Before I played this game, I completely misunderstood it. I thought it was an overrated walking simulator. I couldn't comprehend how so many people liked this game as much as they did. But now, after having the chance to play it myself, and pouring 72 hours into the game, I can proudly say this:

I get it. I finally get it.

Red Dead Redemption 2 feels like a game I want to endlessly write about, but I just can't find the right words to describe how phenomenal this title is. Everything about this game is amazing. This game is a result of over 8 years of dedication and passion put into it. It's a technical and artistic achievement by all means. It's one of the greatest videogames ever made, and I am happy that I was finally able to realize that.

I'd like to go more in depth of my thoughts on this game, but I am still grasping the fact that I even played this videogame. This is my first Rockstar game ever, so I hope to experience some of their other games in the future. I can say for sure that I'll be playing Red Dead Redemption 1 soon. Very soon. I'd also like to mention that this is the first time I ever log a game without actually finishing it. Yes, I've seen the ending of the main story, but I haven't finished the epilogue and haven't actually rolled credits on the game yet.

"May I stand unshaken
Amid, amidst a crash of worlds"

Rarely have I ever felt so many conflicting emotions and the feeling of having so much to say after playing a video game. There is so much that I absolutely despise about RDR2, but on the other hand, there is even much more which I truly love and appreciate. I have to start this by saying that I did start this game earlier this year and I couldn’t believe how boring and daunting it’s opening was, I was almost shocked by just how horrible it was to go through that I couldn’t continue past the first 3 missions. I decided to pick it up back again last week to truly give it chance from beginning to end and to actually give an informed opinion on all its aspects not just its lackluster opening, so when I found most of my problems and even more present for like 13 hours I certainly was annoyed to say the least. The pacing and structure of the first 2 chapters is genuinely insane, it didn’t even feel like I was playing a game or having fun it just felt like a slog and I would even say straight up that it felt like a chore. It felt like a 13 hour long of boring missions which are literally just there to introduce mechanics. Add Rockstar’s horrible mission design that almost everyone on god’s green earth complained about to these problems and you find me almost throwing my whole console through the window. There is nothing and I do mean nothing that grabbed my interest in those first 2 chapters except trying to guess how horrible blackwater was for these characters. I was therefore very glad when the game finally started to pick up the pace and started to be engaging and interesting. Starting with chapter 3 you can truly see what the meat of this game is and how great its writing and open world is. This doesn’t mean that my complains with the horrible mission design are gone, but it’s much more tolerable when the missions are much more interesting and actually exploring our characters and showing the depth that each and everyone of them has. But certainly the most incredible aspect of RDR2 is it’s incredible open world, this game has one of the most beautiful worlds that I’ve explored in any game and is for sure it’s best aspect. The amount of stuff that you can do in this world is not the only thing that makes it so good, I was blown away by how diverse the environments that we get to explore are, from the deserts and canyons of the west, to the freezing mountaintops up north, to the cruelty and little glimpses of hope sprinkled through the “civilized” cities and even having a whole tropical island section. It just always kept me on my toes not knowing what I would find next in each hidden area of the map as I discovered it and I absolutely loved that. The whole open world is filled with so much care and detail in so many aspects, it’s weather system is amazing and so beautiful and the wildlife that’s always present in this beautiful world and their incredible animations are so amazing as well and one thing that seems to be underrated is how all of these things sound during gameplay, it’s stunning how great the sound design is in this game and genuinely still surprised by how good it is. The interactions that can happen in the open world which can spiral into whole side quests are so good and as we approached the end of Arthur’s journey I found these side activities and little encounters meaning so much to me and I was actively seeking them out and wanting to do them. Arthur Morgan and his character are of course the second highlight of this game, the amount of detail that’s put into every aspect of his character is incredible and I found myself really connecting with him by the end. I even spent a whole hour reading through his journal and seeing his beautiful drawings and handwriting and the way he sees things from his perspective which is truly heartbreaking if you read it when he approaches his death.
The whole game starting from the end of the guarma section till the end of chapter 6 is almost perfect and I was blown away by just how good it was, but then we go into the epilogue and I find myself disappointed again. My main problem with the epilogue is that I had this feeling that the game didn’t know what to do which really took me out of the game. Even the whole thing with Micah at the end just felt like it was tying up a loose end and give the player the satisfaction of killing him. Maybe I had this feeling because I didn’t play RDR1 first and didn’t have a prior connection to John and his family and having interest in seeing how his journey in RDR1 starts, but it certainly wasn’t as bad as the first 2 chapters. This whole review is messy and unorganized but I just wanted to let my thoughts out, overall I’m glad I finally gave this a real chance and even though I had many problems with it, these problems cannot ever cloud my judgment in saying that this game is even half bad. I have an enormous amount of respect to this game and the team that must’ve gone through hell to make it. It certainly isn’t a masterpiece or flawless but no game ever really is and I’m just really happy to have experienced it and to have gone on this whole journey and finally understanding why it gets so much praise that for the most part, it well and truly deserves.

i think it's very difficult to reconcile the technical beauty of this game with the actual task of playing it.

when left to your own devices, the game is sublime: the exploring and hunting alone offer a lot of potential for emergent experiences that are exciting and fun to recount to other players. when i first played this game at release, i sank dozens of hours into doing only that.

now, here i am at the end of my "i'll actually play the story this time" run, and my feelings toward this game are ambivalent. while the narrative and acting are good, they also feel like they could just as easily exist in another medium. would the story be any worse off as a movie?

the word i keep wanting to use to describe the missions is "curated," by which i mean that they're completely incongruous with the game's biggest strengths. instead, the story missions are formulaic, on-rails, and even the ones that have bespoke mechanics just don't feel that fun. staring at the mini map while i wait to get to the inevitable gunfight was really long in the tooth way before the game was over.

there's a lot sacrificed in favor of what i assume is an attempt at verisimilitude. movement often feels clunky, and there were a number of times where i died or got stuck because the game was trying to position Arthur to get the correct animation. there are also plenty of instances in which you're asked to press/tap a button while you just sit back and watch an animation unfold. again, would you like this to be in a different medium..?

overall, the game is a spectacle. so much time, money, and effort went into creating it, and it is very apparent. i don't think all of those resources were necessarily allocated to the right things, but i'd still recommend Red Dead Redemption 2 to pretty much anyone, with the caveat that it's at its peak when you're just doing your own thing.

It's a fairly boilerplate story that's somehow tightly-written and loosely-paced, but the only earnest Rockstar game has the right mixture of grandeur and small moments that make up a classic western.

Much like Gears of War 3, it's game from a veteran studio that has outgrown the edgy stuff that made them a household name. Red Dead 1 couldn't quite shake the 'hur hur life is shit and you're gay' tone of the GTAs, but RDR2 is mostly successful as a mature work by adults who actually care about their creative legacy.

This games is truly a work of art. Everything from the open world, the scenery, the locations, the way you discover new things, the story, the characters, the cinematics, the music. Everything is just such a vibe man. However, while i like the overall plot and characters i do think that the game drags on way too long and while the characters are all fun, most of them arent really that interesting. The main plot of the gang needing money also becomes very repetitive. Just like past rockstar games there isnt really a main villian too. Just a handful of bad guys trying to catch the gang. This lack of "focus" is what i didnt like and really bogged down the experience. Does that make sense? Dont know, but thats what i felt playing the game. Also the fucking controls suck ass, feels like im playing a game from 2008.

Overall great experience, but not without its flaws.