I sadly had to refund, the game is unplayable for me. It's technically playable sure, but it's very unpleasant, and is a much worse experience than if they fix the issues.
I really hope Volition is able to bug fix/improve pedesterians, and other in game issues. The game feels like it needs polishing, so I hope they are able to, and that the games reception doesn't harshly affect the company.
There is a skeleton here with a tonne of potential, but doesn't seem to be fleshed out. The parkour/combat/animations/city are all fantastic, but you just need more interesting things to do in it, and more in depth storytelling.
I don't think it being lighthearted is an excuse to not have an interesting story and character development, some of my favourite stories are lighthearted. And I was hoping the playable characters would talk to eachother more, there needs to be more interactions to make the world more interesting.
The ark would have been the perfect opportunity for discussions between characters, some lighthearted moments/cutscenes, or interesting interpersonal character development (including with Persephone and other npc's).
The combat seems great, but there should be more interesting things to do with it, part of what made Saints Row 4 great was the excellent missions, which were involved, had lots of character building and interesting dialogue, diverse, and generally a tonne of fun. Adding on top of that this really good combat would be exceptional.
Busywork is a terrible design idea, gamers hate busywork, especially in open worlds, the focus should be on more interesting (and fun to experience or challenge yourself with) content, that players want to do, or ways to immerse yourself and interact with the world itself.
People don't mind less content if that content is inherently fun and engaging.
What about a Roller Derby game with Daisy? Or Martial Arts? Something Involving Genki? The Gold Silver Bronze system? Something uniquely challenging and replayable?
I want to learn more about the culture and lore behind the city, but it's mostly set dressing, the worst thing about open worlds is when you have this beautiful landscape with diverse locations, but absolutely nothing to do in it, or ways to interact with it. In previous games the characters would interact with places in the city during cutscenes (and in Saints Row 2 you could participate in ambient activities to immerse yourself), stuff as simple as being able to sit really helps world building. Heck, being able to interact with Tai Chi or Yoga would be awesome.
Effort to make the world feel less empty should be a priority usually, I have being saying for months I think intelligent diverse pedestrians are super important for interesting worlds (and enemies could have ambient activities too),
I can't give much feedback on the comedy, I am sure writing is a hugely difficult task. Focusing more on higher brow/witty/intelligent humour might help (crude is fine, just... smart crude? "shrug"). Or taking inspiration from The Stanley Parable/Tales From The Borderlands/Dr Langeskov/Accounting/Undertale.
Saints Row 4 had the best humour for Volition in my opinion. GOTH and 3 felt a little forced.
It's awesome that every character has dialogue for every mission, but if they don't have unique interactions with npc's, don't reveal interesting info, or have great moments/dialogue? What's the point? Why have all these unique characters if they only have one liners, instead of proper interactions and story development?
Why should you replay missions to hear "Completed the objective" in slightly different ways? And no changes in how npc's react? The characters should have more story involvement and depth to the interactions, it could allow more unique humour too.
It doesn't help replayability if almost every line is responding in a very similar way. The potential dialogue on the ark sounds exciting, but the Ark feels quite canned/contrived as well, would have been much better if dialogue interactions were present.
Most of this is based on what I'm hearing about the reception (since I can't properly analyse the game myself right now), and what I have watched/learnt, so feel free to correct me on some of this critique if is false or undermining something.
