It certainly feels like I’m late to the party here, all the reviews have been in for weeks now. I figure I have nothing to lose as no one reads this blog anyway, so the chances of me influencing a potential purchase is nil. But, proceed I will.
Red Dead Redemption is an open world wild west game where you take control of John Marston, an all round contrived protagonist. Who used to roll in gangs that adhered to a robin hood set of ethics. He was left to die by his former gang and has, in short, come to hunt them down for the government. It has to be said, the characterisation of this game is amazing, Rockstar have always been amazing at creating believable, deep characters you can empathise with. The voice acting and scripting of the dialogue as ever is second to none also. From the off the game looks and feels right. The wild west’s vast nothingness peppered with shacks and small towns is beautifully detailed and atmospheric. The first two or so hours of the game consist of herding cattle, finding wild horses for the ranch and shooting a few bad guys. As the game slowly progresses the emphasis is on largely the same mechanic. Herein lies the problem.
RDR suffers from GTA4 syndrome. Initially its great, getting sucked into the wild west atmosphere is exciting, until you realise that all of the missions are achingly familiar to a point of boredom. Either, escort someone to a destination and defend from attackers OR travel to a destination, kill bad guys when you get there and travel back. There are side missions on RDR such as bounty hunting and gathering animal pelts, but they lack variety. It is literally like playing the same game but with different character models and textures. Also, like GTA4, the ‘realism’ ruins the fun of the experience. The huge scenery although beautiful, does get boring after travelling around it for so long. This experience isn’t helped by the horses, which severely mar the experience.
Controlling horses is like driving a carnival float, they get stuck on the smallest pieces of scenery and either fling you off, or you have to try and get them back on track. It can be very frustrating. Character models aren’t without their issues either; numerous times I struggled to walk John up a set of steps to a shop.
I’m not entirely certain if as a gamer I have begun to expect more as technology has become more advanced. Sure, we expect games to be cinematic and technically impressive, but at the expense of repetitiveness and lack of variety?
I’m fairly certain that GTA vice city and even San Andreas had more variety in its mission structure. Maybe, I just didn’t notice. One thing is for certain, with the element of realism that gamers expect now, games have suffered. I played RDR until the end, but I must admit I was struggling with the game as soon as I hit Mexico (area 2 of 3). The game picked up toward the end of this area before becoming fairly dull around the final third of the game. I was playing it for the sake of it, and largely not enjoying the experience. Personally, it’s a rental.
Rockstar knock out some technically impressive games that are worthy of the admiration of the fans. But it does feel they have forgotten how to let us have fun. Surely that’s what gaming is all about?
6/10
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