Izack Seahorn
Contributor
Draven Jackson
Arts and Entertainment Editor
Rockstar Games (R*) is set to dominate the gaming world in just over a week with the Oct. 26 release of its most ambitious work yet, “Red Dead Redemption 2.”
“Red Dead 2” is the prequel to R*’s 2010 hit “Red Dead Redemption,” an open-world game set in the Wild West in 1911 that focuses primarily on the outlaw John Marston, the character players discover the Red Dead world through.
“Red Dead Redemption 2” tells the story of the events which took place before the plotline of the first Red Dead game. The new game holds to the western theme, kicking it up a notch with more detailed graphics and insane and unique storylines.
According to the gaming news source Gamespot, “eight Rockstar studios around the globe are putting bits and pieces of eight different games into Red Dead Redemption 2,” such as “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas,” “Max Payne 3” and “Bully.”
In “Red Dead 2,” players play as Arthur Morgan, a crucial member and second-in-command of the Dutch van der Linde Gang. Throughout the game, players will perform various activities with the gang, such as robbing trains, holding up stores, bank heists and more.
There are going to be a lot of amazing features to this new game. Interactions with non-player characters (NPCs) is super detailed and in-depth, with the NPCs remembering these interactions later in the game and acting accordingly — for example, if players get in a bar fight while playing the game, the people of the town will remember the next time the player comes to visit or the bartender will refuse to serve Arthur the next time he comes around.
“Red Dead 2” is an open-world game, meaning that players don’t have to follow any sort of questline or storyline like they might in other games. While there are questlines set up to be played through, it isn’t required for players to follow those — they can fish, play poker, explore the Wild West, etc.
Think of it as a virtual “Westworld:” all the fun of freely exploring the Wild West without the overwhelming fear of being killed by robots.
“Red Dead 2,” the brainchild of all eight R* branches, has taken eight years to create, but many gamers will agree it has been well worth the wait.
The game looks to revolutionize gaming. According to IGN.com, while games like “The Witcher 3,” which was one of the best role-playing games as far as dialogue in 2015, had 450,000 words during the course of the game’s script, “Red Dead 2” will have 500,000 lines of dialogue within the script, far exceeding previous gaming dialogue bests.
Another important element to “Red Dead 2” which makes it so important to the future of gaming is its close attention to detail. If a player kills someone, hunts an animal or falls in mud, for example, the elements will stick to their clothes like they would in real life, which will cause NPCs to react accordingly from shock, disgust, alarm, etc.
Another thing is that in most games if a player kills something or hunts an animal and the player walks away, that person or animal’s body will despawn because it no longer has a need to be there. However, in “Red Dead 2,” bodies will decay in real time during the game’s day and night cycle.
These are just some of the reasons why “Red Dead 2” is such a phenomenon and topic of conversation in the gaming world right now. For anyone wanting to experience these unique features themselves, they can preorder the game on Playstation 4 or Xbox One via the marketplace located on the console or it can be picked up at your local game store on Oct. 26.
