Heartwarming / Saints Row IV

As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.

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Main game

• When the boss goes to disable the Nuke headed for Washington in a attempted Heroic Sacrifice, the group all pour their hearts out saying their goodbyes, with Matt admitting he would not have attempted to kill The Boss had he known The Boss was willing to go to this length to save the world.
• One of the speeches Southern!Boss gives when creating a President is a (mostly) serious take on education, and deserves to be quoted.
  I'd like to start by saying it's an honor to stand before young people like yourselves. I may be President now, but I remember what it was like being your age. Working hard for shitty pay. Dealing with so called friends who would stab you in the back for a small advantage. But through it all we do one thing: endure. Congratulations, Stilwater Junior High, you've survived three years. Good luck with the next four.
• A subtle one. The prologue mission sees the Boss, Pierce and Shaundi teaming up with Asha Odekar to take down Cyrus Temple, who has made a Face–Heel Turn and became a psychotic terrorist. When the Saints meet up with Asha, Pierce starts whining, which causes Asha to snap back at him, but before things get out of hand, Shaundi interrupts them to introduce herself to Asha, and she was not rude or sarcastic about it either. After behaving like a total psychopath for most of the previous game, seeing Shaundi play peace keeper was rather unexpected.
• At the beginning, Boss tries to brush aside Shaundi's warnings, given Pierce and King were whining. When he/she tries to leave upon learning it was about an impending alien attack, Shaundi grabs him/her, showing how concerned she is about the threat and how in league she is with Asha and Matt given how they help save the world.
  • What makes this better is that the warning about the alien attack came from Kinzie as well. Normally, the crew would blow it off as one of her conspiracy theories, but since Matt and Asha are saying the same thing, Shaundi takes the outlandish threat completely seriously.
  Boss: When did you take Kinzie seriously?
  Shaundi: When the people who helped us save the world said we should.
• Oleg and Josh Birk becoming close friends is rather heartwarming. They even spend their last moments on Earth pleasantly chatting.
• Some are more sweet than others, but the romance scenes are very heartwarming.
  • Surprisingly enough, Johnny Gat's scene may be the sweetest of them all. The Boss pours his/her heart out about the void in their life left by Gat's disappearance before he stops him/her with a kiss.
  • Shaundi's plays off of the UST that may have developed between the two.
• The scene after saving Matt. The group finds another prison shaped as a plane.
  Matt: Whose idea of hell is being trapped in an airplane?
  Boss: Me, Shaundi and... Oh my god... Johnny's alive!
  Kinzie: Boss... Johnny's dead.
  Boss: Who else would be stuck in a plane?!
  Kinzie: Shaundi. It was a life-defining moment for her. It's the only thing that makes sense.
  Boss: You're wrong.
  Matt: I think she's making a lot of sen...
  Boss: SHE'S WRONG!! Find out where this is! We're getting my best friend back.
  • This could also be a tearjerker moment considering the realities of how things end up and just in general the Boss' insistence in the scene.
• The Boss calling Johnny Gat his/her best friend.
• The Boss adopts a more caring and warm-hearted attitude, openly admitting how important each Saint is and that he/she would take a bullet for any one of them.
• Kinzie talking about how much Oleg meant to her in one of her Audio Logs and her sadness over his death.
• Past Shaundi's audio log describing her kidnapping by Veteran Child. She says that she told him it was a bad move to take on The Boss but he never listened. She reveals that the only person who ever listened to her was the Boss him/her self.
• Matt's loyalty mission. He slowly turns the Boss around into liking Nyteblade. At the end, The Boss uses the power of being Earth's remaining world leader to give Matt all the rights, titles, licenses and merchandising rights to the Nyteblade franchise, making him promise to never stop.
  • In the same vein, his rescue mission involves you playing a text-based adventure where you give him the courage and emotional support he needs to stand up for himself against Killbane AND WIN. Then you tell him that you always knew he could do it. Considering Matt was a major antagonist in the previous game, it's a sweet moment.
• Zach (one of the announcers for the Genki activities) breaks down crying over the fact that he misses his wife. Who died when the Earth was destroyed.
  • In another instance, he mentions that his fear is being all alone without anyone to talk to, to which Bobby (his fellow announcer) reassures him that he is there for him.
• The context may be out there even by the game's standards but most of Boss' comments when playing with the furries in "On the Races" from the Enter the Dominatrix DLC are adorable, almost like s/he was with a real pet.
• Boss consoling Shaundi over her guilt when she thinks she got Gat killed. And when the two Shaundis go from hating each other to playing around and Boss helping them get over the nightmare of being kidnapped by Veteran Child.
• Pierce's Loyalty Mission. It is just one big heartwarming moment between the Boss and Pierce. From singing "Opposites Attract" together, to the Boss telling Pierce "You're the Boss". It really shows how much they care for each other, with The Boss finally letting Pierce do one of his complicated plans. Too bad Zinyak had to fuck up Biz Markie.
• If you have Keith and Maero as homies, The Boss seems to hold Donnie in higher regard than Maero, which is heartwarming, since all they ever seemed to do was torture him.
• Kinzie defending former worst enemy Matt and berating the Boss after the Boss assaults Matt for calling Johnny Gat's rescue mission a "bad idea". The Boss then helps Matt to his feet and apologises, which Matt forgiving him/her straight away, realising he owes himself to the Saints after they spared his life. The Boss then almost hugs him.
  • Heck, the development in Kinzie and Matt's relationship in general. They have a lot of small moments toward the end. Matt expresses relief when Kinzie is rescued from her simulated nightmare by the Boss. If Matt and Asha are chosen for the first part of the final mission, Matt muses on a way they could have transported the Key faster. Instead of arguing, Kinzie asks him to explain and they get into a hacker discussion. If Matt and Asha are chosen for the second part of the final mission, he expresses fear about what will come out of the portal from his personal nightmare, to which the Boss and then Kinzie try reassuring him.
• Johnny Gat's loyalty mission. Set to the backdrop of the previous game's murder-spree minigame the Genkibowl, it was deemed to be the best way to make up for lost time between The Boss and Gat. They both share how they have grown as people and what they learned in their time away; Gat learning how to appreciate the simpler things in life (like the wanton slaughter of mascots) and The Boss sharing how much Johnny meant to all of the Saints when they thought he had died. Even Matt, who is overseeing the simulation, is so touched that he decides to make the final encounter against Phillipe Loren so that both Gat and The Boss can get closure from killing him properly. The first song that plays during this mission is "The Boys Are Back in Town", which is really fitting for this reunion.
  • The Boss also spends a good portion of the mission heaping praise on all of the new Saints that have joined since Johnny disappeared. It seems they had taken Kinzie's earlier What The Hell Hero Speech to heart and realized that for the past few years the majority of the Saints have had to put up with the three Stilwater veterans yammering on and on about how awesome this guy they've never met was, and decided to return the favor.
• Shaundi and Gat's homie conversation. Gat consoles Shaundi for all she's suffered since his "death", saying he's alive now, and that won't change.
• The Boss showing concern for Kinzie when she gets kidnapped by Zinyak and being determined to rescue her.
  The Boss: Kinzie... we're not leaving you behind.
• If you take Shaundi on the second part of the last mission, she'll express concern on what will happen to her younger self. Considering she earlier hated her younger self, it's oddly sweet.
• Montell Jordan's "This Is How We Do It" playing during the Dance Party Curtain Call, where all the main characters of the game show off their moves, ending with Zinyak doing the worm, also qualifying as a Funny and Awesome moment.
• Michael Clarke Duncan singing Biz Markie during the end credits.
• During one mission, CID asks Fun Shaundi for a date (after getting shot down by all the other girls). To everyone's surprise, she accepts. She's genuinely excited to go out for pizza and a movie (Pride and Prejudice) with him.
• The Optional Sexual Encounter is as simple as a single button prompt, and clearly a humorous jab at Mass Effect, other Bioware games, and any RPG that features an extensive Romance Sidequest. They are shown in a silly completely non-serious manner, such as Boss going to Asha for rough sex because "Kinzie scares the shit out of [them]". But, two in particular stand out as sincere no-nonsense confessions of love between two great friends:
  • Shaundi: Boss casually and sincerely asks why, with Shaundi's love life, the two of them never became a thing, to which Shaundi responds just as sincerely and flirtatiously "You never asked", leading to them getting together.
  • Johnny Gat: Boss is looking for casual sex on the ship initially, but ends up emptying out their heart to Johnny about how they found solace and coped with sex, drugs, violence, or some combination of them all; especially after he was thought dead. They care about Johnny greatly, and don't want to be with him as a casual fling. They start to ramble on and on, before Johnny cuts them off with an equally genuine and passionate kiss.
• One of the unused Audio Logs reserved for Lin has her realizing that former Westside Rollerz member Donnie had a crush on her despite being in the opposing gang. While she found it unexpected, she admitted that it was a nice surprise that she was Donnie's girl.

How the Saints Save Christmas

• The intro, which shows The Saints preparing the ship with Shaundi and Pierce hanging-up stockings over the display screen playing a video of a Yule Log and Matt getting a box of decorations to help Kinzie with the tree, set to really nice orchestral music.
• Given the Denser and Wackier tone of the series, the holiday is played more straight and with more sincerity than over half the saccharine Christmas Episodes.
• The sheer utter conviction of the vocal talents. No one decides to just phone it in, this was truly meant as a gift to the fans.
• Future Shaundi celebrating Christmas with everyone in an alternate timeline (including her alternate self) after living in a crapsack future where Christmas is dead.
• The letters to Santa from the Saints, specifically Matt's, Shaundi's, and especially the Boss's.
  • Matt's letter has him asking for his favourite show's merchandise. He really hasn't stopped since the Boss made him promise not to with the Nyte Blayde franchise. Not that he would anyway, but still.
  • Shaundi's letter asks that he make sure Fun Shaundi (her younger self in the simulation) has the best Christmas she's ever had. The type of Christmas she used to have before her family split apart. She wants her to be happy, all while admitting she was a jerk to her past self and will have to accept her for who she is.
  • The Boss's letter is simply them asking Santa to get the rest of the crew everything they ask for (along with a pony for themselves, since that's a standard first gift to ask for), after sincerely thanking him for teaching them about the Christmas spirit.
• To cap everything off, we got the final cutscene, which is arguably the most heartwarming moment of the entire Saints Row series: The Boss, a murderous psychopath who has killed untold numbers of people, learns from Santa how good it feels to spread joy to strangers, and making memories with family and friends. As a result, he/she spends Christmas getting into snowball fights with the crew, going caroling, giving out presents, decorating a tree, feeding the homeless, making snow-angels, and becoming a genuinely nice, loving, and caring person. It's a touching note to end on that not even the world getting blown up can stop Christmas if people decide to be good.
  • The Boss giving Kinzie her present. At first, Kinzie just looks content, but she then shakes in joy. Kinzie then hugs the Boss, and the hug is so strong the Boss has to lift her into the air and lean back really far. The two argue a lot, but they know their lives would be empty without each other.
• Considering that throughout the series, The Boss has been regarded as The Sociopath who crossed the Moral Event Horizon, seeing him/her being such a nice and caring individual is inspiring.
• Leading on from the letters, we get The Boss' after the story ends, asking him to grant everyone else's wishes, without any ulterior or selfish motive at all.
  You've taught me more about the Holiday Spirit then I've ever thought possible. Thank you. I'm new to this whole Christmas List thing, so bear with me.

  1. Whatever Pierce wants, if it'll make him happy, I'm good with that.
  2. Whatever Shaundi wants, I'm sure she has her reasons so probably worth letting her have that.
  3. Whatever Keith wants he's certainly worked to deserve, so that's good for him.
  4. Whatever Ben wants is probably stuff most of us find boring, but if it makes him smile then go for it.
  5. Whatever Kinzie wants I'm sure will benefit us all in the end, so I'm guessing we'd all like her to have it.
  6. Whatever Gat wants give it to him. Trust me, it's easier that way.
  7. Whatever Asha wants I'm sure she thinks is important and all, but make sure to throw in something nice and fun for her too. Maybe then she can relax a bit.
  8. Whatever Matt wants I suppose it's ok to let him have. Just don't tell me what it is and I'll probably be happier that way.
  9. Whatever CID wants...I'd probably check to make sure it's safe first. He has some odd tastes.
  10. And for me, a pony. That's the standard first gift to ask for, right?
  Still Full of Holiday Spirit,
  The Boss
  P.S.: And I'm sorry I was such a Grinch (whatever that means as nobody bothered to explain it to me yet) and said "Fuck Santa" before. I didn't mean it. Well, I did mean it at the time, but now I don't.