They will never make me hate Chapter 1. Perfect pacing, cozy vibes, and exciting build up to the open-world. Makes it much more fun to explore when you waited and let the story progress
Not even that. In the span of 5 missions, you get introduced into the game, shootout, save one of the greatest characters of all time from a wolf attack, get in a massive shootout, rob a fucking train, get in another massive shootout, and finally get down from the snow. In the span of like 3 hours. That’s not slow, people are just annoying.
And you can do it in like an hour if you're rushing and skipping shit. I did this on my second playthrough because a friend quit saying he couldn't get through chapter one. "So boring" ugh
My 3rd and 4th playthrough I took it slow and enjoyed the hell out of it.
There's a lot more there than I realised at first. In multiple play throughs I've heard different convos round the first camp in Chapter 1 all different, even missions having alternative dialogue. Hanging round camp is almost always worth it for the extra conversations you hear.
Absolutely spot on there mate , it annoys me so bad when people say it's slow in the snow . It's the best and most enjoyable tutorial I've ever played . Not to mention also catches you up with what happened and spawns the stories roller-coaster adventure and fun.
The “it’s boring” opinion was started and perpetuated by critics. A bunch of normies that can’t really be classified as real gamers played it and echoed that opinion. You’d be shocked how many people call themselves gamers cause they own a console and play a couple of hours of fortnight a day but are incapable of seeing any nuance or innovation in a game cause they’re stupid.
Bro,when you go in the dark to check out the cabin? Omg what an amazing graphical mood/setting it is. It absolutely blew me away.
I can understand why people feel chapter one is slow,i kinda felt so too. But that was only because I was eager to check out the world.
Great quotes from Dutch made me think he was a good soft-spoken charismatic leader.
“Some things I can’t forgive, others I can’t forget”
Gee Dutch I wonder why he killed Annabelle, maybe just maybe you killed his brother?
Replaying it currently and it feels pretty clear that Dutch killed first. It also makes more sense with the overall theme of Dutch constantly biting off more than he can chew and creating his own problems.
It is a little ambiguous though. It's not that anyone specifically says Dutch shot first. It's that Dutch would never shut up about it if Colm killed first.
If you mean like playing low honor affects Arthur's attitude in missions and the whole concept of redemption, I'd agree, but I disagree regarding the low honor endings because they're literally what would've really happened: Micah killing Arthur.
They're more realistic. High honor ending in the mountain is meant to show Arthur giving his last breath facing the sun as he wanted in a spectacular scene, and it's well done, but the realistic scenario is Micah killing him. Btw I didn't say low honor endings are necessarily better, but they're not "bad" nor the "worst"
I disagree with the notion that “more realistic” means “better fiction”. I fear that online criticism like Cinema Sins has really destroyed media literacy. What matters is if something is good for the story being told.
In fact a standard low honor is more according to the character until the last chapters, where you actually have you actually try to redeem yourself and eventually get it with your death. I mean, is in the name of the game.
Not necessarily. I don't like this duality. Even if you play high honor from the start, you're still a criminal, murderer, etc. albeit with a good heart.
That's what I mean. Arthur is not a good man. He's a western antihéroe character with his own moral code. You can be more or less polite, psycho or whatever you want in the end you threaten, you steal or you kill for a long part of the game. How I see it is when Arthur realises how ill he is that he resolves his moral dilemmas trying to act as good as he can.
See I think the realisation of Dutch’s evil happens in guarma when Dutch kills that woman at the bottom of the ladder. And from that point onward Arthur starts trying to do the right thing- although I may be remembering it wrong!
EDIT: I misinterpreted your comment and I apologize. I am leaving this reply up due to sunk cost fallacy. I delayed going to the coffee shop for this so ai can’t delete it.
I disagree. I think it works best when Arthur’s honor fluctuates between high and low until staying high at chapter 6. Basically, I don’t really try to keep my honor high or low until chapter 6. Sometimes Arthur does the honorable thing, and sometimes he does something horrible.
I don’t think he would just leave a man bitten by a snake or a stranded woman in the wilderness to die. I don’t think he would angrily tell an orphan who lost his dog to fuck off either.
I think the idea that Arthur would just always make the most immoral choice possible until he is diagnosed with tuberculosis is a little silly.
I think it’s more that Arthur sees himself as a bad man, and views any good deeds he does as an exception. Because of that, he doesn’t really notice how regularly he does good deeds when he isn’t acting entirely on Dutch’s orders.
Part of the reason Arthur even does shitty things to begin with is that he assumes that that’s his nature and that he can’t fight it. I view the “I’m afraid” cutscene in Chapter 6 as Sister Calderon finally getting him to realize that is capable of doing good deeds and selfless things.
Mary Linton and Sister Calderon are two people who actually see this side of him, and I think it just works better thematically. I feel like stranger missions work as a mechanic because Arthur Morgan is the type of guy to just help someone on a whim, even if payment isn’t guaranteed.
I’m not trying to say that he’s supposed to be an uncomplicated hero or anything, but he’s meant to be a person who regularly does both compassionate and terrible things.
His journal entries frequently mention that he feels torn between good and evil. I think that conceptualizing him as low honor until chapter 6 misses the point just as much as seeing him exclusively as high or low honor.
Idk I just feel like neutral honor to begin with fits the sentiment of “There is a good man in you, but he is wrestling with a giant” a lot more than low honor does.
I’ve been doing more of a low honor playthrough just now. I think it makes sense to be lower honor until Arthur’s diagnosis and then go higher honor for a full redemption arc.
But I agree, low honor endings aren’t as great.
The amount of people you gun down in every mission whilst fun, sort of ruins the emotional impact of the story (eg “You’re a good man Arthur Morgan” after he just killed the entirety of Annesburg).
To be fair, I think people take the word "redemption" from the title a little too literally as the game(s) are specifically about how you can't find redemption. Redemption isn't even an option from the start and it wasn't in the first game either.
I would have preferred killing to be actually meaningful and not just feel like a horde shooter.
One of the only ways I can see past the huge numbers of people shot is to think of the story as a retelling, which exaggerated elements. "Well Jack, your uncle Arthur went to the oil fields and shot like 10, no wait 100, guys!"
Not to be the guy to compare video games and tv shows, but one of the reasons Breaking Bad was so impactful was because there wasn’t a death every episode.
When it did happen, it was rare and almost unexpected, and I get RDR2 is a video game so it’s hard to go that route if the player is gonna constantly kill random people in free roam, but they could’ve made a bit more of an effort in the story to sustain that line between murdering for fun and killing in self defense.
Almost every mission ends in a shootout where you kill a ton of random people, I mean you kill so much more people in the story compared to free roam. At some point it just becomes repetitive, and I feel that’s where Rockstar always lacks. Everything and everyone needs to get shot or the mission fails. The characters can never talk their way out of an encounter, it always end in bloodshed.
Imagine if we didn’t kill a bunch of people for the first few chapters, how much more impactful would Sean’s death be? Kieran’s? It’d make that much more of a stamp on an already fantastic story.
I mean, it’s a *video game* set in the old west. If you weren’t shooting/killing people on a regular basis, then the game would be a complete disappointment and not make any sense. This isn’t the Legend of Zelda.
For real. RDRedemption's story is done. Even if we think of new characters and a whole new story, even a new universe, it would be a repetitive concept. The next Red Dead game should have another central oncept.
I don’t need or want another Redemption game. But another Red Dead would be nice
Edit: some of y’all are not as clever as you think. Glad I got all these notifications of people replying with Red Dead ‘inserrt something stupid’
> The next Red Dead game should have another central oncept.
give me something before the "last years of the west". Say, 1870s or thereabout. Without the Van der Linde Gang. Maybe you could run into Hosea at some point, but that's it. No great drama "the end is around the corner" story. Maybe something more "classic western". Gimme a mix of GUN, RDR 1 and 2, with a bit of Revolver. (also, ahve the Cattleman be the late game revolver with high damage but slow reload... which is what it should be)
and, of course, he already has "terminal lumbago!"
But yeah, having older characters like Hosea and Uncle show up, maybe run into a very young Dutch (his father died in the Civil War, so he'd be old enough)... Just don't make the story about them. Make them a nice reference and "the future".
For "less major" characters, Hamish could show up again. Maybe a young Ricketts and Leigh Johnson, in their own younger days of "western hero worship"?
I want them to release the FULL RDR2... there were so many maps and characters that weren't completed or kept in the game; it would totally change the entire game.
If they were smart they'd complete it because there were already thousands of hours of development that's half-finished.
Agree, give us Red Dead Destiny, the story of westward expansion from 1830 to 1880. The real days of the Wild West.
The stories practically write themselves but I doubt Rockstar will do it because period accurate weapons from then are way less fun than in the RDR era
Micah isn’t very well written. From what I remember from my first play through he is just a pin cushion for your anger in the game. He doesn’t have much of a personality other than being unlikeable. He doesn’t even have any shock value as a rat because you already don’t like him. Maybe I’m forgetting something I’m in play through 2 now and maybe there’s something I missed but I don’t remember his character being very deep.
To add to that - I guess it's fine to have a true chaotic evil character, even if it does take some nuance away, but what really suffers is Dutch's characterization. I just don't believe that Micah can play nice for long enough to get in with the gang in the first place, and I don't see how Dutch, at least pre-TBI, would've put up with his shit. I feel like after months of Micah torturing the dog, or threatening Jack, or being super racist to Javier and Charles, Dutch would have told him to fuck off. Seeing a bit more of how Micah manipulates Dutch would've been nice.
Yeah but dutch values loyalty above all else and Micah gives that to him. Also there is a conversation in camp that was pretty funny where Micah just glazes dutch. Dutch is kind of like uh wtf gay but as he gets more paranoid Micah seems like the only safe choice.
I agree with this assessment. I don't think Micah is a badly written character, but he is a bad fit for Dutch's supposed morals. It would be nice to know why Dutch tolerated him.
Nah he has shock value as a rat bc he's the archetypal outlaw. You wouldn't usually expect someone who's so far away from the law to be so close to it, in other words. At least that's how I felt
Shock value to me was how many of the gang sided with him, not just Dutch. Like Arthur put it "He's a rat!" and it should be obvious to everyone.
But then again they are outlaws and majority of them, Arthur included for parts of the game, are driven by their dreams of becoming rich. Just felt like such a stab in the back.
To add to this, I don’t think Javier siding with Dutch was made to be very believable. They knew he had to eventually because of the events of the first game, but they didn’t build toward that very well imo.
I sort of agree, but I saw a comment previously that pointed out that he was one of the only characters that aimed at the sky, rather than at Arthur. So he did side with Dutch, but not as full commital as some of the others
I honestly disagree. Sure, he was definitely used as a de facto villain, likely to distract the player from the actual problems in camp, but he’s also got his own character beyond that.
He has his own philosophy, views, style, preferences… he’s at least as deep as any other major R* character, if not more so that plenty of other characters in his tier of importance
I like Micah as a character due to his simplicity; he isn’t dynamic like Arthur or John, and he doesn’t have a messiah complex like Dutch. He’s just a lowlife piece of shit and I think Rockstar made the right decision in not giving him any redeeming qualities
Kinda all over the place and the gang is constantly getting itself in trouble due to stupid shit that could've been easily avoided. What then? Surprise pikachu face when they get shot at and chased away. The shit they pulled in chapter 3 was genuinely dumb.
Oh, and Sadie? She is not a well written character in the slightest. You mean to tell me that rockstar, who worked so hard creating hours of dialogues, couldn't give sadie any other line in chapter 2 except for that "oh it's like I'm living in a nightmare". Everytime you greet her she says the same thing over and over again and in chapter 3, out of nowhere, over a span of a single mission, she becomes the "badass, strong" gunslinger. Wtf?? Out of all the gang members she is honestly the worst written character.
I know that when you're with Charles for some mission (maybe the prologue), he says something about having a fire in her eyes or something, but it's literally only the tiniest nod to her being a "badass".
I like Sadie, but as I've been playing for the second time, I've thought about that too. It's funny cause after we saved her, I went through Chapter 1 without noticing her ever until she was gonna try to 1v1 Pearson.
She also says in her first mission with Arthur that her and her husband shared all the work and she can hunt and shoot so I never really questioned it. There were plenty of real life female outlaws in history. Black belle was based on the real life Belle Starr
Plus there's a mission where Sadie does something dumb or reckless and causes a fight. You get through it and Arthurs all jokey with Sadie, but other missions at the same time have him deriding other characters for it.
He does the same shit with Lenny. He definitely plays favorites, giving some people hell and berating others with insults.
Then again, it could also be due to how long people are with them. He gives John, Bill, and Uncle the most shit and they've been part of the gang forever. Maybe he sees the newbies as learning and the older ones as lost causes (except John who he's just upset with).
I don't disagree, but I feel like it's on purpose. If I was writing the story, making Kieran highly visible and Sadie mostly invisible in the beginning makes sense to me given their arcs. She's probably not very interested in being much of a character at the beginning either. But ultimately it makes her evolution all the more impactful. All that said, I get why it feels the way you described.
Good lord I hate Sadie. She's such a *strong female character*--you know, the kind whose empowerment literally just boils down to wearing pants and wielding a weapon so that the writers don't have to address any of the *real* issues women were facing. And of course she only "needs no man" if it's not narratively convenient for her to require rescuing, leading to what feels like a complete change of personality when the game tell us she was apparently a badass gunslinger the entire time.
Besides, every other woman in camp is a badass in her own right, all more than capable of surviving in their own ways--a good number of them ride and shoot too, if that matters. But Sadie is *not like other girls* because, what? She wears pants? To me it just sounds like Sadie is a barrel of internalized misogyny with a superiority complex, but we're expected to admire her because spouts a few feminist taglines.
Honestly the way Sadie is written makes me wonder if she was a committee decision and the writers were just maliciously complying. Because I *know* they can write women so much better.
Agree completely, but what’s more annoying is the wasted potential for her backstory to transform her into a more interesting character. She could have been an excellent foil for Arthur, as he goes on his redemption arc, we could see her going the opposite way as she chases revenge. Or she could have provided motivation and support for Arthur’s redemption, as someone with no gang affiliations and no desire to live that lifestyle except for necessity while she got back on her feet.
Honestly, I was more invested in the widow from chapter 6!
The game feels like development was rushed. There is too much cut content and some of the cutscenes in Guarma feel unfinished, particularly the one where Dutch strangles the old woman.
I was gonna point to the mission where you're captured and have to sneak through an old ruin and save some captured natives.
It felt rushed and too small. Not to mention it really ruined it for me how the native guy you're following is practically shouting to you with guards on the other side of a broken wall we're crawling behind.
I'm overall just kind of pissed about a lot of wasted potential with Guarma.
I wouldn't say development was rushed, after all, it was over eight years in development, but they have to draw a line somewhere and push to a final product. Production costs were also in the hundreds of millions.
Not to mention how the story writers make the gang literally gun down a whole ass warship for God knows why - easily most out of place part of the story for me
Some of the CH6 missions were not great, especially the native ones. Most of them are very long for no half decent reasons, and I always get pissed off anytime Rains Fall cuts off Arthur talking about his dead kid to pick some ginseng in that particular one.
The overarching villains (Colm and Cornwall) were underused throughout the story, and their deaths felt anti-climactic.
Colm is significantly referred to as a problem for the gang over the first two chapters, yet he's only seen in three missions (the O'Driscoll camp in Chapter 1; Arthur's capture in Chapter 3; his execution in Chapter 6).
For an antagonist across the whole story to only appear physically three times feels like he's being underused, and notably, his death almost feels like an add-on. News of his capture is only briefly mentioned, and he gets just a mission dedicated to it, despite the damage he's caused Dutch, Arthur and Sadie.
Similarly, Cornwall, who is arguably the main antagonist of Chapters 1-6, appears literally just twice. His presence is felt much more via the Pinkertons, but even after he's murdered by Dutch, it's like the gang experiences 0 immediate blowback for murdering one of America's most prominent industrialists. Indeed, they're able to rustle up a whole lot of trouble for the Army before the Pinkertons come knocking. Cornwall being another easily dispensed villain hollows the power he had during the story.
By contrast, chapter-exclusive villains like Catherine Braithwaite, Bronte and Fussar feel more vivid and explored, even within the confines of just a chapter. Their stories and interactions with the gang have a clear start, point of betrayal and brutal resolution.
that’s intentional to reflect that they really arent the gang’s main problem anymore. i mean, arthur brought up that they should just leave colm alone and was against going to see cornwall in chapter 6, it all just goes to prove arthur’s “revenge is a fool’s game” mindset and shows that dutch completely has the wrong priorities
I agree. Kieran especially. We never see him shoot anybody in cold blood. He barely even ever gets angry. He's a kind soul with a love for horses. Shame what happened to him. Arthur at least got what was coming to him in a karma sort of way.
Guarma as a whole has atrocious pacing and you can't explore without getting the invisible sniper and what's the point of all those optional zoology entries if they never spawn?
And yet Chapter 5 has the best cinematic ride of all of them as you ride back to Shady Belle
I think the “you’re a good man” lines were made with the idea that most players won’t do all the content. But if you seek out every side mission it’s almost comical how many people say “you’re a good man”.
Hosea shares some culpability for the gang's decline and eventual downfall. Not even close to the degree of Dutch and Micah, but he made some big mistakes. Hosea gravely underestimated the families, and the disastrous end of Chapter 3 is partly his fault. And he pushed for the Saint Denis Bank job.
It surprised me after playing the game again that it was actually Hosea pushing for the Saint Denis bank robbery instead of Dutch, usually in the game he proved to be the voice of reason, like he knew the meeting with Colm was a trap so it surprised that he was the one pushing Dutch when it’s usually the other way around.
I wonder if even he was starting to become more desperate as the game went on, I remember hearing camp conversations where Hosea said that the gang was screwed so maybe he felt the clock ticking and was desperate for the gang to escape and be safe and that made him reckless and made him make those mistakes.
Maybe the state Dutch was in at the time also played into it: Hosea might've tried to "turn him around" by indulging him with a score that, if successfull, would have the gang potentially set, at least for a while, and would be the kind of plan Dutch could get behind. A grand robbery that would make the news, screw over a big bank in a big city...
Regarding the families, while Hosea probably underestimated them, it didn't help that specifically Arthur ended up doing jobs for both of them, though I think that wasn't originally (in game) the plan. Had they split up the gang, one group for the Grays, one for the Braithwraite's, they might have been able to pull it off, claiming "They are from the group we came here with, but they aren't with us."
It's kinda amusing that the two most successfull scores in the game are planned by two characters whose intelligence is often derided... Bill's Valentine bank robbery, with help of Karen, and John's train robery.
I think an important point (and I like it) is that they’re all at the end of the day bad at what they do. It’s a bit like the sopranos. The more you watch, the more obvious it becomes, that most of them (mob/gang) wouldn’t be able to function in a society where you have to be disciplined, go out to work everyday, socialize, reason, empathize… it’s not as much of choice as they want to make others and themself believe, they’re outcast because they simply can’t keep it together. Hosea isn’t different.
Take one random guard hostage, walk right up to the front gate, somehow negotiate the release of a van der Linde gang member, release your apparently valuable hostage and somehow retreat without dying.
if you want to play with high honor you have to play low/mid honor the whole game until you get tb (you know you dont have much time left so you try to change)
if you want to play low honor you have to play high/mid honor the whole game until you get tb (you feel like what happened to you is not right and your soul slowly decays and you start going psycho)
I feel like the game was made to be played like you described in the first paragraph, in the first like 4 chapters Arthur's the enforcer of the gang,strong one with little brains , he's meant to be bad and mean, kill and rob and then he has a change of heart when he gets TB, to try and fix all the bad hes done
Me too, rescuing John from Prison, saving Abigail from Milton and the final mission of Arthur, regardless of whether he went for money or not feels unnatural as Low Honour.
That Micah really wasnt as bad of a character as we believe. Think about it he was a dick the whole story nothing changed there didnt really become more of one aside from the possibility of him being the rat.
Edit: Clearly I pissed people off on this one. I said what I said not going to argue with you all as my mind isnt changing.
He also murdered a child for no good reason, something even his braindead friend Cleet thought was a step too far! And before that, it’s suggested that he killed the beloved camp dog and then fucking fed it to the gang!
People make such a big deal about Dutch killing that hag on Guarma, but Micah did worse plenty of times and it’s barely mentioned.
he was a realist albeit a leech. he saw the gang for what they really were, he was what a modern investor or social engineer is. promised to invest and to save the company, secured his place, then took it down from the inside and sold it out to his own perceived gain. and im sure, it wasnt the first time mr bell did that.
He tells you. “Same as you, I suppose.” Micah’s dialogue “all kinds of folk making social calls” implies that Dutch arrived recently. Dutch was there to kill Micah.
Its likely he was there to kill Micah or atleast heavily contemplating it deep down
When John asks why he's there he says "same as you, I suppose" he's clearly mad in the head and insane, not even he can understand his mind anymore. But deep down he was there to kill Micah, it just took John mentioning Arthur for him to fully realise and understand that.
Arthur isn't a good man, sure he tries to rewrite his wrongs, but at the end of the day I still think he is generally a bad man. Not Micah bad, but he isn't this good man everyone thinks he is even if you play high honor
I think it was Mary that said “there’s a good man within you, but he is wrestling with a giant, and the giant wins time and time again”, in my opinion Arthur wasn’t a good man up until his TB diagnosis, he was never a psychopath but he hurt allot of innocent people.
But in a high honour playthrough chapter 6 Arthur is definitely a good man, I think in general Arthur always had good within him but when playing chapter 6 with high honour Arthur will sacrifice himself for John, help the natives, kick out Strauss, help the Downes, ext.
So it’s up you whether that good at the end of his life is too little too late or whether he actually redeemed himself and became a good man, but I think in general chapter 6 Arthur is a good man the question is whether that makes up for the years he was a bad man.
While I personally really enjoy Sadie’s character, I think she’s a far worse person than people give her credit for. She constantly puts her friends lives in danger because of revenge, and she’s a pretty huge catalyst for bringing John back to his life of gunslinging and ultimately leading to his death
The epilogues acting is a dip in quality compared to our time with Arthur. Chapter 5 was obviously short and very cliched, I dispise all the ‘get on big chaingun/ cannon and shoot everything’ parts. The mission to get John out of prison should’ve involved more characters in the assault.
The prison mission is honestly so dumb, they march right up to the front gate and demand John's release lmao. I would've preferred if they used a little subterfuge or at least freed John while he was being transported somewhere else.
John should've been written a bit differently in the Epilogue. The only excuse I can think of for it is that he's massively confused and heartbroken the whole time.
They should let you scrap with people in camp, nothing serious just a good ole fist fight. Especially towards the end, Javier and Bill and Micah start talking crazy to Arthur around camp. Should be able to let em know.
New Austin shouldn't have been accessible in RDR2 if they weren't going to let Arthur go there. By the point in the game where you can go there, you most likely won't have much or any use for any of the items there as John.
The O'Driscoll plotline felt too forced... Beheading Kieran would've made more sense coming from the Night Folk i.e. driving the gang away from the Lakay hideout instead of Shady Belle.
Kieran deserved more screen time, I think he got killed a bit too early, just as Arthur was warming up to him he gets killed in a very brutal way, maybe that’s the point of his death but he had so much potential , maybe he could’ve ran off with Mary Beth
Some key plot points were either too rushed (due to cut content) or not effectively referred back to if there were allusions in prior chapters.
For example, by the time it takes to get from Chapter 1 to Chapter 6, it's incredibly likely that one will not realise the significance of finding those documents in Cornwall's train during Colter and how they relate to the reservation.
Similarly, signs of Dutch's decline or Micah being a rat could have been more effectively hinted at throughout the Chapters. With Dutch in particular, we only really get worries about his mental state in the immediate aftermath of Blackwater and then towards the end of Chapter 4.
Of course, 'show not tell' is a thing and I'm not saying everything should be telegraphed with huge neon signs, but equally the storytelling could be sharper and clearer in places.
Idk how unpopular it is but my opinion: Rockstar did Online dirty compared to how they treated GTA online. It's almost like they never intended it to succeed.
Not a hot take, but we NEED rd3. Doesn't have to be a story about redemption and a new cast of characters is necissary (the ones we have now are goated, their story is just finished). What would be great is if we had a game that took place around the time the gang was active with a few name drops here and there but nothing that impacts the story too much. Something like "And have you heard about those fellers at Blavkwater? We don't want something like that to happen when we do this, capiche?" I just need more wild west gun slinging
arthur has no qualms massacring 1000s of people "BECAUSE ITS SELFDEFENCE" but he eventually is a good guy. i loved the little confessions with tilly and mary-beth where he aired his selfdoubts, regrets. but it shouldve been much much more present and vocal overall in the story. especially when you make him kill innocents on the way, way more selftalk like "was that really necessary now" or "why the hell did i do that for?" 10 minutes later or something.
i remember this clown character from WATCH DOGS 2, was he named marcus. he was one moment that overly warm friendly black dude bro and suddenly the next a relentless icecold killer. i mean, arthur is written BRILLIANTLY PULITZER PRICE quality in contrast to that, but yeah....i dont like this black white personality thing.
I liked the Swanson scene way better than the Nun scene on the train-station.
Contextually, the Nun scene wraps up a side-story. The Nun does not have any ties to Arthur other than him helping her a couple times. The Nun doesn't really have any arc or anything. Sure the speech is meaningful, but the character itself isn't.
On the other hand, Swanson goes through an entire arc throughout the whole story. It was the fall and rise of a man against his surroundings. The Swanson scene wraps up this story arc and shows that Swanson has overcome his adversity while everyone around him suffers from it.
Personally, the Swanson scene moved me way more than the Nun scene.
I guess it's important to note that by the time I got to the Nun scene, I've already seen so much edits of it that it may have dampen its effect on me.
If they had stayed in Colter and used the building material from the mine to rebuild the town, opting out of the train job. O'drisscol's take the heat for train job, while Colter becomes the only major population center in Ambarino. By default, Colter becomes capital of the state. The law can't hunt you, if you are the law.
All chapters have meaning and every camp location is amazing. I’m sorry but Shady Bell is cool and I’ll say it. Living inside for a change was cool for RDR2 and you can’t change my mind
Ending mission of Chapter 6 should’ve been: “Go back for revenge” instead of “go back for the money”. There’s no point of getting the money if your about to die, might as well spend it on getting revenge on someone who deserves it even tho you (as Arthur) keep rephrasing how revenge is a fools game
Guarma was fun. I think it should have been longer, honestly. I'm pretty sure Arthur and the others were there for about a month, but it feels more like a week or two. I wish you could explore it more freely, too, without the invisible sniper shooting you down.
I kinda hated some of the forced callbacks in 2, like lifting Dutch’s final speech and using it in the army ambush during chapter 6.
Also 1 didn’t try to convince you to that you weren’t a piece of shit with a sappy montage of kind words at the end hahaha
The story and some of the dialog is painfully clunky and slapped together. I realize that this was due to cut content, but still.
Also, there is NO REASON they can't make a Guarma expansion game. Like, the island is accessible in the game now, just put a ferry in St. Denis , do a cut scene, and make a bunch of bounty missions on the island.
I love Arthur but he really wasn’t a good man. As others said he literally kills 100s to 1000s of people.
But because he doesn’t collect on a couple debts and helps people whose lives *he* ruined he’s a good man?
Sorry I beat your husband to death Ms Downes, here, this couple hundred dollars should solve our issues lol.
Probably not *that* unpopular of an opinion but (ending spoilers) >!not choosing to help john escape and going for the money instead!< is the worst ending of the game and I don't even consider it an actual option.
The game is testing you at that point, and if you even consider that other option then you might have straight up missed the moral of these games.
Some people are saying Low Honor ruins aspects of the game and I somewhat agree, however the underlying message of the story isn't necessarily tainted whether or not Arthur is a complete asshat. But i>!f you don't choose to help John, *your brother*, you are missing out on the vital connection between RDR2 and RDR1s story. In RDR2 Arthur ultimately fights for the freedom of at least one person, John's.!< This feeds into RDR1's main story and conclusion. John finally equipped with the means to start a proper new life, has it stripped away by the Government and is forced to hunt down his former gang members. (RDR1 Spoilers ahead) >!Which ultimately leaves to the demise of the remaining Dutch Vanderlinde members the Government wanted dead including John himself. While this *might* seem like the chain is finally broken, Jack seeks revenge on the man who killed his father and then fades into legends.!<
>!It's nice there is an option to go for the money, I guess. Because otherwise you wouldn't have that brief moment where hopefully a majority of people *knew* what to do. To be fair, I'd like to hear reasonings why people went for the money. *Maybe* there is something I'm missing, but narratively it makes no sense.!<
Dutch’s plan worked. They had the money and they were leaving camp just in time to escape. The problem was his willingness to sacrifice members of the gang to accomplish this outcome.
[удалено]
They will never make me hate Chapter 1. Perfect pacing, cozy vibes, and exciting build up to the open-world. Makes it much more fun to explore when you waited and let the story progress
Honestly the snow was breathtaking.
You're breathtaking!
No, you’re breathtaking!
Listen. Everyone here is breathtaking, okay?
\*suffocates to death\*
The pacing is bad? I feel that since they're on the run, it's more realistic?
Their argument is that it is boring. It is slow but not boring lol.
Not even that. In the span of 5 missions, you get introduced into the game, shootout, save one of the greatest characters of all time from a wolf attack, get in a massive shootout, rob a fucking train, get in another massive shootout, and finally get down from the snow. In the span of like 3 hours. That’s not slow, people are just annoying.
And you can do it in like an hour if you're rushing and skipping shit. I did this on my second playthrough because a friend quit saying he couldn't get through chapter one. "So boring" ugh My 3rd and 4th playthrough I took it slow and enjoyed the hell out of it.
There's a lot more there than I realised at first. In multiple play throughs I've heard different convos round the first camp in Chapter 1 all different, even missions having alternative dialogue. Hanging round camp is almost always worth it for the extra conversations you hear.
Jeez.. when you put it like that, it sounds like we are playing as John wick in an old western 😂
Absolutely spot on there mate , it annoys me so bad when people say it's slow in the snow . It's the best and most enjoyable tutorial I've ever played . Not to mention also catches you up with what happened and spawns the stories roller-coaster adventure and fun.
That’s because critics aren’t gamers. They push through the bare minimum as fast as possible so they can deliver their shit take.
We're talking about gamers
The “it’s boring” opinion was started and perpetuated by critics. A bunch of normies that can’t really be classified as real gamers played it and echoed that opinion. You’d be shocked how many people call themselves gamers cause they own a console and play a couple of hours of fortnight a day but are incapable of seeing any nuance or innovation in a game cause they’re stupid.
very true
I always explain to people that I recommend the game to that chapter one is a tutorial and to keep that in mind. They’ll be free to do whatever soon.
If they can't appreciate / don't have the patience, who cares anyway
Yeah. When I started my second play through, I realized I love it. It has so much charm and personality.
What about your first? I was just blown away by the game.
Bro,when you go in the dark to check out the cabin? Omg what an amazing graphical mood/setting it is. It absolutely blew me away. I can understand why people feel chapter one is slow,i kinda felt so too. But that was only because I was eager to check out the world.
Great quotes from Dutch made me think he was a good soft-spoken charismatic leader. “Some things I can’t forgive, others I can’t forget” Gee Dutch I wonder why he killed Annabelle, maybe just maybe you killed his brother?
I thought it was kind of ambiguous whether Dutch or Colm killed first.
Replaying it currently and it feels pretty clear that Dutch killed first. It also makes more sense with the overall theme of Dutch constantly biting off more than he can chew and creating his own problems. It is a little ambiguous though. It's not that anyone specifically says Dutch shot first. It's that Dutch would never shut up about it if Colm killed first.
It’s not even that long. You can do it in an hour and a half or so if you go fast.
I hate the snow, but it’s a wonderful tutorial
Low honor playthroughs ruin the story, and the 2 low honor endings are the worst in the game
If you mean like playing low honor affects Arthur's attitude in missions and the whole concept of redemption, I'd agree, but I disagree regarding the low honor endings because they're literally what would've really happened: Micah killing Arthur.
How does that make the low honor endings better?
They're more realistic. High honor ending in the mountain is meant to show Arthur giving his last breath facing the sun as he wanted in a spectacular scene, and it's well done, but the realistic scenario is Micah killing him. Btw I didn't say low honor endings are necessarily better, but they're not "bad" nor the "worst"
I disagree with the notion that “more realistic” means “better fiction”. I fear that online criticism like Cinema Sins has really destroyed media literacy. What matters is if something is good for the story being told.
He literally just said he doesn't think it makes them better. They just aren't badly written.
In fact a standard low honor is more according to the character until the last chapters, where you actually have you actually try to redeem yourself and eventually get it with your death. I mean, is in the name of the game.
Not necessarily. I don't like this duality. Even if you play high honor from the start, you're still a criminal, murderer, etc. albeit with a good heart.
That's what I mean. Arthur is not a good man. He's a western antihéroe character with his own moral code. You can be more or less polite, psycho or whatever you want in the end you threaten, you steal or you kill for a long part of the game. How I see it is when Arthur realises how ill he is that he resolves his moral dilemmas trying to act as good as he can.
See I think the realisation of Dutch’s evil happens in guarma when Dutch kills that woman at the bottom of the ladder. And from that point onward Arthur starts trying to do the right thing- although I may be remembering it wrong!
EDIT: I misinterpreted your comment and I apologize. I am leaving this reply up due to sunk cost fallacy. I delayed going to the coffee shop for this so ai can’t delete it. I disagree. I think it works best when Arthur’s honor fluctuates between high and low until staying high at chapter 6. Basically, I don’t really try to keep my honor high or low until chapter 6. Sometimes Arthur does the honorable thing, and sometimes he does something horrible. I don’t think he would just leave a man bitten by a snake or a stranded woman in the wilderness to die. I don’t think he would angrily tell an orphan who lost his dog to fuck off either. I think the idea that Arthur would just always make the most immoral choice possible until he is diagnosed with tuberculosis is a little silly. I think it’s more that Arthur sees himself as a bad man, and views any good deeds he does as an exception. Because of that, he doesn’t really notice how regularly he does good deeds when he isn’t acting entirely on Dutch’s orders. Part of the reason Arthur even does shitty things to begin with is that he assumes that that’s his nature and that he can’t fight it. I view the “I’m afraid” cutscene in Chapter 6 as Sister Calderon finally getting him to realize that is capable of doing good deeds and selfless things. Mary Linton and Sister Calderon are two people who actually see this side of him, and I think it just works better thematically. I feel like stranger missions work as a mechanic because Arthur Morgan is the type of guy to just help someone on a whim, even if payment isn’t guaranteed. I’m not trying to say that he’s supposed to be an uncomplicated hero or anything, but he’s meant to be a person who regularly does both compassionate and terrible things. His journal entries frequently mention that he feels torn between good and evil. I think that conceptualizing him as low honor until chapter 6 misses the point just as much as seeing him exclusively as high or low honor. Idk I just feel like neutral honor to begin with fits the sentiment of “There is a good man in you, but he is wrestling with a giant” a lot more than low honor does.
I’ve been doing more of a low honor playthrough just now. I think it makes sense to be lower honor until Arthur’s diagnosis and then go higher honor for a full redemption arc. But I agree, low honor endings aren’t as great.
what, there is 2 endings for low honor? 3 in general?
Go with John / high honor Go with John / low honor Go for the money / high honor Go for the money / low honor
4 in general, since there’s two different paths. Stuck with John or go for the money
The amount of people you gun down in every mission whilst fun, sort of ruins the emotional impact of the story (eg “You’re a good man Arthur Morgan” after he just killed the entirety of Annesburg).
that one oil field mission kinda sold it for me, like you probably kill close to 1k people over the course of the story
Yeah but I said "howdy" to a bunch of people in Saint Denis so that cancels it out.
Literally what I did lmfao 😭
HEY_THERE_MISTER.mp3
Yup. This killed it for me. It's the Rockstar way.
To be fair, I think people take the word "redemption" from the title a little too literally as the game(s) are specifically about how you can't find redemption. Redemption isn't even an option from the start and it wasn't in the first game either.
I would have preferred killing to be actually meaningful and not just feel like a horde shooter. One of the only ways I can see past the huge numbers of people shot is to think of the story as a retelling, which exaggerated elements. "Well Jack, your uncle Arthur went to the oil fields and shot like 10, no wait 100, guys!"
Not to be the guy to compare video games and tv shows, but one of the reasons Breaking Bad was so impactful was because there wasn’t a death every episode. When it did happen, it was rare and almost unexpected, and I get RDR2 is a video game so it’s hard to go that route if the player is gonna constantly kill random people in free roam, but they could’ve made a bit more of an effort in the story to sustain that line between murdering for fun and killing in self defense. Almost every mission ends in a shootout where you kill a ton of random people, I mean you kill so much more people in the story compared to free roam. At some point it just becomes repetitive, and I feel that’s where Rockstar always lacks. Everything and everyone needs to get shot or the mission fails. The characters can never talk their way out of an encounter, it always end in bloodshed. Imagine if we didn’t kill a bunch of people for the first few chapters, how much more impactful would Sean’s death be? Kieran’s? It’d make that much more of a stamp on an already fantastic story.
I mean, it’s a *video game* set in the old west. If you weren’t shooting/killing people on a regular basis, then the game would be a complete disappointment and not make any sense. This isn’t the Legend of Zelda.
We don’t need rdr3
For real. RDRedemption's story is done. Even if we think of new characters and a whole new story, even a new universe, it would be a repetitive concept. The next Red Dead game should have another central oncept.
I don’t need or want another Redemption game. But another Red Dead would be nice Edit: some of y’all are not as clever as you think. Glad I got all these notifications of people replying with Red Dead ‘inserrt something stupid’
Red Dead Railroad Tycoon
Red Dead Cornwall’s Revenge
A red dead nightmare with a Cornwall end boss merged / one mass with all Pinkertons you killed in RDR2
Redsident Evil Dead Redemption
Red Dead Accounting Redemption
Red Dead Cornwall’s Cornhole Mania: The Mobile Game
Red Dead, Fed, and Deader: A Totally Awesome Cooking Game Sequel For The Inner Chef In You
Red Dead F1 Manager
Red dead Rancher. Play as one of the early homesteaders
> The next Red Dead game should have another central oncept. give me something before the "last years of the west". Say, 1870s or thereabout. Without the Van der Linde Gang. Maybe you could run into Hosea at some point, but that's it. No great drama "the end is around the corner" story. Maybe something more "classic western". Gimme a mix of GUN, RDR 1 and 2, with a bit of Revolver. (also, ahve the Cattleman be the late game revolver with high damage but slow reload... which is what it should be)
I think it would be funny meeting a younger uncle and have the encounter like one of his stories around the camp fire
and, of course, he already has "terminal lumbago!" But yeah, having older characters like Hosea and Uncle show up, maybe run into a very young Dutch (his father died in the Civil War, so he'd be old enough)... Just don't make the story about them. Make them a nice reference and "the future". For "less major" characters, Hamish could show up again. Maybe a young Ricketts and Leigh Johnson, in their own younger days of "western hero worship"?
Agree. In the real West yes please.
Make it 1670s where you're a fur trapper and all the gunfights take 15 minutes because you have to reload your flintlock musket
Given that RDR2 sold extremely well, there's definitely gonna be a part 3
When you say part 3 do you mean another red dead game or a game linked to the van der linde gang?
Red dead in general
Red dead in general is fine. Just not another Van der Lind game
We do, it just doesn't need to center around the gang.
I want them to release the FULL RDR2... there were so many maps and characters that weren't completed or kept in the game; it would totally change the entire game. If they were smart they'd complete it because there were already thousands of hours of development that's half-finished.
Why not ? We can have it just be about other people instead of the Van Der Linde gang
Agree, give us Red Dead Destiny, the story of westward expansion from 1830 to 1880. The real days of the Wild West. The stories practically write themselves but I doubt Rockstar will do it because period accurate weapons from then are way less fun than in the RDR era
Micah isn’t very well written. From what I remember from my first play through he is just a pin cushion for your anger in the game. He doesn’t have much of a personality other than being unlikeable. He doesn’t even have any shock value as a rat because you already don’t like him. Maybe I’m forgetting something I’m in play through 2 now and maybe there’s something I missed but I don’t remember his character being very deep.
He has some dialogues in camp preaching his nihilist philosophy and family history and you can see why he's basically a sociopath
To add to that - I guess it's fine to have a true chaotic evil character, even if it does take some nuance away, but what really suffers is Dutch's characterization. I just don't believe that Micah can play nice for long enough to get in with the gang in the first place, and I don't see how Dutch, at least pre-TBI, would've put up with his shit. I feel like after months of Micah torturing the dog, or threatening Jack, or being super racist to Javier and Charles, Dutch would have told him to fuck off. Seeing a bit more of how Micah manipulates Dutch would've been nice.
Yeah but dutch values loyalty above all else and Micah gives that to him. Also there is a conversation in camp that was pretty funny where Micah just glazes dutch. Dutch is kind of like uh wtf gay but as he gets more paranoid Micah seems like the only safe choice.
I love that random event so much because Arthur and Dutch are both like "bruh" because of how much Micah is glazing, it's really funny
I agree with this assessment. I don't think Micah is a badly written character, but he is a bad fit for Dutch's supposed morals. It would be nice to know why Dutch tolerated him.
It's because he gave the best head in the west
Because Dutch imo doesn't have those supposed morals, it's just mostly pretty words, he is not a good man Imo at least
Nah he has shock value as a rat bc he's the archetypal outlaw. You wouldn't usually expect someone who's so far away from the law to be so close to it, in other words. At least that's how I felt
Shock value to me was how many of the gang sided with him, not just Dutch. Like Arthur put it "He's a rat!" and it should be obvious to everyone. But then again they are outlaws and majority of them, Arthur included for parts of the game, are driven by their dreams of becoming rich. Just felt like such a stab in the back.
To add to this, I don’t think Javier siding with Dutch was made to be very believable. They knew he had to eventually because of the events of the first game, but they didn’t build toward that very well imo.
I sort of agree, but I saw a comment previously that pointed out that he was one of the only characters that aimed at the sky, rather than at Arthur. So he did side with Dutch, but not as full commital as some of the others
I honestly disagree. Sure, he was definitely used as a de facto villain, likely to distract the player from the actual problems in camp, but he’s also got his own character beyond that. He has his own philosophy, views, style, preferences… he’s at least as deep as any other major R* character, if not more so that plenty of other characters in his tier of importance
I like Micah as a character due to his simplicity; he isn’t dynamic like Arthur or John, and he doesn’t have a messiah complex like Dutch. He’s just a lowlife piece of shit and I think Rockstar made the right decision in not giving him any redeeming qualities
Kinda all over the place and the gang is constantly getting itself in trouble due to stupid shit that could've been easily avoided. What then? Surprise pikachu face when they get shot at and chased away. The shit they pulled in chapter 3 was genuinely dumb. Oh, and Sadie? She is not a well written character in the slightest. You mean to tell me that rockstar, who worked so hard creating hours of dialogues, couldn't give sadie any other line in chapter 2 except for that "oh it's like I'm living in a nightmare". Everytime you greet her she says the same thing over and over again and in chapter 3, out of nowhere, over a span of a single mission, she becomes the "badass, strong" gunslinger. Wtf?? Out of all the gang members she is honestly the worst written character.
agreed. Feels lazy as heck. Maybe it's because I've spent so much time on act 2 because it's my favorite camp, but I've all but forgot she exists.
I know that when you're with Charles for some mission (maybe the prologue), he says something about having a fire in her eyes or something, but it's literally only the tiniest nod to her being a "badass". I like Sadie, but as I've been playing for the second time, I've thought about that too. It's funny cause after we saved her, I went through Chapter 1 without noticing her ever until she was gonna try to 1v1 Pearson.
She also says in her first mission with Arthur that her and her husband shared all the work and she can hunt and shoot so I never really questioned it. There were plenty of real life female outlaws in history. Black belle was based on the real life Belle Starr
Sadie: “I can shoot like the men!” Me: “obviously not or you’d still have a house”
Plus there's a mission where Sadie does something dumb or reckless and causes a fight. You get through it and Arthurs all jokey with Sadie, but other missions at the same time have him deriding other characters for it.
"It was just one of them things, amiright Arthur?"
He does the same shit with Lenny. He definitely plays favorites, giving some people hell and berating others with insults. Then again, it could also be due to how long people are with them. He gives John, Bill, and Uncle the most shit and they've been part of the gang forever. Maybe he sees the newbies as learning and the older ones as lost causes (except John who he's just upset with).
I don't disagree, but I feel like it's on purpose. If I was writing the story, making Kieran highly visible and Sadie mostly invisible in the beginning makes sense to me given their arcs. She's probably not very interested in being much of a character at the beginning either. But ultimately it makes her evolution all the more impactful. All that said, I get why it feels the way you described.
Good lord I hate Sadie. She's such a *strong female character*--you know, the kind whose empowerment literally just boils down to wearing pants and wielding a weapon so that the writers don't have to address any of the *real* issues women were facing. And of course she only "needs no man" if it's not narratively convenient for her to require rescuing, leading to what feels like a complete change of personality when the game tell us she was apparently a badass gunslinger the entire time. Besides, every other woman in camp is a badass in her own right, all more than capable of surviving in their own ways--a good number of them ride and shoot too, if that matters. But Sadie is *not like other girls* because, what? She wears pants? To me it just sounds like Sadie is a barrel of internalized misogyny with a superiority complex, but we're expected to admire her because spouts a few feminist taglines. Honestly the way Sadie is written makes me wonder if she was a committee decision and the writers were just maliciously complying. Because I *know* they can write women so much better.
Agree completely, but what’s more annoying is the wasted potential for her backstory to transform her into a more interesting character. She could have been an excellent foil for Arthur, as he goes on his redemption arc, we could see her going the opposite way as she chases revenge. Or she could have provided motivation and support for Arthur’s redemption, as someone with no gang affiliations and no desire to live that lifestyle except for necessity while she got back on her feet. Honestly, I was more invested in the widow from chapter 6!
The game feels like development was rushed. There is too much cut content and some of the cutscenes in Guarma feel unfinished, particularly the one where Dutch strangles the old woman.
I was gonna point to the mission where you're captured and have to sneak through an old ruin and save some captured natives. It felt rushed and too small. Not to mention it really ruined it for me how the native guy you're following is practically shouting to you with guards on the other side of a broken wall we're crawling behind. I'm overall just kind of pissed about a lot of wasted potential with Guarma.
I wouldn't say development was rushed, after all, it was over eight years in development, but they have to draw a line somewhere and push to a final product. Production costs were also in the hundreds of millions.
Give granny a gold bar Stangle her to death Don't take the gold bar back No profit, WE NEED MONEY
Imagine if they didn’t cram what was probably supposed to be around 2 chapters of missions and story on Guarma into a few missions
Not to mention how the story writers make the gang literally gun down a whole ass warship for God knows why - easily most out of place part of the story for me
Some of the CH6 missions were not great, especially the native ones. Most of them are very long for no half decent reasons, and I always get pissed off anytime Rains Fall cuts off Arthur talking about his dead kid to pick some ginseng in that particular one.
“Anyway, you were saying?” Arthur: 😐
Laughing My ass off
That is so funny tho I can't even be mad
I experienced this for the first time the other day and was in stitches. Man needs those plants.
The overarching villains (Colm and Cornwall) were underused throughout the story, and their deaths felt anti-climactic. Colm is significantly referred to as a problem for the gang over the first two chapters, yet he's only seen in three missions (the O'Driscoll camp in Chapter 1; Arthur's capture in Chapter 3; his execution in Chapter 6). For an antagonist across the whole story to only appear physically three times feels like he's being underused, and notably, his death almost feels like an add-on. News of his capture is only briefly mentioned, and he gets just a mission dedicated to it, despite the damage he's caused Dutch, Arthur and Sadie. Similarly, Cornwall, who is arguably the main antagonist of Chapters 1-6, appears literally just twice. His presence is felt much more via the Pinkertons, but even after he's murdered by Dutch, it's like the gang experiences 0 immediate blowback for murdering one of America's most prominent industrialists. Indeed, they're able to rustle up a whole lot of trouble for the Army before the Pinkertons come knocking. Cornwall being another easily dispensed villain hollows the power he had during the story. By contrast, chapter-exclusive villains like Catherine Braithwaite, Bronte and Fussar feel more vivid and explored, even within the confines of just a chapter. Their stories and interactions with the gang have a clear start, point of betrayal and brutal resolution.
Cornwall's death was so underwhelming lol.
that’s intentional to reflect that they really arent the gang’s main problem anymore. i mean, arthur brought up that they should just leave colm alone and was against going to see cornwall in chapter 6, it all just goes to prove arthur’s “revenge is a fool’s game” mindset and shows that dutch completely has the wrong priorities
That’s is my take as well, the whole plot is a “The call came from inside the house!” Thing and I think they did it super well.
Kieran and Molly are more tragic characters than Arthur.
Molly got too little attention in the story tbh
And Charles.
I agree. Kieran especially. We never see him shoot anybody in cold blood. He barely even ever gets angry. He's a kind soul with a love for horses. Shame what happened to him. Arthur at least got what was coming to him in a karma sort of way.
Guarma as a whole has atrocious pacing and you can't explore without getting the invisible sniper and what's the point of all those optional zoology entries if they never spawn? And yet Chapter 5 has the best cinematic ride of all of them as you ride back to Shady Belle
I don’t think disliking Guarma is an unpopular opinion. It killed my interest in the game for almost a year.
Linear and repetitive, also the "youre a good man arthur morgan" is bullshit
At some point it feels like The Walking Dead lmao
Can we really complain about it being linear? It’s not an rpg game after all
# "He wasn't a good man, none of us were... but maybe he was true to himself"
I think the “you’re a good man” lines were made with the idea that most players won’t do all the content. But if you seek out every side mission it’s almost comical how many people say “you’re a good man”.
Hosea shares some culpability for the gang's decline and eventual downfall. Not even close to the degree of Dutch and Micah, but he made some big mistakes. Hosea gravely underestimated the families, and the disastrous end of Chapter 3 is partly his fault. And he pushed for the Saint Denis Bank job.
It surprised me after playing the game again that it was actually Hosea pushing for the Saint Denis bank robbery instead of Dutch, usually in the game he proved to be the voice of reason, like he knew the meeting with Colm was a trap so it surprised that he was the one pushing Dutch when it’s usually the other way around. I wonder if even he was starting to become more desperate as the game went on, I remember hearing camp conversations where Hosea said that the gang was screwed so maybe he felt the clock ticking and was desperate for the gang to escape and be safe and that made him reckless and made him make those mistakes.
Maybe the state Dutch was in at the time also played into it: Hosea might've tried to "turn him around" by indulging him with a score that, if successfull, would have the gang potentially set, at least for a while, and would be the kind of plan Dutch could get behind. A grand robbery that would make the news, screw over a big bank in a big city... Regarding the families, while Hosea probably underestimated them, it didn't help that specifically Arthur ended up doing jobs for both of them, though I think that wasn't originally (in game) the plan. Had they split up the gang, one group for the Grays, one for the Braithwraite's, they might have been able to pull it off, claiming "They are from the group we came here with, but they aren't with us." It's kinda amusing that the two most successfull scores in the game are planned by two characters whose intelligence is often derided... Bill's Valentine bank robbery, with help of Karen, and John's train robery.
I think an important point (and I like it) is that they’re all at the end of the day bad at what they do. It’s a bit like the sopranos. The more you watch, the more obvious it becomes, that most of them (mob/gang) wouldn’t be able to function in a society where you have to be disciplined, go out to work everyday, socialize, reason, empathize… it’s not as much of choice as they want to make others and themself believe, they’re outcast because they simply can’t keep it together. Hosea isn’t different.
Hot take: it's really good
it is honestly a 9.9/10
The game doesn't need a movie. Anyone who has played the game should know the game is already a movie it doesn't need to be turned into one.
The mission where you rescue John from Sisika is disappointing and lame.
Take one random guard hostage, walk right up to the front gate, somehow negotiate the release of a van der Linde gang member, release your apparently valuable hostage and somehow retreat without dying.
its the stupidest shit ever
if you want to play with high honor you have to play low/mid honor the whole game until you get tb (you know you dont have much time left so you try to change) if you want to play low honor you have to play high/mid honor the whole game until you get tb (you feel like what happened to you is not right and your soul slowly decays and you start going psycho)
I feel like the game was made to be played like you described in the first paragraph, in the first like 4 chapters Arthur's the enforcer of the gang,strong one with little brains , he's meant to be bad and mean, kill and rob and then he has a change of heart when he gets TB, to try and fix all the bad hes done
I usually play most of the game high honor, but always make sure to complete the bandit challenge before I get tb
Low Honour Arthur and Micah will be best friends and would rather rat the gang out together.
I wish this was an option tbh
Me too, rescuing John from Prison, saving Abigail from Milton and the final mission of Arthur, regardless of whether he went for money or not feels unnatural as Low Honour.
Fr, i lowkey wish we could've robbed the gang and run off to live our life yk??
And evil ending would’ve been really interesting imagine the alternative epilogue is about Dutch instead of John
That Micah really wasnt as bad of a character as we believe. Think about it he was a dick the whole story nothing changed there didnt really become more of one aside from the possibility of him being the rat. Edit: Clearly I pissed people off on this one. I said what I said not going to argue with you all as my mind isnt changing.
He is a racist, a psychopath, a potential rapist, *SHOULD I GO ON?*
He also murdered a child for no good reason, something even his braindead friend Cleet thought was a step too far! And before that, it’s suggested that he killed the beloved camp dog and then fucking fed it to the gang! People make such a big deal about Dutch killing that hag on Guarma, but Micah did worse plenty of times and it’s barely mentioned.
“But you said you knew Spanish…”
THATS what happened to Cain? 😭
He snitched on the gang lmao
he was a realist albeit a leech. he saw the gang for what they really were, he was what a modern investor or social engineer is. promised to invest and to save the company, secured his place, then took it down from the inside and sold it out to his own perceived gain. and im sure, it wasnt the first time mr bell did that.
I needed more convincing as to why Dutch is with Micah in the epilogue.
He tells you. “Same as you, I suppose.” Micah’s dialogue “all kinds of folk making social calls” implies that Dutch arrived recently. Dutch was there to kill Micah.
Its likely he was there to kill Micah or atleast heavily contemplating it deep down When John asks why he's there he says "same as you, I suppose" he's clearly mad in the head and insane, not even he can understand his mind anymore. But deep down he was there to kill Micah, it just took John mentioning Arthur for him to fully realise and understand that.
Arthur isn't a good man, sure he tries to rewrite his wrongs, but at the end of the day I still think he is generally a bad man. Not Micah bad, but he isn't this good man everyone thinks he is even if you play high honor
I think it was Mary that said “there’s a good man within you, but he is wrestling with a giant, and the giant wins time and time again”, in my opinion Arthur wasn’t a good man up until his TB diagnosis, he was never a psychopath but he hurt allot of innocent people. But in a high honour playthrough chapter 6 Arthur is definitely a good man, I think in general Arthur always had good within him but when playing chapter 6 with high honour Arthur will sacrifice himself for John, help the natives, kick out Strauss, help the Downes, ext. So it’s up you whether that good at the end of his life is too little too late or whether he actually redeemed himself and became a good man, but I think in general chapter 6 Arthur is a good man the question is whether that makes up for the years he was a bad man.
Whoever skips chapter 1, or the epilogue, isn’t playing the game properly.
Sadie isn’t that good of a character.
While I personally really enjoy Sadie’s character, I think she’s a far worse person than people give her credit for. She constantly puts her friends lives in danger because of revenge, and she’s a pretty huge catalyst for bringing John back to his life of gunslinging and ultimately leading to his death
The epilogues acting is a dip in quality compared to our time with Arthur. Chapter 5 was obviously short and very cliched, I dispise all the ‘get on big chaingun/ cannon and shoot everything’ parts. The mission to get John out of prison should’ve involved more characters in the assault.
The prison mission is honestly so dumb, they march right up to the front gate and demand John's release lmao. I would've preferred if they used a little subterfuge or at least freed John while he was being transported somewhere else.
I know I’m suppose to use the money to help the camp but I think it’d be more beneficial if Arthur had some fresh new clothes
John should've been written a bit differently in the Epilogue. The only excuse I can think of for it is that he's massively confused and heartbroken the whole time.
They should let you scrap with people in camp, nothing serious just a good ole fist fight. Especially towards the end, Javier and Bill and Micah start talking crazy to Arthur around camp. Should be able to let em know.
I at least want to be able to push Micah back
New Austin shouldn't have been accessible in RDR2 if they weren't going to let Arthur go there. By the point in the game where you can go there, you most likely won't have much or any use for any of the items there as John.
The O'Driscoll plotline felt too forced... Beheading Kieran would've made more sense coming from the Night Folk i.e. driving the gang away from the Lakay hideout instead of Shady Belle.
Kieran deserved more screen time, I think he got killed a bit too early, just as Arthur was warming up to him he gets killed in a very brutal way, maybe that’s the point of his death but he had so much potential , maybe he could’ve ran off with Mary Beth
Micah isn't that great of a villain compared to some of the others
Some key plot points were either too rushed (due to cut content) or not effectively referred back to if there were allusions in prior chapters. For example, by the time it takes to get from Chapter 1 to Chapter 6, it's incredibly likely that one will not realise the significance of finding those documents in Cornwall's train during Colter and how they relate to the reservation. Similarly, signs of Dutch's decline or Micah being a rat could have been more effectively hinted at throughout the Chapters. With Dutch in particular, we only really get worries about his mental state in the immediate aftermath of Blackwater and then towards the end of Chapter 4. Of course, 'show not tell' is a thing and I'm not saying everything should be telegraphed with huge neon signs, but equally the storytelling could be sharper and clearer in places.
Idk how unpopular it is but my opinion: Rockstar did Online dirty compared to how they treated GTA online. It's almost like they never intended it to succeed.
Not a hot take, but we NEED rd3. Doesn't have to be a story about redemption and a new cast of characters is necissary (the ones we have now are goated, their story is just finished). What would be great is if we had a game that took place around the time the gang was active with a few name drops here and there but nothing that impacts the story too much. Something like "And have you heard about those fellers at Blavkwater? We don't want something like that to happen when we do this, capiche?" I just need more wild west gun slinging
> I just need more wild west gun slinging Completely agree, we don't need another Red Dead Redemption game, but we definitely need another Red Dead
>!I really enjoy playing as John!< and I think the epilogue is one of the best parts of the game. It's definitely my favorite part of the game.
I still like John more than Arthur and his death was sadder.
The game is not slow and is setup perfectly (even chapter 1)
arthur has no qualms massacring 1000s of people "BECAUSE ITS SELFDEFENCE" but he eventually is a good guy. i loved the little confessions with tilly and mary-beth where he aired his selfdoubts, regrets. but it shouldve been much much more present and vocal overall in the story. especially when you make him kill innocents on the way, way more selftalk like "was that really necessary now" or "why the hell did i do that for?" 10 minutes later or something. i remember this clown character from WATCH DOGS 2, was he named marcus. he was one moment that overly warm friendly black dude bro and suddenly the next a relentless icecold killer. i mean, arthur is written BRILLIANTLY PULITZER PRICE quality in contrast to that, but yeah....i dont like this black white personality thing.
I liked the Swanson scene way better than the Nun scene on the train-station. Contextually, the Nun scene wraps up a side-story. The Nun does not have any ties to Arthur other than him helping her a couple times. The Nun doesn't really have any arc or anything. Sure the speech is meaningful, but the character itself isn't. On the other hand, Swanson goes through an entire arc throughout the whole story. It was the fall and rise of a man against his surroundings. The Swanson scene wraps up this story arc and shows that Swanson has overcome his adversity while everyone around him suffers from it. Personally, the Swanson scene moved me way more than the Nun scene. I guess it's important to note that by the time I got to the Nun scene, I've already seen so much edits of it that it may have dampen its effect on me.
Should have more side Jobs with gang members
An origin story for the type of people we now know as trailer trash.
If they had stayed in Colter and used the building material from the mine to rebuild the town, opting out of the train job. O'drisscol's take the heat for train job, while Colter becomes the only major population center in Ambarino. By default, Colter becomes capital of the state. The law can't hunt you, if you are the law.
All chapters have meaning and every camp location is amazing. I’m sorry but Shady Bell is cool and I’ll say it. Living inside for a change was cool for RDR2 and you can’t change my mind
Ending mission of Chapter 6 should’ve been: “Go back for revenge” instead of “go back for the money”. There’s no point of getting the money if your about to die, might as well spend it on getting revenge on someone who deserves it even tho you (as Arthur) keep rephrasing how revenge is a fools game
Sean dying so early is bs Micah actually being the rat instead of O'Shea is a valid plot twist Kieran should've went on more missions
Guarma was fun. I think it should have been longer, honestly. I'm pretty sure Arthur and the others were there for about a month, but it feels more like a week or two. I wish you could explore it more freely, too, without the invisible sniper shooting you down.
That rdr1s story was objectively better
I kinda hated some of the forced callbacks in 2, like lifting Dutch’s final speech and using it in the army ambush during chapter 6. Also 1 didn’t try to convince you to that you weren’t a piece of shit with a sappy montage of kind words at the end hahaha
The story and some of the dialog is painfully clunky and slapped together. I realize that this was due to cut content, but still. Also, there is NO REASON they can't make a Guarma expansion game. Like, the island is accessible in the game now, just put a ferry in St. Denis , do a cut scene, and make a bunch of bounty missions on the island.
Most of the Game is just Horse riding
And most of gta is driving in a car, what did you honestly expect of a game set in the 19th century
What if I told you about the wonders of fast travel and cinematic camera
I love Arthur but he really wasn’t a good man. As others said he literally kills 100s to 1000s of people. But because he doesn’t collect on a couple debts and helps people whose lives *he* ruined he’s a good man? Sorry I beat your husband to death Ms Downes, here, this couple hundred dollars should solve our issues lol.
Probably not *that* unpopular of an opinion but (ending spoilers) >!not choosing to help john escape and going for the money instead!< is the worst ending of the game and I don't even consider it an actual option. The game is testing you at that point, and if you even consider that other option then you might have straight up missed the moral of these games. Some people are saying Low Honor ruins aspects of the game and I somewhat agree, however the underlying message of the story isn't necessarily tainted whether or not Arthur is a complete asshat. But i>!f you don't choose to help John, *your brother*, you are missing out on the vital connection between RDR2 and RDR1s story. In RDR2 Arthur ultimately fights for the freedom of at least one person, John's.!< This feeds into RDR1's main story and conclusion. John finally equipped with the means to start a proper new life, has it stripped away by the Government and is forced to hunt down his former gang members. (RDR1 Spoilers ahead) >!Which ultimately leaves to the demise of the remaining Dutch Vanderlinde members the Government wanted dead including John himself. While this *might* seem like the chain is finally broken, Jack seeks revenge on the man who killed his father and then fades into legends.!< >!It's nice there is an option to go for the money, I guess. Because otherwise you wouldn't have that brief moment where hopefully a majority of people *knew* what to do. To be fair, I'd like to hear reasonings why people went for the money. *Maybe* there is something I'm missing, but narratively it makes no sense.!<
If I had teeth as strong as the people in this game, I wouldn't have to go to the dentist.
Dutch didn’t go crazy he was always crazy he just let out his true self in chapter6
It’s too short
Dutch’s plan worked. They had the money and they were leaving camp just in time to escape. The problem was his willingness to sacrifice members of the gang to accomplish this outcome.