Review - Red Dead Redemption

I remember just how excited I was when I bought Red Dead Redemption. It came out just weeks after I graduated from college and I was determined to take advantage of my newfound freedom. And how better than to play cowboy and ride my horse around the old west, firing my six-shooter to round up bandits and cattle rustlers.

There had been so much hype surrounding the game. All the video game pundits I regularly subscribed to were fawning all over Red Dead Redemption. They hailed it as being Grand Theft auto 4 in the west and they had all loved that game, right? So this one had to be great, right?

Not so much.

Within moments of starting the game I was confused. I could follow the onscreen instructions well enough, but I wanted to know who I was and why I was there. Why was I being instructed to enter a saloon? Why did I need to follow a guide? No one explained anything to me. I just continued following the on screen instructions.

I later learned that Marston's wife and son were taken by federal police and are being used to blackmail Marston into finding and killing members of a gang of which he was once a member. There is a lot going on there to explain Marston's emotional state. And yet, this information isn't revealed to the player until several hours into the game. It would have been nice to see how happy John's life was with his family before they were suddenly wrested from him. At least then I might understand why he's so pissed off all the time. And by all the time I do mean all the time.

John Marston is just one of many characters that I found I couldn't empathize with. Whether it be Nigel West Dickens who uses Marston to help him con ranchers into buying his “vitality elixir”, or Edgar Ross who uses Marston’s family as leverage to have Marston track down criminals, or Agustin Allende the military leader of Mexico who makes light of raping women, the majority of characters in this game are simply not appealing. I assume that Rockstar wanted to fill the game with over the top caricatures in an attempt to create satire and comedy, but the effect is merely discouraging.

And, if you want to continue playing the game's storyline you have to interact with these characters. The experience is 100% linear. With a vast open world, I was expecting the kind of freedom I might get in a game like Fallout 3, where I can choose which missions to take or ignore and essentially choose my own adventure. But if I want to keep playing, I have to help the racist, the con man, the blackmailer, and the drug addict.

The one thing the game does get right is the wider world. It's just so damned absorbing. I played for hours and hours and still wanted to keep going when my eyes were closing by themselves. You ride your horse over a hill and look out over the horizon as the sun sets while rabbits and hawks and deer roam the wilderness. It's gorgeous. Like Fallout 3, the absolutely massive world is filled with random encounters. There are multitudes of people traveling, people who need your help or otherwise want to kill or steal from you, and wildlife that changes based on the setting.

It would practically feel alive except that none of what you do seems to have any reaching effects on the world. No matter how many travelers you save, stolen horses you return, or hangings you prevent, these events continue to happen and Marston continues to act in his normal disgruntled manner. Supposedly people treat you differently after a while, but all I really noticed is that I could steal people's horses without them getting upset.

Overall, Red Dead Redemption was extremely disappointing. At the outset of the game I was so excited, but the more I played the game the more alienated I felt from its characters and events. It's almost painful every time I hear someone talk about how great the game is, how engaging its story, how good the acting, how well written, because for me it just isn't.