I have to admit that Red Dead Redemption wasn’t on my radar. Perhaps I’m sandboxed-out, punished by the grueling grind of GTA IV or drained by the surprisingly fun Red Faction: Guerrilla, but when the game was announced I promptly swept it under my “Not Interested” rug.
After spending some time with the game at PAX East, Red Dead is now sitting on the rug. No, better yet: Red Dead is hovering above my cherry wood floor with a spotlight on it.
One of the biggest complaints I have with open-world games is that they tend to be lifeless. Yes, there is always a mission or sidequest to go on, but when walking through the streets of a city the interaction of a main character is limited to picking a fight with a prostitute or running for 10 minutes between accessible buildings. Doors, it always seemed, would never open unless they were a specific location that was crucial to the story. With the Grand Theft Auto series, Rockstar’s games seemed to epitomize these so-real-they’re-dead worlds.
Red Dead Redemption doesn’t fall into this trap, at least not from what we’ve played. The world, an incredibly dusty and rough desert devoid of people, seems more lifelike than any that draw inspiration from a real-world American locale. The wild animals graze and hunt, settlers occasionally ride by on horse-drawn carriages, and tumbleweeds bounce around among the buildings in small towns.
By focusing on the style of the game’s time period rather than any specific location, the developers were able to concentrate on my interactions with every detail. Going from one target to the next on a mission was no longer a chore, as along the way I was able to rope horses, hunt and skin wolves (awesome!), and even take out a family in a carriage. That was one of my highlights. In GTA, murdering people on the street resulted in the cops appearing instantly and other clone-like civilians jumping in on the fray, but in Red Dead I was able to enjoy the lawless Wild West, opting to leave the family for the vultures (or other passers by).
The shooting mechanic is an evolution (and slight simplification) of the one found in GTA IV. The addition of what seemed like a nice “snap” when locking onto the enemies, along with an average cover mechanic, made for a pleasant and gripping series of gunfights. In one situation, I was placed in the middle of a gunfight in a small town. As I ducked behind barrels and gates and picked off gang members one-by-one, bullets fired from inside bar windows whizzed by my character’s head.
The developer we spoke with mentioned inspiration drawn from classic Westerns like “Unforgiven” and “The Wild Bunch”, in which gun fights were methodical and purposeful, and how RDR is designed to capture this with its very deliberate shooting style. Chaotic blind fire isn’t an option; each shot needs to be well-placed and well thought-out. It’s this attention to detail that has Red Dead feeling like an on-going adventure instead of a mission-based open world.
The visuals are stunning. Capturing the desolation of the early frontier Redemption parallels the look of Fallout 3, but with less nuclear chaos and more pre-industrialization and savagery. Witnessing the dust shift with the wind along the paths in the town (remember: this is before paved roads) can leave a gamer feeling like someone with a rifle is always watching them; I know I did.
Multiplayer details are scarce, and the developers didn’t want to speak too much about it, but did mention that questions would be answered shortly.
Red Dead Redemption‘s stylized Western world arrives on May 18th. Circle your calendars and prep your wallets, because this may be a GOTY contender in the waiting.
Images courtesy Rockstar Games
2 Comments