How to play Saints Row 2 Multiplayer

In order to play SR2 online you will need to make the following patches which will be detailed below

This is not tested on the steam version.

You will need a hex editor, such as HxD to perform these changes. The EXE used in this tutorial has an md5sum of 11766354c3e2f5c28f78820d08d9369c

Step 1 - Open file

Open SR2_pc.exe with hxd.

Step 2 - Replace standard services

Replace all instances of gamespy.com with openspy.net
Be sure to select Search direction All

You should see 14 occurances changed.

Step 3 - Replace public key

Find the string BF05D63E93751AD4A59A4A7389CF0BE8A22CCDEEA1E7F12C062D6E194472EFDA5184CCECEB4FBADF5EB1D7ABFE91181453972AA971F624AF9BA8F0F82E2869FB7D44BDE8D56EE50977898F3FEE75869622C4981F07506248BD3D092E8EA05C12B2FA37881176084C8F8B8756C4722CDC57D2AD28ACD3AD85934FB48D6B2D2027 and replace it with afb5818995b3708d0656a5bdd20760aee76537907625f6d23f40bf17029e56808d36966c0804e1d797e310fedd8c06e6c4121d963863d765811fc9baeb2315c9a6eaeb125fad694d9ea4d4a928f223d9f4514533f18a5432dd0435c5c6ac8e276cf29489cb5ac880f16b0d7832ee927d4e27d622d6a450cd1560d7fa882c6c13
The string should come out as the exact same length, with no bytes added or removed, all characters in the replaced string should be overwritten.


Step 4 - Change AuthService from https to http

In the mean time, there is not a valid SSL cert for this service, so the url scheme must be changed. Search a string beginning with "https://%s.auth.pubsvs" and change the "https" to "http".

Next you will need to add a null byte to account for the removed "s" character, otherwise the exe will not function. At the end of the string you will see a null byte, write another null byte (value 00 in the hex view) at the very end of the string.
The output MD5 sum should be fa6f638f6db74167444159c93d8d50cf

Step 5 - Create multiplayer Account

You should now be able to play multiplayer after registering account.
Do not use a shared, or trusted password.

Once filling in the required info, you can create an account as usual.

Login to your newly created account, and host or join a game!