In Review: Red Dead Redemption 2 (PS 4 Edition)

Synopsis: After a robbery goes badly wrong in the Western town of Blackwater. Arthur Morgan and the Van der Linde gang are forced to flee. With federal agents and the best bounty hunters in the nation massing on their heels, the gang must rob, steal and fight their way across the rugged heartland of America in order to survive. As deepening internal divisions threaten to tear the gang apart, Arthur must make a choice between his own ideals and loyalty to the gang that raised him.

Review: Red Dead Redemption 2 is a prequel to the hugely successful Red Dead Redemption, which came out of nowhere back in 2010 and pretty much saw me and many other gamers, both casual and hardcore, locked indoors living in the dying days of the wild west.

The Game

Set in the year 1899. Red Dead Redemption sees players assume the role of Arthur Morgan, who is the second in command of the Van der Linde gang, who are being hunted across America in the closing years of the wild west.

The game is both an action-adventure story as well as a free-roaming open world sandbox where you can do pretty much whatever you want. If you want to be a black hat cowboy and cause trouble by engaging in gunfights, killing travelers and looting them or robbing houses, trains, shops, and banks. The choice is yours, but there are consequences.

The first two hours of gameplay see you interacting with and getting to know your gang. Once you get through this two hours, you can pretty much do what you please after that. But I am of the opinion that it is better to play through the game’s missions as much as you can early on to figure out how stuff works.

This opinion is pretty much based on my first 8 hours of gameplay. It seems easier to make money by playing as many of the missions through before going it alone. Although this is an action game. It is pretty slow paced as you travel between missions, but this is actually a good thing because it gives you chance to meet some pretty cool and quirky characters.

The Graphics

The graphics on this game are visually stunning. In fact, its some of the best I have seen and it looks stunning on a normal PS4 through a 4K TV, which is my set up. It’s worth riding around the different locations in the game because there is no shortage of something new to see.

Even the various animals that inhabit the landscape look fairly realistic. Thus far have met a few rabbits, Dogs, dear and the meanest grizzly bear ever, which I plan to go back and hunt down at some stage.

Playability

In terms of playability. Where do you start? There is so much to do in this game. You can hunt game and sell pelts and meat. Become a career criminal and rob passersby or hunt down bounties.

The controls take a short while to learn and the game makes fairly good use of the various buttons on the gamepad. Though you do have to be careful. Have found myself shooting my guns on a few occasions by accidentally pushing the R2 button.

I love how you get to interact with pretty much every one of the none player characters in the game and can greet, antagonize or rob them. I also enjoy how there our consequences for how you treat the various NPC’s in the game.

For example, if you find a man sat in the road screaming because of a snake bite. It is best to suck the venom out. You will be rewarded later in the game. So there are lots of things like that, which keep you interested and engaged with the world.

Overall

This game is a game that I have been waiting for since 2014 and it is worth every bit of hype it has had, and with the online beta due to launch next month. I can safely say that there is much more to come.