I know what you're thinking. "Why do I need a character guide for a third person, gangster fueled sandbox game? Don't I just get some guns, get some homies and start smoking fools?" Well, you can certainly do that, and have success with it, but if you really want to make your mark on Stilwater, and make the main story missions easier in the process, you're going to want to ease back the hammer, put the heater away for the time being and divert your attention to activities for a moment.

The reason for this can be summed up in one word: unlockables. As you make progress in the various activities sprinkled around your fair city, you'll unlock abilities, weapons and discounts. Most of the unlockables are unlocked after completing level three and level six of an activity, meaning that you can do but a few levels of an activity to pump your character up a little, and at the higher end, spend less than an hour to get some very powerful bonuses, bonuses like unlimited sprint, unlimited pistol ammo, 3x health regeneration and more melee damage. Do I have your attention now?

Before we get started, let's go over the basics of activities. Activities are located all throughout Stilwater and are designated on your map as blue diamonds. At first they'll show up with question marks in them until you get close enough so that you can see what they are. Once you complete the first few mandatory story missions in the game you can go off and do any activity you want. We'll be using this to our advantage as we propel your death dealing abilities into the stratosphere. To do an activity, simply walk into the designated activity circle and choose to start the activity. Once you've completed a level, you'll be given the option to either proceed to the next level or quit out. It's that simple.

Now, there's going to be a method to our activity madness and it might seem odd, but bear with me and all will be revealed. First up, go ahead and lower your difficulty level before you get started. Saints Row 2 lets you change your difficulty level on the fly, so take advantage of it to make your time spent doing activities as easy as possible. There aren't any achievements or trophies for doing anything at a particular difficulty level so all you have to worry about is pride, and honestly, no one but you cares what level you completed Snatch on.

Second, you're going to be making money while doing these activities and you'll be tempted to go off and use your money to buy all sorts of weapons and ammo, but curb that urge. By doing the activities we talk about, you're going to get the best weapons in the game and pretty much all of the ammo you'll need. Plus, many of the activities give you all of the weapons and ammo needed to complete the activities, or you don't need weapons at all. What you want to spend your money on is anything that will give you style points, namely clothes, jewelry, crib upgrades, vehicle or vehicle upgrades. The reason behind this is that as you acquire style points, you gain style ranks and gaining style ranks give you a respect bonus when completing activities. This way, all of your activities will not only get you the best weapons and abilities in the game, but also give you so much respect that you can just slam through all of the story missions one right after another. Don't worry about going crazy on buying things, as obtaining just the first level of style points will give you enough of a bump to get you earning extra respect and you'll want to save some money to make some activities easier, but at the same time, don't blow all of your cash on 40's and pistol ammo.

For the purpose of this guide, we're going to split the unlockables into "Must Haves", "Nice to Haves" and everything else. In addition to dividing up the activities, we'll be giving tips on completing the activities and diversions used to unlock items. You're on your own for any unlockables gained through story mission progression. Keep in mind that there are trophies and achievements for completing all levels of all activities and for completing all levels of all activities in co-op, so even if the unlockables don't tickle your fancy, there is some small incentive for doing everything. The unlockables will be outlined in the following fashion:

Unlockable name

Activity name and level

Activity location

Unlockable description and tips for completing the activity

As some activities give two different unlockables once the activity is completed to level 6, we'll be combining those unlockables into one entry.

Must Haves

Kobra (pistol), Unlimited Pistol Ammo

Fuzz level 3, Fuzz level 6

Projects

If you read this guide and decide to throw out everything we're telling you, you owe it to yourself to at least get these unlockables. The Kobra's are the best pistols in the game, and quite possibly, the best weapon over all. They can be dual wielded, they're totally automatic with a 15 round clip and they can take down pretty much every vehicle in the game, including helicopters. Pairing the Kobra's with unlimited pistol ammo makes you an unstoppable killing machine. Once you get the Kobra's, you'll need to equip them from your crib's weapon stash. Ditto for the infinite ammo.

Thankfully Fuzz is one of the easiest activities to do to completion. Getting a partner to help out makes things even easier as one person can drive and the other can shoot. In Fuzz, you'll be impersonating a police officer, driving around in a cop car with a cameraman from the show "Fuzz" and tasked with taking out various criminals so that the cameraman can get footage. The important thing about Fuzz is to only follow the cameraman's request for using specific weapons when it makes sense. Using a mini-gun to break up a demonstration makes sense, using satchel charges to take down fleeing skateboarders does not. You want to get to the crime as quickly as possible, kill whoever needs killing and move on to the next one. Finally, do not even think about breaking up the steroid ring with a melee weapon as the steroid users will kill you with one punch. Either run them down or shoot them.