Red Dead Redemption II is a Rockstar open world western game, and so you know that it is going to be high quality, brimming with details. It has a huge single player campaign, which is a prequel to Red Read Redemption. It follows Arthur Morgan, as part of the outlaw group led by Dutch. If that sounds familiar, that’s because the previous game’s protagonist, John Marston, was part of this group. You will see John, and other familiar characters, show up from time to time, but it is still very much Arthur’s story.
The game starts off setting up the scene where the group botched a job, and they are now on the run. Dutch had screwed up and this sets off some doubts within the group. Not much, but you can see the seeds there, and as Dutch becomes more unstable throughout the game, you see his downfall coming. Nevertheless, Arthur is part of this gang, and they eventually move to near Valentine, setting up camp. The story is then kind of one where Arthur lives the life of an outlaw, robbing from the rich, hunting to survive, and just general day to day stuff.
Despite the slice of life aspect, and the whole jack of all trades thing with Arthur helping out everyone with a bit of everything, the story does intrigue you and suck you in. This is because while life can be good, it can also be bad. They are outlaws and are on the run, hunted down by bounty hunters, lawmen, and other outlaws, it is not a completely rosy life. There is a lot of hardship, and they have to be constantly on the move.
The gameplay is also one where the game excels at. It introduces new elements that makes the game more realistic, which is kind of annoying at first, but it doesn’t impact the enjoyment too much. That is, Arthur now has various “cores” (health, stamina and “dead eye”), and you need to regularly eat in order to keep them up. Same with his horse, which has cores you need to keep up that will improve over time so that you can gallop for longer without tiring etc. Riding a horse continues to require you to tap X, and these things become second nature.
In terms of gameplay mechanics, Arthur can run and climb, as well as ride a horse. He carries with him a multitude of weapons, although annoying, they are often left on the horse and you need to reequip them each time. Gunplay is solid, with the aim assist and just general aiming to be very good. Arthur has the “dead eye” ability, which uses a meter to slow down time so you can fire multiple shots in quick succession. Like everything else in the game, shooting is also a deliberate affair. You cannot run and gun easily, as it takes time for the gun to reload, or to take another shot after the previous one.
The open world is where the game shines the brightest. After the first chapter, you’re then let loose on the whole open world and it is massive, filled with things to do. There are various bigger towns, as well as smaller buildings. There are strangers out there that you can help, and hunting is a big part of the experience. Sneaking up to the wildlife and then shooting it down carefully to get the best quality skin is addictive. There is a day night cycle, and it feels like a world where it is lived in. Random events can also happen such as wolves attacking you at night, or other outlaws asking for a toll to cross a bridge.
There is a lot of choice in how Arthur approaches things. He can have honorable actions, or not so much. This affects the honor meter and will affect how others will treat Arthur (such as raising and lowering prices in the shops accordingly). All this may sound like the game has a ton of systems, but it somehow all manages to not be overwhelming and are synergistic with each other. The game is cohesive, and that is what makes it so engaging and immersive.
Mission structure and progressing through the story is probably the most standard part of the game. There are mission icons on the map, and as you approach the character, you’ll get some story cutscenes and then the mission objectives. There is mission variety, from robbing a train, to shootouts, to herding sheep, those sections aren’t too boring. What can be boring is being forced to slow walk or slowly ride your horse next to the character, as they speak. Wrestling control away from you is never great, especially when there is a large distance to traverse, but the game does it well enough that it isn’t too much of an annoyance. Given that the game is so long, it ends up repeating a lot of the mission structure, so that eventually it does get boring when the vast majority of each missions is either riding your horse or shooting people.
If you beeline for the story missions alone, this is still a massive game and takes hours upon hours to finish. But then include all the optional stuff and it can feel like a game that is never-ending. There are tons of sidequests to do, as well as minigames like poker and dominoes. You can find wildlife to hunt or do some fishing. Even just general galloping around exploring the amazing environment isn’t boring at all. Each story mission also has optional objectives to do if that is your jam.
The graphics are phenomenal and coupled with the attention to detail, it is a visual spectacle. The beginning of the game really shows off what it can do, with how Arthur trudges through the snow. Then while walking or riding, you can see the footprints left behind on certain terrain, it is crazy. Unfortunately though, you will eventually get burn out with how slow and methodical the game likes to be. Missions can start to become repetitive as they usually involve a lot of riding, some shooting, and maybe some sneaking. Repeat for 50 hours for over 100 missions and it’s a tad bit too much.
The more and more you play the game, the more and more the forced slow walking will start to annoy you. It just feels like the developers is forcing a slow pacing onto the player, instead of letting them decide how quickly or slowly they would like to proceed. The story elements feel repetitive too, and while yes, it is supposed to show Dutch descending into madness, the fact that they gang walks into so many traps, and constantly screws up so much, you’d think that they would learn. It’s frustrating when the characters are idiots like that. You feel that Rockstar could have taken out big chunks of the story to streamline the game more.
This is a game where everyone takes a wildly different time to finish. Although if you rush through everything, then the main story will take around 35 to 40 hours, but then it’ll open up the Epilogue section. The final few missions can really feel like they are dragging things out bit by bit, even more so than normal. The amount of horse riding, the number of enemies you have to kill etc, it feels overly bloated. Rockstar has gone for “realism” too far, and yet in other aspects, it doesn’t. How does Arthur survive killing literally hundreds of enemies? Anyway, as this is a prequel, some characters are immune, and that’s a shame. You can see what the ending was going to be like, and it’s sad. It doesn’t help that effectively all the good characters die, and you’re left with the extremely unlikeable ones as you progress towards the end of the game.
The Epilogue sounds like a good concept, a slower and relaxing way to wind down the game while setting up for the original Red Dead Redemption. Unfortunately, like the rest of the game, the developers have clearly self-indulged, and the Epilogues goes for far too long. It takes around ten hours to complete, and it wouldn’t be so bad if the missions were so repetitive, so overly long, and feeling so pointless. All it needed to do was to wrap up any loose ends and set up the first game, but no, it continues on and on and on, where each mission you’d wish would be the last but it isn’t. Where each mission you’d hope for something interesting but isn’t. Or that it would be short but isn’t. Rather it’s a bunch of menial tasks, quicktime events, even more horse riding and even more shootouts, something you’ve been doing for 40 to 60 hours already. It makes the game feel bloated and thematically completely different to the ending of the game.
Overall, Red Dead Redemption II is an amazing game. However, the developers clearly had a vision and while it gave the game so much character and atmosphere, this is a game first and foremost and it isn’t the most player friendly decisions. In their quest for realism, and attention to detail, sometimes where 99% of players won’t notice, you have to wonder if they could have put those resources into streamlining the story, streamlining the controls, and giving more variety in how the story is told beyond just talking while horse riding. Again, it’s still an amazing game with a great story, but the conscious decisions to make everything so slow and tedious will not gel with everyone.
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