The Saboteur™

Its holds up perfectly graphically, runs great on modern software/hardware and one of the few great WW2 french resistance video games. Also using the offline GOG installer it runs better than the steam version so keep that in mind.

The Saboteur is a game I really enjoyed playing, and a game that shows that the sum of its parts may be better than expected. The game has you flung in the middle of the Nazi occupation of Paris, shortly after it happened. The story is an average revenge one, though it does get points for not being the cliche one of "Repel the invaders" or "Protect your country". Your character doesn't care for the conflict, he just wants to kill a single man. In trying to do so though, he will use enough explosives to level a small mountain. The game itself is an open world one, even if the world is small (Paris and its surroundings). You are free to move around, accepting possible quests (though you'll have to unlock them first), looking for collectibles, blowing stuff up or just causing mayhem. The city is divided into zones, with each zone requiring proper papers to pass through the checkpoints, but you can always either ignore the checkpoints and look for a different way through, or run through them and attempt to evade the Nazis. It does sometime help to go through such a checkpoint, blow a few guard towers up and die (or load), since anything you destroyed outside a mission will remain destroyed once the mission is started, which can make your life easier. For getting around, the game has quite a few vehicles, though the driving isn't anything exceptional. It does the job, and that's all. Alternatively, you can always climb up to the rooftops of Paris, though again, the climbing and free running isn't something to write home about. Finally, the gunplay. You can carry up to two weapons on you at a time, as well as grenades, dynamite and RDX. There is a bit of variety for the weapons, though I usually found myself using a sniper rifle and either a silenced weapon or a rocket launcher, depending on my mood/target. Gunplay is the usual 3rd person cover based regenerating health style, which once more just does the job. Somehow though, a game where most of the mechanics are mediocre ends up being quite enjoyable. It could be all the nods and references you find in the game ("Somebody Set Up Us the Bomb" is a mission for example), as well as the planning of how to sabotage a group of targets without getting noticed, or the mayhem that ensues once your planning proves inadequate. The game unfortunately still retains a few bugs, though GOG is working on fixing those as well, and the price may be too high for a few people. All in all though, it is an enjoyable game that should give you quite a few hours of enjoyment.

Unlike some other reviewers, I really hadn't heard much about Saboteur when I saw it for sale on GOG. And honestly, it's not my usual game fare: I tend to really strongly prefer WRPGs and a smattering of strategy games. But I have to say it took me by surprise as being just....fun. The stealth and action is done well enough not to be overly frustrating. Although there are times where alrms are triggered in situations where earlier in the game they weren;t. And there are some occasional bugs and glitches that occur from time to time. This game is far from perfect technically, but I really never got aggravated with the bugs. There's something kinda fun about popping a nazi who's walking about on a long destroyed tower platform and watching his magical mid-air walking powers vanish. The core gameplay is what I actually enjoyed most about this game. The driving it also fun as long as you enjoy dodge-em cars. The ai drivers are crazy and slow. But it's fun to zoom about, slide through corners, and head-on collide with some oncoming lorry. And the soundtrack is just perfect for driving and very reminiscent of the era. People talk a lot about the visual grey versus color device that (does) set the mood, but not enough credit goes to the audio IMO. The story is pretty cliche, the voice acting is ocassionally less than terrific but with a few stronger performances mixed in as well. I enjoyed Skylar's (Kari Whalgreen) performance in particular. The personality of the protagonist himself left me a bit underwhelmed. Not really my kinda guy but adequate for the task at hand. Let's face it, sneaking around blowing up nazi's, and bombing their stuff, is always great. The only real critique is that while there's a TON of open-world saboteur work to do, it does get a bit repetitive after a while. I would have liked to see more story-style response to my activities but, C'est la vie. In any case, if nudity makes you want to run to your mother shivering in terror, this will likely not be the game for you. It has nudity. It's partly set in a burlesque club. You've been forewarned. I got probably 30 hours or so out of the game, and could have done more feeelance work had I felt so inclined. I paid about $20 for the game and felt it was well worth the price. The weapon loadout options are pretty good, although there are definitely some goons towards the end that take a lot more putting down even with your best kit. In all, I really enjoyed this game. It's not even in my preferred genre, and so it kinda surprised me how much I did enjoy it. Graphics are abit outdated these days (wish they had some higher res assets) Sadly, pandemic were shot in the back of the head by their EA overlords. Pity. Would have loved to see their next effort. Any ex-Pandemic devs that happen to see this: thanks for some memorable good times with this game. You deserved better from EA.

Just finished the game and while the story & characters aren't that intriguing the story missions are kind of fun. Saboteur has clunky controls while driving (especially in older cars, racing cars are better to control). The biggest downside were sporadic crashes or freezes, which is kind of frustrating because you have to restart missions.

I am a massive fan of modern open world games. I've played a lot of them, so comparatively, I had trouble rating this. The star of the show, the world, is unique and immersive. I've never seen a WWII game that takes place on the civilian end, particularly occupied Paris. However, everything else feels weak and uninteresting, even for Pandemic's catalog. The only real activities outside side missions are to blow up Nazi structures. Unfortunately it's very easy and they are EVERYWHERE. Like, two every city block or more. It becomes repetitive and uninteresting. Especially since the main missions pretty much ask you to do the same. There isn't really any depth to the gameplay and the story is bland. Go to location, shoot Nazis and blow up a thing. Rinse and repeat. I had fun playing it, but compared to other GTA-likes, this one is on the worse end.