Saints Row Undercover Almost Took a Dump on PSP

There are already a handful of canned Saints Row projects that have leaked over the years, but Saints Row Undercover – a PlayStation Portable spin-off of Saints Row 2 – was forgotten by practically everyone. The project was officially cancelled all the way back in 2009, and has been left sitting in a Volition backroom ever since. But now it's been dusted off, and the developer's even planning to steam some gameplay on Twitch next week.

"It was supposed to be a Saints Row 2 port directly to the PSP, and then they realised, 'Uh, we can't actually do this.' So then they started making [it] its own game," explained video producer Alexander Mejia. "Volition isn't a handheld developer, so when projects like this come up we get an outside studio to work on it," community manager Mike Watson added. "But both THQ and Volition looked at the project and after multiple reviews felt that it really wasn't living up to [expectations]."

It's an unfinished project so naturally it looks like grade-A garbage, but with games like Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories already on the platform, we can see why the publisher decided to scrap the spin-off. Still, the firm seemingly left it in the oven for a pretty long time before pulling the plug, as there appear to be the nuts and bolts of a complete game in place here. As neat as it is seeing this canned cash-grab, though, we must say that we're more enamoured with the PSP development kit – never seen one of those before.