Red Dead Redemption is a western open world adventure game, which has one of the most authentic atmospheres imaginable
Contains: Strong Violence and Gore, and Very Strong Language
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Red Dead Redemption is a sandbox style, western open world game developed by Rockstar, which utilizes the same RAGE graphics engine as Grand Theft Auto 4.
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STORY – 3/5
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Taking place in the year 1911 in the American Old West territory, John Marston, a retired outlaw formerly of a gang led by Dutch van der Linde, is taken away from his wife Abigail and his son Jack by government agents. The only way he can get to see them again, is if he assists the government agents in catching or killing the former members of a gang he was once part of, by any means necessary.
As you progress more people become entangled in the plot, and you find yourself having to assist other various characters with their own set of problems in order to gain answers to further help your situation in hunting down the former gang members and establish the safety of your family. Despite the large amount of varied missions to complete, the threshold of the story moves along far too slowly, and the build up to the ending is un-dramatic, and finally capitalises with a poorly delivered, unsatisfactory conclusion to what was a promising and involving script.
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CHARACTERS - 5/5
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Like the Grand Theft Auto series, you can always rely on Rockstar to engage the player with a wide range of memorable and humorous characters along the path of the story, and there isn't much exception to that regular formula here. While there isn't as much laugh-out-loud moments as you'd expect, there is still plenty of characters that come and go into the plot, and leave their mark with either a polite and friendly personality or a down-right strange one. John Marston is a very likeable protagonist, and this helps you feel more involved with the story as you are so engaged with the main character who's suffering considerably with the loss of his family at the present time, which makes completing important objectives that bit more compelling to your heart.
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GAMEPLAY - 5/5
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Distinct similarities reflect from GTA here, but overall they shouldn't even be compared, as Red Dead Redemption feels like a brand new game altogether, and one of its most positive traits is the unique western open world design which is totally immersive. It won't take long before you are addicted to the many varied side challenges and optional activities scattered around the huge map open and inviting thorough exploration of each beautiful location. Your horse is the main principle of transport throughout the game, and there are a good enough variety of different breeds to choose from at the general store, each with there own speed and stamina abilities.
With the integration of shops, which withhold many helpful and interesting items, ammo and scraps of clothing, there is plenty of variety in how you want to play. Earning money doesn't just come from missions, but also from selling products to buyers in the shops. Skinning animals is a gruesome and satisfying task, but also one which is rewarding. A rare animal's fur will sell for a high price whereas some of the more recognisable and frequent wildlife will sell for less, and this encourages you to not just go from mission to mission, but build up a healthy amount of money to purchase weapons when they become available.
Hunting animals is fun, but it can turn into tight tension very easily if you are the one being hunted. The formidable looking Tall Trees location is inhabited by Grizzly Bears, and sometimes unbearable tension in such a quiet locale could force you to back out and try again later when you feel more comfortable with a more powerful gun.
Gunfights in Red Dead Redemption are conducted using a third-person system. The player can take cover, target a specific person, blindfire, and free aim. Individual body parts can also be targeted, in order to take targets down non-lethally, who can then be lassoed and "hogtied" to capture individuals alive. The gunplay is solid, and thanks to the game engine, realistic physics and body animations make shooting enemies feel different each time, and the blood splatter is also just as effective at immersing you in to the current mission, side mission, or random gunfight you started. A combat feature that Marston can utilize is Dead Eye targeting, which slows down time and allows you to crucially place shots with deadly accuracy. This feature can also be upgraded by completing specific challenges related to it.
There is a big network of choices open up to you, and these change the way citizens respond to you, and the way shopkeepers negotiate with you. There is an honour system, that goes up or down depending on your actions, and whichever way of the karma system you choose to go, there are unique bonuses that open up to you. If you decide to be a criminal, random people will turn away from you and run in the opposite direction, whereas if you are good, towns folk will greet you, and grant you discounts on purchases in stores.
Another ranking system layout is Fame. Each activity you complete or stranger you help makes you more famous throughout the world, and so people will react to how popular or unpopular you are, and you'll occasionally overhear conversations relating to what you've done, some will be lies if your infamous, while some talk will be almost referring to you as a saint of the wild west. What ever the case, the open world design is full of things to do, and whichever strategy you take, is entirely up to you.
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GRAPHICS - 5/5
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The visual presentation is nothing short of outstanding. Sure there some quirky visual glitches and rare frame rate stutters, but for the immense detail put into the western world, it makes the bright blue sky or dark night moon such a positive glow on everything you witness. Even when it rains, the puddles and muddy ground are distinctly visible and capture what the western scenery would have truly looked and felt like, and the immersion is never lifted. Facial animations have been improved from GTA IV, and so the cutscenes are just as beautiful as the free roaming world.
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SOUND - 5/5
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A spaghetti western vibe is evident in the background, and compliments to the epic sound effects of weapons, the present sounds of animals in the distance, and the impressive voice acting. The soundtrack of western nature is conducted with a great influence on the way the game is currently playing out. If you are in combat stance and taking cover and taking a heavy amount of fire the tune is noticeably fast-paced, whilst if you are out at night in the wilderness its very quiet, to give the player the feel of conducting activities under the moon.
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CONTROLS - 5/5
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With a great set of controls, and simple missions at the beginning of the game to settle you into the control scheme, there isn't much margin for error in this part of the game. The controls are very familiar to GTA IV, so having played a lot of that game, there wasn't any real trouble in taking cover, aiming and shooting etc. for me.
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ATMOSPHERE - 5/5
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The western atmosphere in Red Dead Redemption is probably the best aspect to take away from the game, as every possibility in immersing you is nailed to perfection. As an open world game, this raises the bar for the lot of them. Every random stranger event you encounter is portrayed to a degree that is really quite special, and the animations of random citizens in the town are simply spell binding to watch. When you wander into a saloon and see someone playing the piano, people drinking and sitting down in various ways, see prostitutes try and engage with someone else, and watch a game of poker playing out before your eyes, it settles you in to the environment and pulls you in to the state of what is trying to be portrayed as vividly as possible and never lets you off the hook of reality. It is something quite special to attempt in so many cool ways, but to pull it off perfectly leaves a mark that can never be erased or conquered anywhere else.
Outside of towns the atmosphere feels just as real, the animals roaming around or trying to attack you, the birds swarming the sky, and when you've eliminated a gang of enemies, it isn't long before the vultures swarm the scene. Trains go about their everyday business, stopping, letting on passengers and dropping them off at certain locations, and simply staying idle in the middle of the wild west is enough to captivate you into awestruck silence at the epic achievement established for open world games.
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ENEMY AI - 4/5
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Enemies do have a mind which reaches a degree of satisfactory intelligence, but its their animations which compliment more than they actually deserve. They effectively find cover, and pop up and shoot or blindfire when they feel necessary, and force you to maintain a cover position until an opportunity arises to take them out. (Dead eye targeting is advisable for precise shots of your chosen placement). When riding on horseback groups of enemies try to go around either side of you, forcing you to engage them, and shooting them off horses is satisfying and looks and sounds cool. When you have a bounty on your head for committing a crime, law enforcement officers will hunt you down aggressively, and depending on how high your bounty is, more and more marshals will add to the enemy count to attempt to stop your crime spree. Witnesses to a crime can be bribed before they tell the closest sheriff, or simply shot, but like mentioned above, shooting innocent people will only aggravate your honour meter and deplete it considerably quickly if you remain trigger happy.
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LENGTH - 5/5
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Red Dead Redemption should last a considerable amount of time, and should keep you playing for at least 30- 40 hours. To lengthen the experience there is so many activities and mini games to participate in, from known games such as Liars Dice, Blackjack and Poker, there is also arm wrestling and horseshoes. The optional side missions you can complete include capturing or killing bounties, various challenges, helping out strangers with their own predicament, night watch jobs, braking wild horses, and more. Its so easy to find yourself addicted to certain activities, and their are other small events that are randomly triggered from time to time in the environment, like saving someone from a pack of wolves, transporting goods, helping the sheriff kill criminals, and many more. You can choose to do the ones you want and there is no penalty for ignoring a task.
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REPLAY VALUE - 4/5
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One playthrough is really all you need to experience Red Dead Redemption, but there is reason to replay the single player campaign, and choose a different karma path to the one you chose before, or help out different people than previously. And even know there was a decent range of story missions, the disappointing ending is enough to put some people playing through it again because of how poor it was. Of course, that's my opinion, but if you did dislike the ending, its hard to find the need to want to play through everything you've done again, as its likely to not be quite so effective and engaging as it was on a first playthrough.
But overall Red Dead Redemption is an epic action adventure game, which immerses you into such a realistic atmosphere and deeply enjoyable gun fights, that its difficult to put down, and you only could wish there was more story missions to do, as the ending is unexpectedly closer than you might have expected.
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OVERALL SUMMARY - 9.5/10
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Good Points: Totally immersive open world design with superb visuals and physics; Realistically presented western atmosphere that captures the exact feel of the wild west; Large amount of optional side quests, challenges and mini games to participate in and keep you playing; Some memorable characters; Well implemented shops feature with a wide variety of weapons and items; Hunting and skinning wild animals is gruesomely satisfying and rewarding.
Bad Points: Various visual and gameplay glitches; Slow-paced story capped off with a disappointing ending.