Tag Rockstar Games

Entries 3 Total

Final Thoughts on Red Dead Redemption

Aug 3, ’10 3:55 PM

I achieved 100% completion in Red Dead Redemption in just over 43 hours, and nothing else I’ve played this year has come close to equalling that gaming experience. I normally avoid 100% completion—I would like to think I have better things to do, and I believe my friends and family tend to agree. In this case, however, the experience was enjoyable, motivated, and most importantly the tasks made sense within the gameworld. One of my complaints about Grand Theft Auto IV‘s completion stats is that there are many things in that game that I do not believe Niko would normally do—the online dating side-missions in particular run at odds with the Kate McReary subplot. That was not the case in RDR.

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Red Dead Reactions, Pt II

Jun 2, ’10 12:10 PM

I made it to Mexico last night. I could write some thoughts here, but look, Chris Dahlen did it for me. He has written an interesting piece about the cynicism of RDR’s storyline within the constraints of a world that was designed to be “badass.”

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Red Dead Redemption, sans Redemption?

May 21, ’10 10:56 PM

Red Dead Redemption was the most exciting game I didn’t get to play at PAX East. I’d barely heard of it prior to the convention, and I certainly wasn’t going to wait in that line to try a brief demo, but I left PAX craving old western films and quietly counting down the days until the game’s release.

Now that the game is finally out, I am having a blast. After some initial issues with the horse controls the game quickly dragged me in, and hasn’t let me go. In fact, the only reason I’m  writing about it and not playing it right now is that I’m once again stuck on a bus. I haven’t progressed very far in the story due to work obligations, but the writing is solid, and after two years of Grand Theft Auto 4 the thing that most surprised me was how likable I found the characters. The world generally holds together, and the sheer variety of events and emergent situations I’ve encountered in the first few hours of play boggles my mind. Unfortunately, at this point in the game a few narrative elements are still bothering me, and the game’s Western setting prevents me from brushing these minor flaws away.

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