Saints Row may be dead as original design director says Embracer “ghosted” 1970s prequel pitch

The design director of the original Saints Row game, Chris Stockman, seems to have said his final goodbyes to the series. Currently, the Saints Row franchise is in the hands of Embracer Group through PLAION. However, the original developer of the series, Volition, shut down in 2023 during Embracer’s restructuring wave, leaving the IP dormant.

It was last November when Stockman teased the possibility of a Saints Row prequel on the Saints Row subreddit. In his post, he said, “Guys and gals, I have hopeful news. I’ve been asked to create a pitch for a Saints Row reboot. I can’t say anything more than that, but my dreams for this game just became a little more than dreams.”

This request came directly from Embracer’s label, PLAION, after Stockman brainstormed the idea of bringing Saints Row back to its roots.

However, this hope didn’t last long. In a recent Discord post, spotted by X user @paparpg, Stockman responded to a fan who mentioned that the last canon Saints Row game was released nearly a decade ago.

Stockman answered straightforwardly, “Yeah, and honestly, I think the franchise is dead, unfortunately. I get the sense that Embracer has zero ability to do anything with it. I wish things were different. I tried my best to offer a path forward, but they’ve ghosted me.”

Stockman’s initial hopes of reviving the franchise seem bleak. He had a clear path in mind. During an interview in October 2025, Stockman imagined a 1970s prequel in which players would run around as teens who later grow up to become the main Saints Row crew from the 2006 original.

He said:

“You could really go all in on the ’70s theme with big Afros, bell-bottoms, and the music of that whole period.” When asked why the series needed a hard reset, he stated that the 2022 reboot was a “terrible idea” and posed a question:

“What is it trying to be? You’re rebooting it, but why are you rebooting it? There are many characters in the series that people love. It wasn’t Saints Row at all. Just call it something else at that point.”

The original Saints Row was released in 2006 as an Xbox 360 exclusive and earned critical acclaim for being a grittier alternative to the GTA series. Later iterations adopted a light-hearted tone and used silly humor, which kept the Saints Row fanbase happy for years.

However, the 2022 reboot didn’t sit well with gamers and critics, earning a Metascore of 63/100 and a user score of 3.3/10. This directly contributed to Volition's shutdown in 2023, and Embracer’s silence to Stockman’s pitch leaves the IP practically shelved.

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