Hands-On With Red Dead Redemptions's New Co-Op

Take a look inside your copy of Red Dead Redemption and you should see a little leaflet in there advertising a co-op mission pack "coming soon." Like the leaflet says, this downloadable pack--dubbed "Outlaws to the End"--will add six new co-op missions to Red Dead, complementing the game's fairly extensive competitive multiplayer offerings. The good news with this mission pack is twofold. First, "soon" is actually tomorrow, so you'll be able to download the pack within the next 24 hours. Second, it'll cost you a grand total of zero dollars. Not a bad deal.

If you just can't wait a day to find out what the co-op pack has in store, fear not. Rockstar recently gave us a chance to play through a couple of missions to see what's involved. The missions range from a rainy nighttime shootout against the Mexican Army in a mission called Ammunition, to a sprawling stage choach chase through seemingly endless frontier trails in The Escape. All of these missions are outfitted with checkpoints to keep the action going as long as at least one player is still alive. If all four die, it's back to the start. If the surviving player(s) makes it to a checkpoint, everyone's back in it.

There are a handful of other interesting new twists to the existing gameplay formula in there. When a teammate goes down in battle, you're given a certain amount of time to rush over and revive him before he dies. Second, you can choose a preset loadout before the match begins. Examples include the fire-bottle-equipped soldier and the sniper rifle expert marksman. Our favorite class was the marksman, because we enjoyed the balance between taking out enemies from afar and rushing into the proverbial bees nest to revive fallen comrades when they needed help.

At the risk of spoiling any surprises for you, we'll refrain from going into further detail on Outlaws to the End. But suffice it to say that having some more structured co-op to go alongside the free-roaming opportunities already in the game is a compelling notion, and you certainly can't beat the price tag--or lack thereof. It will be out tomorrow on both platforms.