Red Dead Redemption 2 isn’t just a fun video game, it’s a Wild West Life Simulator that immerses you in the life and times of Arthur Morgan, an outlaw on the run with his gang in 1899, the civilised world having caught up to them, rejected them, and began to hunt them down. Imagine the reason people visit WestWorld, that’s why you want to play Red Dead Redemption 2, there is so much life to live, it’s an actual experience that may for an unfortunate lack of word, change you. Lame! I know, but this story combined with the vivid open world is profound, there isn’t a specific purpose besides living your life and taking care of the ones around that you care about, all of your survival on the line.

It’s the classic American Dream story that Rockstar has become known to tell, every single Grand Theft Auto game for example, whether you’re Carl Johnson or Niko Belic. But Rockstar has given it’s world and characters unprecedented amounts of humanity, in the mere fact that even in the main story, there is no rhyme or reason to what’s happening. In the open world things just happen, whether you’re there to see it or not, whether you chose to intervene, help, make worse, things just happen despite the fact that the experience centers around you. Woman are kidnapped, bandits are arrested and plead for help, ambushes lie in wait just to steal what little money you have, history can be unearthed. The outrageous thing is that the description I used is a horrifically superficial scratch of the surface, I legitimately only had one run in that i’d say was identical, and I think I just had a personal mishap with the auto save. I was attacked by a panther, stumbled upon mutilated corpses posed by a serial killer on accident… I was robbing a house and discovered a bunch of mangled corpses thinking I found another serial killer sighting, but actually upon investigating a hole in the roof found a meteorite had fell from the sky and killed everyone. I sold that bad boy for some cash! That’s life, literally, you can help people for nothing in return or watch them die to avoid the inconvenience, and it will be an inconvenience to give out the limited supplies you cultivate yourself, or give out your hard earned money. And no surprise, the folks trying to murder them especially want to murder you.

I was dead set on being a merciless, heartless outlaw ready to combat this cruel world with my black heart, but I swear everyone I met was such an individual, I went from questioning if I should even pull my gun on them to trying to help them outright. There are pitfalls here, yes I was compelled to be good, and god it can be rewardless, which is the best thing ever. But there are times when being moral unlocks additional gameplay options that you would miss out on if you didn’t do good right then and there. Like how donating to a begging holy man can give you a prophecy about the future (Amazing!), or how giving to a monk will give you information about a slaver using the pharmacy as a front to abduct POC. I even had to be good boy just to get into an illegal poker game that I ended up robbing. But there never seems to be a cool achievement or stroke of the brush that will unlock additional missions, opportunities, or ultimately affect the ending of the game, by being truly be evil, which is a shame. In addition to that, you can interact with everyone in the world and choose between, greeting them, antagonizing them, or subsequently rob them. It works as a phenomenal mechanic, but there’s no logic behind antagonizing your allies, though hilarious because Arthur knows how to roast, makes you unlikable to people you actually want to like you. Maybe that was my problem, but towards the end of the brilliant plot of RDR2, being evil sincerely came off as frivolous. It’s better to be honorable, try to change the terrifying world you’re in for the better. The conversation system also bleeds over into making decisions, which was another great innovation, choosing a plan of action is amazing, especially when it invokes me to reload the game since one of my choices got a fav killed. Conversations falter but decision making is the good stuff, they needed a lot more of it.

The open world cannot be praised enough, but the true strength of the narrative comes from the characters, Arthur Morgan seems like a Two Dimensional cowboy but I am ashamed to admit that I fell in love with him. He is so dynamic, a burly man of action that can actually carry a conversation, given the opportunity he will show doubt and remorse, he’s tired but knows he has so much purpose left.  The evidence is in the journal he carries around, where he’s writing and drawing in it from time to time. The journal starts months before the game’s plot as Arthur details how things fell apart in his eyes, he’s a beautiful story teller and verges on the edge of being a poet, philosopher. Being an idiot I neglected to read it at first because I hadn’t thought much of Arthur, but once I cracked it open I had to read every single page, I sat on his bed and just went through it before shaving. It’s worth noting that the books in the game are the equivalent of GTA’s TV shows, knock yourselves out! The interesting random things you find on your adventures, Arthur will draw them in his book, it’s heavenly.

The most consistent problems I had in the game were the controls themselves, which is the biggest persisting issue in the game, I encountered frustrating moments from beginning to end. Hitching your horse is a nightmare, it’s such a small thing that never stops, trying to angle the dumb horse you stole just so the game will prompt you to hitch it, and then it wanders off regardless. In fact, angling yourself to interact with something properly is frustrating, trying to properly interact with the world is hard. Riding your horse can be cumbersome and tedious, it’s where you get the best interactions on the road, find the best stuff, but the map is so enormous that a days long ride is genuinely a slow and long distance to travel. I’m a genius so I figured out the fast travel with my camp upgrades quick, but goodness gracious the novelty of galloping wore off. Riding with people should be easier, especially with the cinematic camera and just having to hold X apparently, but that was not the case. It’s exhilarating riding in a posse but can get clunky, and once I found out you could run into trees, it just kept happening…. By the last few chapters of the game glitches seemed to be in abundance, pop in graphics and characters during cutscenes, figures going out of whack.

The biggest flaw with the game is the wanted level bounty system. It could take up to an hour to escape pursuers because they’re always dropped 500 feet in front of wherever you’re heading. Defend yourself and your bounty goes up, considering I had a bounty of $1300 in a single county. Bounty hunters track you to the end of the world and they could get lucky and take you down, after a while of simple travel the rate they came out became hellish. Escaping on foot is all but impossible, I lead a foot chase through a city that racked up $700 in damage, which is a lot!

Despite those flaws, everything else in RDR2 constituted what is a phenomenal experience. The fact that the online component isn’t available yet is the last big takeaway from the overall quality, airgo I have given Red Dead Redemption 2 an:

8/10

I wanted to write about how the original Red Dead Redemption created the absolute perfect foundation for RDR 2. Arthur Morgan more than rubs shoulders with John Marston, it’s a dream come true. There’s an ultimate tragedy fueling the story, it’s seriously the best western story in existence. It’s made my Best 10 stories of all time.

“I gave you all I had…”

-Arthur Morgan