After the tragic fall of THQ, Deep Silver acquired the rights to the Saints Row franchise and also snagged the developers, Volition, as well, leaving many to ponder the fate of the Saints. We all knew there’d be another game, but when? Well, August, apparently.

Volition and Deep Silver have just released the announcement trailer for Saints Row IV, which will release on August 20th in North America and August 23rd in Europe on PC, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. Sorry, Wii U owners, but it won’t be coming to your console. Nor have Deep Silver announced any plans to port the game to next-gen consoles, although that is, of course, always a possibility.

As you can tell the fourth game in the franchise is very much continuing the third game’s love of incredibly insane antics, with aliens, superpowers and more making their appearance. While the first two  games in the series were certainly over-the-top, it was the third game which really took the Saints into the realms of ludicrous.  For those of you not in the know, Saints Row 4 is actually based off of a DLC pack titled Enter the Dominatrix that was originally intended for Saint’s Row 3. During development of the DLC Volition decided that it simply had too much potential and cool ideas, so they cancelled it with the intention being to add it all in to the next game, which they’ve clearly done.

The original premise for the pack was that an evil alien stuck the leader of the Saints in a virtual representation of Steelport, whereupon aforementioned leader discovered he could manipulate the world to give hum superpowers and stuff.  Saint’s Row IV is going to build on that idea, with the official press release stating:

“In Saints Row IV, the head honcho of the Saints has been elected to the Presidency of the United States. But the Saints are just getting started. Now the larger-than-life insanity of the Saints series gets a new twist with a catastrophic alien invasion, and the aliens have transported the Saints to a bizarro-Steelport simulation. Wield gargantuan superpowers and fight to free humanity from alien granddaddy Zinyak’s mental grasp. Escape the simulation that’s trapped the Saints crew, or die trying.

Saints Row IV lets players delve into an arsenal of alien weaponry and technology that will turn each Saint into an ultimate entity of destruction. Utilize out-of-this-world superpowers to fight all the way to the top. With intensified action and enhanced customization, players can use their newfound superpowers and leap over buildings, outrun the fastest sports cars, or send enemies flying with telekinesis in the greatest, most insane installment of Saints Row yet.”

I know a lot of Saints Row fans out there were unhappy with the shift in tone that the third game brought about, but I for one enjoyed it. Sure, it’s utterly insane, but in a world filled with gritty realism it was nice to be given an open world that encouraged me to simply have fun with all manner of silliness, and I still find myself going back to even to this day to enjoy the mayhem.

Role on August