Red Dead Redemption: The Mild Wild West

Red Dead Redemption was one of the games of 2010, and an anticipatory highlight of my own, I’ve been itching to play a stellar Western game since the fun yet flawed Gun back on the big black box. To say that I was excited when Rockstar, one of the most inspired developers out there were returning to the Old West with Red Dead Redemption, would be an understatement. Coupled with the marketing engine going into overdrive and enthusiastic praise from all members of the press my expectations were high. Were they all met? Could they ever have been, given my rose-tinted outlook on the merits of Gun and of past Rockstar games? This review has been a long time coming, and hopefully I can go some way to explain why.

The year 1911, the place; the fictional Mexican border states of New Austin and West Elizabeth. Our protagonist John Marston alights from a ferry into Blackwater, a town on the relentless march to modernisation. There’s even a motor-car being unloaded onto the docks as Mr Marston boards his train and heads West, to the Old West, a place whose values and significance is in decline. When it comes to dealing with intelligent socio-historical discourse Rockstar is second to none and this is certainly true of RDR. Set right at the very end of the Old West’s heyday it provides the perfect setting for the narrative and themes.  You have been tasked with hunting down and through capture or execution, deal with your old brother’s in arms, Dutch’s Gang, a group you rode with till their cheeky capers turned a little sour. However this is no self-appointed task, you have been strong-armed into it by the unscrupulous Bureau at the behest of a Governor whose electoral promises included a reduction in crime. Until your task is done they hold your wife and son, and your life, in the balance.

Having failed to negotiate with a former comrade who shoots you down and leaves you for dead, the first hours of the game are spent in the delightful company of Bonnie MacFarlane, “a woman in a man’s world” learning the ropes of game-play. From horse-breaking, to herding, to shooting pilfering rabbit and coyote all the mechanics work perfectly and provide a sedate introduction into a dauntingly epic world. Roclstar's West is one of the most beautiful environments ever rendered onscreen. Save for the ubiquitous Rockstar minimap, you could be fooled into thinking from a distance that you were playing an actual cow-boy film such is the loving attention to detail. The graphics engine is so sturdy you can ride from the northernmost tip of West Elizabeth to south of Mexico without ever encountering a loading screen or draw distance beyond the realistic field of human vision. The day and night cycle provides some of the most authentic and gorgeous lighting ever experienced, be it the silver-light of the moon in a midnight stroll across the prairie or the blood-red sunset at the top of the Mesas of Mexico. It’s enough to take your breath away. The weather too perfectly immerses you in the environment, from the heat-waves that cause the landscape to shiver before your eyes to the thunderstorms that follow the wind, the downpour filling up potholes in the road and drenching you and your horse. Unlike Grand Theft Auto’s Liberty City, this landscape is populated by animals rather than people, hawks and crows wheel overhead, snakes rattle in the scrub while wolves and bears haunt the mountain forests. Despite the sheer volume of carefully recreated wildlife and dynamic weather effects its hard to escape the feeling that the landscape is a little empty. Perhaps a design-decision you nevertheless feel that the master’s of the “sand-box” game could have done with putting in a few more buckets and toys.

 Accompanying this stunning and geographically varied landscape is a wonderful, pitch-perfect score. Emulating the best of Enrico Morricone to the more recent eeriness of Nick Cave’s score for The Proposition it has everything you would want from an authentic American sound. From twanging banjos, haunting harmonica solos and thrumming bass, the orchestra reacts to the game-play, picking up tempo for a gallop and reaching crescendo as frantic gun-battle comes into play. This blue-grass cleverly mutates into salsa when crossing the border, replete with muted trumpets and the shake of tambourines. The visuals married with this truly wonderful score instantly transport you to a time where those gunslingers that haven’t already bitten the bullet are being hunted to extinction by the inexorable encroachment of federal government and modernisation.

Despite an environment that is both rich in detail as it is in potential, this potential that remains somewhat under-utilised by John Marston’s story and the many elements of game-play. Distractions from the main game fall under the guise of challenges, hunting down treasure from maps, shooting a particular number or species of animals, and the incredibly tiresome picking of flora scattered around the ground. Though you can encounter strangers with various challenges they amount to little more than elaborate fetch-quests or dialogue missions. Given the epic scope of the landscape this kind of facile interaction seems somewhat disappointing.

Traversing the land is done mainly on horseback, and the horses have been expertly recreated from whinnies to tail-swish to undulating muscle tone, unfortunately much of what you see of them is from the back. Your trusty steed can be counted upon to gallop to your side with a quick whistle, a useful if a little oversimplifying addition. Unlike the myriad of satirically named cars from GTA the horses all handle pretty much the same and run at the same pace, with not much in the way of progression, or an incentive to keep the one you have for the mysterious “loyalty bonus.” They also have a tendency to handle badly as only Rockstar modes of transport do, and committing suicide by throwing themselves and me off mountains tops. Cheddar may you rest in peace.

 I have already frequently referenced it, but comparisons between RDR and GTA are both tempting and inescapable.  Not surprising given that the framework of running to different characters on the map at your own leisure in order to begin missions has been carried over, along with that darned useful mini-map,  the only GTAism that looks out of place. Unfortunately whereas GTA IV was truly exciting in its mission variety, with some really stellar set pieces, the Heat style Bank Robbery being an excellent example, most of RDR’s missions boil down to the following formula. Ride to character, listen to excellent dialogue, ride with character to location, become involved with gun-fight, more dialogue, mission end. You know something’s wrong when one of your highlights of the game is winning a game of poker, liar’s dice or a knife twixt the fingers contest.

Though no doubt historically accurate the weapons sound tinny and unsatisfying, the realistic rag-doll physics and Spaghetti Western death-animations not seeming to match up with what you’re holding in your hands. While GTA balanced ammo-capacity, with range and power, in RDR the differences between a Winchester or a Henry Repeater seem nominal. I could go on about how the inclusion of regenerative health and a bullet time feature make J.Marston overpowered but what I found most disappointing is the fact I was meant to be the good-guy. What did I expect? The story is about redemption; both personal and in the eyes of the law, did you really think you’d be knocking boots with authentic period-whores then blasting them with your iron? Well, yes I was hoping...“Sorry miss I’m a married man” Damnit John! I’ll be interpreting the sanctity of the marriage vows if you please. Though flippantly articulated it nevertheless sums up my main gripe with an otherwise brilliantly realised game.

Grand Theft Auto’s Niko Bellic was a perfect anti-hero, you could play him as an utter sociopath or reluctant criminal, in RDR there’s only the incentive to be good, accentuated by an unnecessary morality gauge. If you’re good, people give you discounts, if you’re bad, a price is put on your head and people don’t tip your hat to you in the street. I wanted to rob trains, hold-up wagons, blow up banks, instead the closest I got to villainy was burning down huts with Molotov cocktails for a disreputable Mexican despot.

Red Dead Redemption is a gorgeous game, with innumerable touches that make exploration of the world rewarding and astounding. The story is right on the money in terms of setting, execution and tone from promising beginning to nihilistic end. Unfortunately both the story and the world hold it back from being the anarchic, grisly hilarity that makes GTA IV so much fun. Arguably I was a victim of my own expectations, placing far too much hope that it would combine the epic scale and professionalism of Rockstar’s games with a little bit of Gun style head asplosding and horse riding thrown in. I hope Rockstar return to their own vision of the Old West, only this time give me a reason to shoot a train-driver and all his passengers, other than to liven up yet another dreary horse-ride.