Saints Row 2: Purgatory Guide

The Saints Row games are easily my favorite games of all time, they hold a lot of sentimental value to me since I literally grew up with them. Saints Row 1 was the first game I played on the 360 and exposed me to games as a whole. It created a burning passion within me that has led me into wanting to work in the animation and games industry.

Unfortunately, Saints Row 2’s PC port is horrible. It was ported by CD Projekt Black and they did not do a great job with it, over compressing audio and introducing a multitude of bugs. I can’t really blame them though since it is a miracle Saints Row 2 even works at all, even on console. Seriously the code is horrible, but this is easily the best open world game of all time.

There are two options when it comes to playing this game on PC, emulation through Xenia and playing the PC version. This guide is going to show you how to setup the definitive PC version of Saints Row 2. Xenia is the simpler and more stable option, trading in modding for DLC and stability. A more in-depth comparison can be found here.[www.saintsrowmods.com]

Before we start, these are the mods that we will be using to clean up SR2 while keeping it as close to vanilla as possible, here is what you should download. (Mods that cannot be installed with SR2MM will have instructions next to them).

• SuperUI[www.saintsrowmods.com] – Heavily improves the UI and adds quality of life features such as character importing from a previous save, being able to buy all clothes from your crib, and more.
• Sandbox++[www.saintsrowmods.com] – Pretty much just an advanced cheat menu.
• F13’s Visual Overhaul[www.saintsrowmods.com] – Makes the game look a bit better while maintaining the original feel.
• Cutscene Patches[www.saintsrowmods.com] – Fixes a lot of small problems in cutscenes throughout the game. This does not fix cutscene desync.
• Radiomod[www.saintsrowmods.com] – Replaces the horrible audio banks for the radio stations with the high quality 360 ones, making music sound great. (Replace music1.vpp_pc & music2.vpp_pc)
• SR2 Improved Audio[www.saintsrowmods.com] – Improves the audio outside of the radio stations, doesn’t sound as good as on the 360, but gets rid of the sharp noises. (Replace music4.vpp_pc)
• Optimized Stilwater[mega.nz] – Heavily improves performance in certain areas, mainly interiors, by removing shadows. Created by ItsIggy, I compiled the chunk file to make it easier to install. (Replace chunks3.vpp_pc) [Not necessary if you are turning off shadows in SR2’s settings.]

  Download these mods and continue with the guide. You can find more mods at Saints Row Mods.[saintsrowmods.com]
  

Gentlemen of The Row[www.saintsrowmods.com]is easily the most popular and helpful mod for Saints Row 2 on PC. It alleviates a lot of issues with the port, adds in a lot of fun stuff, and is essential if you plan to install any other mods. GoTR is one of the two essential tools we will use to get this busted port working and maybe adding a bit of spice to the game.

1. Download and extract Gentlemen of The Row v1.9.2
2. Run Create_Custom_GotR_v1.9.2.bat
3. Customize as you wish, however if you are a first time player, I recommend just reverting the main menu and pause music to original in Audio Menu and reverting CDs to OG placement in Misc Menu to keep the experience as vanilla as possible.
4. Type in P to BUILD CUSTOM PATCH!
5. Move the files in MY_CUSTOM_PATCH into Saints Row 2’s main directory, overwrite files if asked.

Masamaru’s SR2 Mod Manager[www.saintsrowmods.com] is a tool I have been using as of recently, but it is easily the most helpful tool when you are modding this game. Gone are the days of having to recreate a patch for every configuration of mods you use, now it can all be done and controlled in one simple program, along with being able to set mod priority.

Note: This manager is for mods you would put in the personal mods folder in GoTR before creating the patch, not mods that require you to replace game files with (EX: Radiomod, Optimized Stilwater, Improved Audio).

1. Download and extract the mod manager.
2. Put the mods you downloaded into the mods folder. it is important that you structure them correctly, create and name a folder for each mod and place the raw files into that folder. (EX: SR2ModManger_v2.07>mods>SuperUI>Raw Files)
3. Open the mod manager, go to File>Open SR2 Installed Folder, it should automatically detect where the game is located, if not, locate it. It will copy the patch file into the patch_vpp_pc_original folder.
4. Check all your mods and set the priority. Mine look like the image below, but it shouldn’t really matter as long as they’re checked.
5. Go to Make>Compile and wait for it to finish.
6. Once it has compiled, go to File>Copy new patch.vpp_pc into installed SR2 folder.

You may want to also save your mod manager configuration through File>Save settings.

SR2’s executable is 32-bit from 2008, so it goes without saying that it is outdated. However, the modded executable doubles the amount of virtual memory the game can use by using a Large-Address-Aware flag (2 GB to 4 GB), potentially increasing performance. The executable is also needed for multiplayer to work since it is retargeted to use Openspy instead of Gamespy.

Saints Row 2 Openspy Files[mega.nz] – Download and place both of these files into your SR2 main directory, we will go more in-depth with multiplayer and co-op later.

DXVK can potentially improve performance for Saints Row 2 by using Vulkan instead of DirectX 9.

DXVK[github.com] – Download and extract DXVK, then put d3d9.dll & dxgi.dll into your SR2 main directory.

In my experience, these are the most optimized settings for Saints Row 2, without sacrificing too much graphical quality.

Ambient Occlusion: All
Motion Blur (subjective): No
Fullscreen Antialiasing: 2X (Adds Transparency To Hair, Hair Will Look Ugly Without It!)
Anisotropy Filtering: 16X
HDR: No
Shadow Maps: Off or Simple (Very Demanding!)
View Distance: Near
Dynamic Lighting: All (Very Demanding, Game Looks Horrible Without It!)
Blur (subjective): No
Depth of Field (subjective): No

Fullscreen Antialiasing: Off vs On (Credit to Uzi for the pictures.)

You may have heard that SR2 online is dead. Well, it was in a way, Gamespy shut down in 2014, taking SR2 online with it. However, you could still play the game using a LAN VPN, such as Hamachi, Radmin, or Zerotier. Still, that is a lot of effort, it straight up might not work, and not many people want to install networking software to play one game. That is why Openspy has become the best method to play SR2 online. It is easy to install, simple to get running, and just works. You remember that Openspy file I told you to put into SR2? This is where we use it.

Note: Make sure that you are using the Modded EXE, otherwise this will not work!

1. Go to Saints Row 2’s main menu.
2. Open Co-op or Multiplayer
3. Select Online, then create your account. (You don’t need to use a real email for this)
4. Select Log Into Gamespy, your credentials will be saved.

If all goes well, you should see this. Go nuts, and wreak havoc with your friends in Stilwater!

Congratulations! You have completed the guide, and hopefully just didn’t scroll down here to see the epilogue.
If you are a first time player to this series, I highly recommend playing Saints Row 1 using Xenia, unlocking the FPS with patches, turning on FSR, and capping it at 60. It is not essential to play it before playing Saints Row 2 because SR2 stands on its own, but SR1 is still an amazing game and will give you more insight to this wonderful series.

• You should complete these activities first. Projects Fuzz for the Kobra and unlimited pistol ammo, Downtown Snatch for the Gal-43 and unlimited SMG ammo, Red Light Escort for free vehicle delivery and the Pimp Cane, and Mills Insurance Fraud for infinite sprint. See Unlockables in Saints Row 2[saintsrow.fandom.com] for more info.
• Complete the quick and easy Base-jumping diversion for no fall damage, seriously it will save you a lot.

Mike Watson, better known as Idolninja, the creator of GoTR and former Community Manager at Volition. Watson spearheaded trying to fix this game with a proper patch, he never stopped searching for the source code and when it was found, worked on the patch all the time he could, even on his last days. Unfortunately, Mike Watson passed away in August of 2021. His contributions to the community were immeasurable, rest in peace.