Best Games By Volition, Ranked

Volition, a game studio based in Champaign, Illinois, had been making games for three decades. They are known for popular action-fueled franchises such as Saints Row and Red Faction. But in August 2023, the decision was made by Volition's parent company Embracer Group to shut down the studio for good.

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The studio developed and successfully published 18 games since it was first founded in June 1993 as Parallax Software. And while their final game, a reboot of Saints Row, did not do the numbers they wanted, the studio leaves behind many great games for people to go back and experience for years to come.

7 The Punisher

Volition was known for making quite a few original universes, but they aren't strangers to using other well-known properties for games. A great example of this is their 2005 third-person shooter The Punisher, which was a game about the Marvel Comics character of the same name.

As the Punisher, players serve as a vigilante looking to get revenge after his family was killed by the Mafia. The gameplay mainly revolves around exploring levels, hunting down enemies, and taking them out by either killing them instantly or making them suffer to get information.

6 Summoner

A lot of games by Volition feature sci-fi elements, but they had their hand at making a fantasy-driven world as well with Summoner, an action RPG released initially on PlayStation 2 before coming to PC. The story revolves around the playable character Joseph and a party of individuals who go on an adventure with him.

There are many branching elements to the story, which date back to when Joseph was a child using his powers as a Summoner for the first time and things going awry. The game features a combat system that includes real-time and turn-based elements, where players take turns performing actions but movement happening without selecting menus.

5 Red Faction: Guerrilla

The shooting franchise Red Faction started out as a first-person experience but then transitioned into an open-world third-person shooter with its sequel. But while the sequel had its issues, the franchise's third installment, called Red Faction: Guerrilla, was considered a step up for Volition with this third-person format.

Put in control of Alec Mason, a member of the Red Faction looking to take on the Earth Defense Force, players will be tasked with exploring Mars and fighting enemies in each of the six districts on the colonized planet. Guerrilla features destructible environments, including the ability to destroy buildings and other structures in the heat of battle.

4 Saints Row 4

The most unhinged edition of the Saints Row series came with the release of Saints Row 4. The game features a customizable main character who serves as the leader of the Saints, a beloved gang that is so popular that the player also happens to be the President of the United States.

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The main plot of Saints Row 4 is that the world has been invaded by aliens who attempt to put the world under a simulation. Along with the arsenal of tools at the player's disposal when taking on missions in the open world, they will also gain superpowers that will make it even harder for them to be stopped by enemies.

3 FreeSpace 2

After Parallax Software rebranded as Volition, they made a spin-off of Descent, their original shooter franchise, that instead featured space combat. But Volition's best space combat simulator came about a year after the first one with the release of FreeSpace 2, one of the few Volition titles that is still exclusive to PC to this day.

The experience revolves around a player flying a spaceship and fighting aliens known as the Shivans. Missions range from taking on giant ships with the artillery available to escorting an ally through a hostile area. The game is presented in first-person, giving the player the feeling of being inside their ship as they are fighting.

2 Red Faction

While Volition continued the franchise for nearly a decade, it is hard to argue that the best entry of the Red Faction series isn't the original Red Faction itself. The first-person shooter was one of the first to introduce the ability for players to alter environments thanks to its Geo-Mod technology.

As a miner who joined in the movement to fight the Ultor Corporation, players will go through various levels attempting to take out enemies while having the technology to destroy everything they see in the process. The game also offers split-screen multiplayer that includes a deathmatch game mode.

1 Saints Row The Third

For many years, Saints Row was seen as just a clone of Grand Theft Auto and nothing more. But Saints Row The Third was where the franchise began to find its identity. That identity was taking a hard turn into being ridiculous and silly compared to a somewhat more serious franchise in GTA.

After being stranded in one city thanks to an organization called the Syndicate, the Saints spend the game looking to build their gang forces to return peace to the place they call home. Along with having many powerful yet normal weapons, some of the more absurd weapons introduced in Saints Row The Third are a fart-in-the-jar grenade and a dildo bat.

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