthetics on the idea that it takes place in a simulation. That computer program causes some of the virtual nonplayer characters to bug out when they get close to a rift. The Extended Rift Radius mod from IdolNinja causes those funky effects to influence a much larger part of the map. This makes it much more likely that you’ll come across some player with wonky arms or gigantic eyes.

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SaintsHUD from modder PixelMurder adds a lot of tweaks to the in-game user interface and camera system.

This module enables players to remove all hints for anyone who finds that makes the game too easy. Gamers can also use SaintsHUD to move the camera in closer so that the action looks more like Gears of War or Resident Evil 4.

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Saints Row IV supposedly enables players to turn into superheroes, but Volition limits your standard character to gliding. Modder Stormy is amping up that ability with the Fly Mod that makes it so you can glide for a much longer amount of time.

Players that use this will still feel the effects of gravity but much less so than in the standard game.

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Volition studio director of programmers Jeff Thompson:

“One mod that we are excited about is the re-introduction of hydraulics into vehicles.

Modder IdolNinja created a mod for Saints Row IV that enables players to customize their cars with hydraulics and lets players start Bouncin’! This was a feature that was much loved from Saints Row 2, and the modding community has brought it back for Saints Row IV!”

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