Well, I just finished Saints Row 2. It took me about 39 hours, according to the in-game counter. I finished every "Activity" except the racing ones.

I really didn't expect to like the game as much as I did, or to get so completely sucked in (it's all I've been doing since I bought it, pretty much).

I bought/played the first Saints Row as a Greatest Hits, a couple months after I beat GTA4. I absolutely hated the first.
To be fair, I didn't really give it much of a chance. Literally, within the first 5 minutes of playing I encountered a bug where my car got stuck in the ground and turned completely invisible, leaving my character floating in the air. I believe it was the very first car I jacked in the game. That did NOT make a good first impression. I had heard it was buggy, but that was absurd.

After that, I messed around in the game for a little while. Did one or two activities, and never touched it again. I laughed at all the posts I had previously seen saying how much better Saints Row was than GTA4. I could not fathom how people could think that.

I still can't. From what I played of the first, it was a bug ridden piece of crap. I still have it, so I guess I could pop it back in and see if the good outweighs the game being damn near broken.

So I bought the second game, against my good judgment. Cheapy had such good things to say about it that it was hard to resist, after I traded in some games at Gamestop last week.

Saints Row 2 is buggy. Not as bad as the first game. Not nearly, considering I encountered more/worse bugs in 10 minutes of the first, than I did in 39 hours of the second. The bugs in Saints Row 2 happen infrequently enough, and are not much of a big deal, so they are easy to overlook. The fun factor was through the roof.

I really have to say it's on par with GTA4. The games aren't equal in the same areas, but they level out overall, in my mind.

GTA4 had massive polish, awesome physics/animations, and a great story (if a bit derivative).

SR2 has nowhere near the polish, but it has a ton of really entertaining "activities" to do, and awesome rewards which are constantly given throughout the game. It has a more casual play style, that never really got frustrating. It's just... fun!

I can't say I enjoyed Saints Row 2 more than GTA4, but I definitely liked it just as much, but in a different way.

Thanks go out to Cheapy, for recommending the game. I probably wouldn't have giving the series another try if it weren't for him pimping it on the CAGcast.

Big ass chains!

Hopefully, I can now get back to all the other games I've been ignoring since picking up the game!