I'm gonna warn you now, this is going to be a really long review and will contain spoilers for the story mode, so if you can get through the whole thing then I really appreciate you, but boy do I have a lot to say about this game.
Red Dead Redemption may often just get called GTA in the old west and while that is a fairly accurate comparison, it's so much more than that and frankly I think this series is miles better than any GTA game I've ever played. First and foremost the environment in this game is G O R G E O U S, seriously it might be one of the most beautiful games I've ever played. The map is huge, the environments are full of life and realism, there's so so much for you to find and to do it's unbelievable that a game this huge could even exist but if anyone was to pull it off, it would be rockstar. There's also so much to do in this game, if following the story is not your thing (which if it is, shame on you because this story is one of the best ever!) but as you explore the game you'll find all kinds of things to do, there's fishing, hunting, people you can help or people you can rob, you can pull off train robberies and bank heists, you can play poker or dominoes, you can do so so much in this game! The gunplay is a little different this time around so it will take some getting used to but personally I like it as it's more realistic. See since most weapons back then had to be cocked manually before you could shoot them, you have to hit the trigger on the controller twice in order to shoot again regardless of what weapon you're using, some people won't like this but I found it to be more enjoyable and made a lot of encounters way more intense. As I mentioned the story is fantastic but the gameplay during a lot of these missions is so much fun to play, there's one mission in particular where you and most of the gang all walk up together to this big mansion in order to save a young boy who was kidnapped, and as you can expect you have to shoot your way out, and that's only one! there's train robberies, bank robberies, straight up gang wars between you and the rival gang the O'Driscols, there's just so much fun to be had here, but the real cream de la crop is the story, so let's talk about that now.
Now if you're familiar with the first game, you probably know who John Marston is, in the first game John would often talk about the old days of running in the Dutch Van Der Linde gang alongside many of his compadres. While John is present in this game he is not the main character this time around, this time you play as a man named Arthur Morgan, at first I did not know what to think of Arthur but as I played through the 60+ hour campaign I grew to love him in ways I never even thought possible, he is without a doubt my favorite video game character I've ever had the pleasure to play as, I realize that's a high honor but I do mean it. As Arthur you run with the gang to pull off jobs and run from the Pinkerton detective agency, as well as face off against rival gangs. Dutch, the leader of the gang is always talking to everyone about his dream for them to escape from America, a land once thought to be free but is now being plagued by modernization and the takeover of society, where people like Dutch and his gang are no longer welcome. Dutch always having been a dreamer believes that they must pull off "one last big score" and only then they will have enough to flee the country and go somewhere where they can truly be free to live out the rest of their days. There are many complex and amazing characters here besides Arthur, Dutch, Hosea, Charles, Sadie, I could go on and on, by the end the gang really felt like a family to me than just some characters in a game which is what makes it so much sadder at the end when the gang eventually splits up and people go their separate ways. I don't want to give away too much of the story but you likely know this by now, about 3 quarters into the story Arthur contracts Tiberculosis and is informed that he will soon die, so in his final moments he chooses who he wants to be remembered as. Now the player has the option to choose what kind of person Arthur is but I like to think he would have always made the "good" choices in all these situations, he spent time with the woman he loved but could never live with because of who he was, he helped John get away from the gang and find a way to keep his family safe, he helped many of the people whose lives he made worse prior to the end of the story. Arthur may not necessarily be the chaotic good character we want him to be, but by the end he definitely is a much better person than he was. There's one particular cutscene in the game that always makes me emotional every time I see it, where Arthur tells a nun he knows about his wife and son who sadly passed away years ago and how he wants to be a good person but feels that it's not possible because of who he's been in his past, and that while he thinks he's not worthy of much he's still afraid of dying now that death is staring him right in the face.This of course makes Arthurs eventual death that much tragic by the end and I'm not afraid to tell you that I shed a few tears when I saw him go out the way he did. After Arthur passes you play through a slow and not as exciting epilogue as John where he tries to begin his new life with his family (only to have him eventually be pursued by the pinkertons again and the set the events of the first game in motion) so while the game does end a bit on a lower note, the rest of it really makes up for it and makes this game undoubtedly one of my all time favorites.
Red Dead Redemption may often just get called GTA in the old west and while that is a fairly accurate comparison, it's so much more than that and frankly I think this series is miles better than any GTA game I've ever played. First and foremost the environment in this game is G O R G E O U S, seriously it might be one of the most beautiful games I've ever played. The map is huge, the environments are full of life and realism, there's so so much for you to find and to do it's unbelievable that a game this huge could even exist but if anyone was to pull it off, it would be rockstar. There's also so much to do in this game, if following the story is not your thing (which if it is, shame on you because this story is one of the best ever!) but as you explore the game you'll find all kinds of things to do, there's fishing, hunting, people you can help or people you can rob, you can pull off train robberies and bank heists, you can play poker or dominoes, you can do so so much in this game! The gunplay is a little different this time around so it will take some getting used to but personally I like it as it's more realistic. See since most weapons back then had to be cocked manually before you could shoot them, you have to hit the trigger on the controller twice in order to shoot again regardless of what weapon you're using, some people won't like this but I found it to be more enjoyable and made a lot of encounters way more intense. As I mentioned the story is fantastic but the gameplay during a lot of these missions is so much fun to play, there's one mission in particular where you and most of the gang all walk up together to this big mansion in order to save a young boy who was kidnapped, and as you can expect you have to shoot your way out, and that's only one! there's train robberies, bank robberies, straight up gang wars between you and the rival gang the O'Driscols, there's just so much fun to be had here, but the real cream de la crop is the story, so let's talk about that now.
Now if you're familiar with the first game, you probably know who John Marston is, in the first game John would often talk about the old days of running in the Dutch Van Der Linde gang alongside many of his compadres. While John is present in this game he is not the main character this time around, this time you play as a man named Arthur Morgan, at first I did not know what to think of Arthur but as I played through the 60+ hour campaign I grew to love him in ways I never even thought possible, he is without a doubt my favorite video game character I've ever had the pleasure to play as, I realize that's a high honor but I do mean it. As Arthur you run with the gang to pull off jobs and run from the Pinkerton detective agency, as well as face off against rival gangs. Dutch, the leader of the gang is always talking to everyone about his dream for them to escape from America, a land once thought to be free but is now being plagued by modernization and the takeover of society, where people like Dutch and his gang are no longer welcome. Dutch always having been a dreamer believes that they must pull off "one last big score" and only then they will have enough to flee the country and go somewhere where they can truly be free to live out the rest of their days. There are many complex and amazing characters here besides Arthur, Dutch, Hosea, Charles, Sadie, I could go on and on, by the end the gang really felt like a family to me than just some characters in a game which is what makes it so much sadder at the end when the gang eventually splits up and people go their separate ways. I don't want to give away too much of the story but you likely know this by now, about 3 quarters into the story Arthur contracts Tiberculosis and is informed that he will soon die, so in his final moments he chooses who he wants to be remembered as. Now the player has the option to choose what kind of person Arthur is but I like to think he would have always made the "good" choices in all these situations, he spent time with the woman he loved but could never live with because of who he was, he helped John get away from the gang and find a way to keep his family safe, he helped many of the people whose lives he made worse prior to the end of the story. Arthur may not necessarily be the chaotic good character we want him to be, but by the end he definitely is a much better person than he was. There's one particular cutscene in the game that always makes me emotional every time I see it, where Arthur tells a nun he knows about his wife and son who sadly passed away years ago and how he wants to be a good person but feels that it's not possible because of who he's been in his past, and that while he thinks he's not worthy of much he's still afraid of dying now that death is staring him right in the face.This of course makes Arthurs eventual death that much tragic by the end and I'm not afraid to tell you that I shed a few tears when I saw him go out the way he did. After Arthur passes you play through a slow and not as exciting epilogue as John where he tries to begin his new life with his family (only to have him eventually be pursued by the pinkertons again and the set the events of the first game in motion) so while the game does end a bit on a lower note, the rest of it really makes up for it and makes this game undoubtedly one of my all time favorites.