Saints Row 2 is better than GTA 4

So after getting quite a few games over Christmas (Call of Duty: World at War, Left 4 Dead, Grid, Saints Row 2, Gears of War 2, Far cry2, Fallout3) I was kept pretty busy.

I think I've come to the realisation that Saints Row 2 is better than GTA. Might sound stupid? But there are a couple of reasons for this.

I've never been a fan of the way you get missions in GTA. You seem to aimlessly bounce from one random character to another, not caring who they are, or what they are doing, once they give you money. I found myself asking "who the hell is this guy?" quite a lot. Saints Row 2 cuts out this problem. You work for your gang against the rival gangs to make Stillwater your own once again. Gang wars I can understand, mostly random characters I don't. Kate is an important part of the story in GTA4, but I had hardly any interaction with her whatsoever even though she was supposed to be Niko's actual interest. Didn't make much sense when you already had two girls that got rid of your wanted level and restored your health.

Overall, the missions are more enjoyable than GTAs. Even the side activities are a good laugh (spraying shit from a van onto Ultors businesses, breaking up a women's rights protest with a chainsaw, or causing as much damage as physically possible in a short space of time etc). You don't get to do these things in GTA. It takes all the stuff that you do in your spare time in GTA and throws them into the actual gameplay. You need to do some of these things to advance the story.

Another good thing is the in-mission checkpoints. In GTA i found it very frustrating when you were near the end of a reasonably difficult mission (eg: killing Dmitri), when someone completely random happens and you die (eg: shot a barrel that landed beside a crate, after a cutscene I was placed behind the crate and supposed to be in cover, but they placed me on the barrel and clearly visible to the enemy who quickly shot me in the face multiple times in under a second) and have to go get more body armor, restart the whole mission again which may include driving back to it, basically it was a pain in the ass. The in-mission checkpoints gets rid of this frustration and makes Saints more enjoyable. The regenerating health is also very nice too. Again not realistic, but at least you know if you are in trouble and have a long way to go in a mission, you can go hide. In GTA you know that if you have little health left and have a long way to go in a mission, you might aswell just step out and get shot because your screwed anyways.

One thing that I find difficult though, is to aim while driving. This goes for both games but more so for Saints. Its difficult to press A to accelerate, the right stick to aim and the right trigger to shoot all with the same hand.

Overall, I loved both games, but Saints has the edge for me. Initially it took me a while to adjust to the look of Saints, as it is not as pretty as GTA, but when it all boils down to it, it is GTA with a massive amount of fun things injected into it.