Post by quadrophenia on Apr 15, 2011 20:59:49 GMT 1
I love Westerns. Today, Westerns aren't quite as revered as they used to be. A straight up nineteenth century drama set in the American Old West with cowboys, desert plains and gold hearted prostitutes just doesn't fly with a jaded and genre-savvy audience. We know how it'll end, we know that the wandering gunslinger or the virtuous sheriff will meet the villain at sundown and lodge a bullet in his chest after a two-minute staring contest. This is the clichéd plot of dozens upon dozens of Westerns that pervaded popular public consciousness from the thirties to the sixties. Because the Western genre represented a time that symbolized the glory of American culture dominating the wild frontier, and because Hollywood knew what to sell to the average American movie audience, the same plot was recycled hundreds of times.
Oh, there were exceptions. Stagecoach, The Searchers, The Treasure of Sierra Madre, The Magnificent Seven (easily the most badass classic Western ever made), Shane, to name a few, and don't get me started on the films of Sergio Leone. But these were few and far in-between. Everything else was the same cookie cutter "singing white hat cowboy riding out into the sunset" malarkey. Because of this, this is the bar set for most Western films. This is what most people expect the Western to be like. It doesn't help that Mel Brooks' masterpiece comedy Blazing Saddles ruthlessly leveled the genre to hell, with many Western aficionados later claiming that film was solely responsible for the death of the popularity of the classic Western.
I should point out that there has been a recent resurgence of popularity in the old husk, and I thank God for that. From the early nineties of Unforgiven to 2005's No Country For Old Men, the Western has enjoyed new life in the twenty first century.
But those films haven't exactly reached the section of the generation that I'm a part of. The nerds, the geeks, the otakus and the gamers. Out of everyone in my circle of friends, only two are willing to give Westerns a chance. I feel somewhat alone in my love for this genre. If only there was a way to express, eloquently, why this genre means so much to me.
It's as if Rockstar had heard my prayers, because in summer 2010 they released the award-winning Western extravaganza of a sandbox blowout, Red Dead Redemption. This game can only be seen as a love letter to the West. It is the purest distillation of the genre I have ever seen, taking everything good, bad and ugly about it and reconstructing from the ground up to create a marvelous homage to an almost forgotten cinematic style. Rockstar has done a far better job than I in expressing why the Western should warrant adoration.
Everything about RDR was seemingly tailored to my tastes. Not only can I be a cowboy, I get to be a Clint Eastwood-style anti-hero who resembles a mish mash of the most famous stars to ever pull a quickdraw. I can see an influence of Eastwood in his stance and background, I see a little of Charles Bronson in his eyes and complexion, and his manner and personality match Yul Brynner's performance in The Magnificent Seven. Whether I'm a vagabond knight errant or a thief, the West is open to me.
I will split this review in three parts. One will cover an analysis of the gameplay mechanics, the second is a close critical look of the storyline, and the third will dissect the popular DLC/now-stand-alone game, Undead Nightmare.
Here we go, cowboys.
Part I: Gameplay Mechanics
As much as I love the game as a finished product, the game mechanics – I have to say – are a little hit-and-miss. When controlling John Marston, I wouldn't blame you if you were under the impression the controller had a mind of its own, because there were often times when Marston refused to jump over a perfectly short fence when I commanded it. What, was he waiting for a blue moon, for a musical cue? Get a damn move on, Marston!
At some point I somehow found myself stuck in a wall. No joke. When I tried to step back, Marston made a token effort to move… to stay faced to the wall. I get the feeling he's a bit resentful. Turning can be a pain in the ass. Even the simple action of walking onto a platform can be unnecessarily arduous. Also, why do I have to hold a to run? There have been times in a gunfight where I've bitten a fair share of a bullet sandwich because I couldn't get to this one spot of cover fast enough… because John felt like he wanted to take a stroll. Couldn't the player character just – at least – power jog? Even Shepard in the ME franchise could jog at a decent pace without having to hold the a button for a minor sprint.
After the first hour or so, you do – I admit – get used to it, but it does become this irritating running gag where your character can't overcome a five inch-raised rail or platform.
As this is a Rockstar game, it's an open-world sandbox. For a fun piece of trivia, this is the largest area the company has ever developed in any of their games. That's right, it's a larger area than Vice City or San Andreas. There are several towns and outposts scattered throughout the West, and the three official parts of the world are "New Austin," "Nuevo Paraiso," and "West Elizabeth."
New Austin is – by and large – a near replication of the John Ford western. It's sunny and vibrant, reminiscent of the colourful idealism of the early westerns. Nuevo Paraiso (Mexico) takes its page from the films of Sergio Leone. It's as unapologetically gritty as crushed asphalt.
But for a change of pace, if farmlands, deserts and wastelands get on your nerves, there's West Elizabeth's scenic forest-and-woodland area. Stylistically, it's somewhere between New Austin and Nuevo Paraiso. It's not as vivacious as the former, but not quite as gravelly as the latter. It's a clever shout-out to the dim-lit postmodern westerns of Unforgiven. Each stage is a museum exhibition of locations and character archetypes from the main three epochs of western history in cinema.
It's absolutely beautiful, and by God it does feel big. And in case one gets tired of riding a horse from point a to point b – and since horses don't run on the same horsepower, haha, of sports-cars – there's the merciful mechanic of "making camp." Set up on some patch of dirt off-road, and you can set a marker anywhere on the map. Once you pick a spot, you can fast-travel there Fallout 3 style. Hopefully you don't mind forty-five second loading screens.
But if you prefer the scenic route, you'll enjoy exploring the world of Red Dead Redemption. There's never any shortage of means to acquire money. There are over twenty animals to hunt down and skin, and you can sell their pelts to dealers for a hefty price. It's also the easiest way to make money, provided you have enough bullets.
What is a little annoying, though, is the skinning animation. Occasionally you might cause a glitch that'll skip it, but for the most part you have to watch the same cinematic of Marston skinning downed prey over and over again. It's needlessly time-consuming, and while hunting animals is the fastest way to make fast, heavy money… it's also paradoxically the slowest.
On the subject of hunting, allow me to list the prey worth hunting.
Bears, wolves, coyotes, cougars, rattlesnakes, boars and bobcats. Most other animals will run away from you, these guys however will actively pursue you if you run into their line of vision. Coyotes are the easiest to handle. Once you have Dead Eye and maybe a better handgun, a pack won't cause you any further grievance. A single boar is nothing. Yes, they can kill in two hits, but just aim for the head and you should do fine…
But never be on foot if you have more than three boars running after you. Get on your horse, get some distance and load the rifle.
Rattlesnakes are painfully annoying little bastards. They blend easily into their environment, which is why I'd advise the player not to run around the desert of New Austin on foot unless you're absolutely sure. Because of their nigh-invisibility, they're dangerous opponents. Two bites can kill you.
Bobcats are like coyotes, I wouldn't worry about them.
The dominant predators of RDR are cougars, wolves and bears. A pack of wolves are among the most dangerous animals in the game. There are times when you won't notice they're sneaking up on you until the last second, in which case say goodbye to your steed and your life!
Unlike coyotes, they're not afraid of gunfire, but if you manage to kill one of their own with a heavy weapon – preferably a shotgun – the pack will disperse. Be careful, while wolves – like most animals in the game – have low health, a pack can and will mow you down if you aren't fast enough.
One bear, like a boar, isn't an issue. But again, like a boar or a wolf, a sleuth of these bastards can be – to put it mildly – fairly intimidating. Unless you've got full Dead Eye and some of the best weapons in the game, I would not recommend approaching them on foot.
Cougars are the worst. They're the fastest prey in the game and have a notorious reputation amongst many aggravated players for their silence. They can sneak up, pounce, and you'll be lunch before you know it. They're one to two-shot wonders… and sometimes they'll come in groups of two or three, in which case, mount the horse and run.
Thankfully, cougars can be taken down in one hit with the shotgun or the Bolt-Action Rifle.
As the game generates the number or appearances of animals randomly, it's always a matter of probability. Sometimes it's just one cougar or one bear, or sometimes…
Funny thing. There have been occurrences in which gamers have triggered an endless rush of wave after wave… of wolves, bears and cougars. There are a few spots in the game world where you can engineer these rushes by performing a very specific action (look up online for more info).
So aside from hunting, how else can you make money, outside of story missions? The game will generate random events such as stagecoach robberies (which you can prevent or instigate), heists, and stick-ups. At other points you can find yourself saving lives and getting paid for it.
Official sidequests come with their own cinematics, and can be completed at any point in the game. There's the unofficial constant sidequest of bounty hunting or playing as the night-watchmen in a few towns throughout the game.
Then there are the minigames. Poker and five-finger fillet, to name two. Not much else to say about that, really.
It should also be noted that the game has an endless supply of gang hideouts. Even if you clear one, fifteen minutes later it'll be re-taken over by members of the same gang. Not that I'm complaining. Free ammo and extra money, and it's a good challenge. Oh, even better, vultures tend to congregate at the hideout after you've killed everyone. Take this opportunity to shoot them down and collect their feathers, shops will pay handsomely.
Now that I've handled player mechanics and the plethora of options for a sandbox world… let's tackle one of my biggest peeves about the game.
Horseback-Riding 101.
Believe it or not, it's harder than it looks. Horses will get you where you want to go, but they run like brick walls and they're just as fluid. Try turning a horse, especially if you're in gunfight with other horseback riding bandits. I know a horse isn't a car, but they're just terribly rigid, which doesn't help me at all when I'm in a fast-paced shoot-out.
They could at least improve it.
But speaking of combat mechanics, it's high time we pick that apart for a minute.
For those not-in-the-know, Dead Eye is a helpful little tool that grants the player the ability to enter bullet-time, where Marston's vision perceives the immediate environment as glowing piss-yellow. Time slows enough for you to target specific body parts on your opponents and fire away with precise accuracy. However, to give enemy AI a fair advantage, the Dead Eye meter is relegated to a drain limit, and if you don't have tobacco or Snake Oil the meter will recharge slowly.
If you ever find yourself without, expect life to get a hell of a lot harder when you bump into a posse of outlaws.
Similar to Rockstar's GTA franchise, gunfights boil down to third-person cover based shooting. Want to survive, hide behind a chest-high rock and return fire when the enemy is reloading.
The guns vary in range, power, accuracy and firing rate.
The High Power Pistol (FN M1903, aka the Browning No. 2) is arguably the most effective and powerful handgun in the game. It has surprising long range and it is ungodly brutal in close range. Couple that with a high rate of fire, you have a gamebreaker on your hands. If it couldn't get any cheaper, it's the easiest to reload. While it takes over five seconds to reload a revolver cylinder, the High Power Pistol just needs a fresh clip, and you're ready in an instant.
But the most powerful revolver in the game is the LeMat Revolver. According to stats, it packs the best punch. While the High Power Pistol has the edge in speed and reliability, the LetMat Revolver can kill most characters and even predators in single shots.
The best rifle is the Bolt-Action Rifle. Like the High Power Pistol, it can be relied on for its versatility.
There are a number of guns throughout the game, but to get them you'll have to advance through the story… or cheat. Check the internet for more details.
When the story is over, chances are you'll find yourself a little bored. Without a plot as the catalyst, the drive to explore loses its edge. Which is why there's always one another venue of fun that's always open in this game, and that's the multiplayer. Want to take down gangs with other players, kill other players, defend forts and towns from other players? Hell, want to team up with other players and fend off a zombie apocalypse?
Then I guarantee you will spend hours on Xbox Live. It's fun, addicting, and I wouldn't have it any other way. It keeps interest alive and the game doesn't lose its luster.
We'll cover the plot and the characters in the next chapter of this review, but I'd like to finish this off with an analysis of one of the facets of the game that just… absolutely twists my tits.
"The Honour System."
Remember how in GTA or in Saint's Row (I or II) the more of a dick you were, the higher your wanted meter? And each time you committed more and more atrocities there would be a corresponding escalation of threat levels to take you out? From smalltime beat-cops to the goddamn National Guard.
Remember when they posed a challenge? In Redemption, you only fight posses if you've been a bad boy.
In this game, your acts are measured by an honour meter, again similar to Fallout 3. The meter also correlates with your reputation, which may include discounts at some of the stores you come across. They run the gamut of cut-throat douchebag to "legend of the west."
I have an issue with this system… it has no impact whatsoever. You can act as a truly despicable monster so villainous even Angel Eyes would tell you to take a chill pill, but it doesn't have any relevance on the story, the shops or the NPC's don't act any different towards you and ultimately there are no bonuses.
There isn't even any escalation of a challenge, which is what I liked about pissing off the law in Saint's Row II. I know, there aren't any tanks or helicopters in the Wild West, even in 1911, but give me a break.
Posses, that's it? They're laughably easy.
I once spent an hour bunkered in the Blackwater police station, hidden behind a bulletproof oak desk. Ten seconds prior, I murdered two officers from afar with my Winchester and waited for the incoming swarm to squeeze themselves through the bottleneck that was the station's only door. It was all part of a strategy of mine, and they fell for it.
The same lawmen or posse members kept barging in just begging me to end their miserable existence of minimum income, and I happily obliged. But they didn't have, say, an escalation of increasingly potent weapons. I had everything from the LeMat Revolver to the pump action shotgun to the Explosive Rifle. Couldn't my enemies be equipped with slightly better weaponry as well? I wanted a challenge, dammit.
Except, I reiterate, I had spent some time in my strategical position laying waste to hundreds of lawmen until it got boring. At which point, I walked out of the station, called my horse and rode out of town with a posse hot on my wheels… all of whom I promptly shot down.
And then I used one of the government pardons I had been saving up and I received in-return a get-out-of-jail free card. Suddenly they stopped chasing, as if nothing happened. Weak.
What I liked about Fallout 3 or the Mass Effect games were how all of your actions held significant weight. They could change the outcome of the plot and the gaming world in cool and interesting ways. At least in GTA or the Saint's Row, while actions had no relevance and the story and the sandbox universe were segregated, there was – as I have mentioned – a threat level escalation.
A single posse of five guys doesn't measure to the army, and that just infuriates me. The army features in a significant story mission, and there was a point where you could use a Gatling gun while allied NPC's could drive an armoured car.
Why couldn't they be my enemies? It baffles me that they wasted an opportunity for some fun mass mayhem.
There isn't really anything to gain, no tangible reward that could benefit the player. No special weapon, no body armour (Fistful of Dollars style), nothing. There isn't any reward for being good or evil, and the satisfaction out of committing heinous acts of merciless bastardry loses its luster after the first ten bodies.
This made acts of heroism seem fruitful, when all was said and done. I remember I once tied a bandit to train tracks, and watched with glee as he was splattered into a geyser of gore and body parts as the train ran over his body. Aaah… sociopathy is justified and fun when it's directed at criminals.
To paraphrase Marv from Sin City, "I love hitmen. You can do horrible things to 'em and you don't have to feel bad about it."
Kidding aside… time to finish the review with this positive number.
It's made one of my old childhood dreams come true. I got to be a gunslinging cowboy, a knight with a revolver, heroically saving innocents and shooting down punks and murderers like a badass. Despite its many flaws, this is a dream world of six-shooters, horses, sunsets and romanticized, rugged heroism. The sensation alone, after finishing the game, was all I needed to feel that I had spent my time on something worthwhile.
It is easily the best game Rockstar has created, and while on gameplay alone it isn't that distinct from their GTA library, I'll go on to show how when we take a gander at the plot, story and narrative structure of Red Dead Redemption in the next chapter.
If I had to be frank… if I made a top ten list, this game would be number seven. Hell yeah.
Until next time, my friends.
Oh, there were exceptions. Stagecoach, The Searchers, The Treasure of Sierra Madre, The Magnificent Seven (easily the most badass classic Western ever made), Shane, to name a few, and don't get me started on the films of Sergio Leone. But these were few and far in-between. Everything else was the same cookie cutter "singing white hat cowboy riding out into the sunset" malarkey. Because of this, this is the bar set for most Western films. This is what most people expect the Western to be like. It doesn't help that Mel Brooks' masterpiece comedy Blazing Saddles ruthlessly leveled the genre to hell, with many Western aficionados later claiming that film was solely responsible for the death of the popularity of the classic Western.
I should point out that there has been a recent resurgence of popularity in the old husk, and I thank God for that. From the early nineties of Unforgiven to 2005's No Country For Old Men, the Western has enjoyed new life in the twenty first century.
But those films haven't exactly reached the section of the generation that I'm a part of. The nerds, the geeks, the otakus and the gamers. Out of everyone in my circle of friends, only two are willing to give Westerns a chance. I feel somewhat alone in my love for this genre. If only there was a way to express, eloquently, why this genre means so much to me.
It's as if Rockstar had heard my prayers, because in summer 2010 they released the award-winning Western extravaganza of a sandbox blowout, Red Dead Redemption. This game can only be seen as a love letter to the West. It is the purest distillation of the genre I have ever seen, taking everything good, bad and ugly about it and reconstructing from the ground up to create a marvelous homage to an almost forgotten cinematic style. Rockstar has done a far better job than I in expressing why the Western should warrant adoration.
Everything about RDR was seemingly tailored to my tastes. Not only can I be a cowboy, I get to be a Clint Eastwood-style anti-hero who resembles a mish mash of the most famous stars to ever pull a quickdraw. I can see an influence of Eastwood in his stance and background, I see a little of Charles Bronson in his eyes and complexion, and his manner and personality match Yul Brynner's performance in The Magnificent Seven. Whether I'm a vagabond knight errant or a thief, the West is open to me.
I will split this review in three parts. One will cover an analysis of the gameplay mechanics, the second is a close critical look of the storyline, and the third will dissect the popular DLC/now-stand-alone game, Undead Nightmare.
Here we go, cowboys.
Part I: Gameplay Mechanics
As much as I love the game as a finished product, the game mechanics – I have to say – are a little hit-and-miss. When controlling John Marston, I wouldn't blame you if you were under the impression the controller had a mind of its own, because there were often times when Marston refused to jump over a perfectly short fence when I commanded it. What, was he waiting for a blue moon, for a musical cue? Get a damn move on, Marston!
At some point I somehow found myself stuck in a wall. No joke. When I tried to step back, Marston made a token effort to move… to stay faced to the wall. I get the feeling he's a bit resentful. Turning can be a pain in the ass. Even the simple action of walking onto a platform can be unnecessarily arduous. Also, why do I have to hold a to run? There have been times in a gunfight where I've bitten a fair share of a bullet sandwich because I couldn't get to this one spot of cover fast enough… because John felt like he wanted to take a stroll. Couldn't the player character just – at least – power jog? Even Shepard in the ME franchise could jog at a decent pace without having to hold the a button for a minor sprint.
After the first hour or so, you do – I admit – get used to it, but it does become this irritating running gag where your character can't overcome a five inch-raised rail or platform.
As this is a Rockstar game, it's an open-world sandbox. For a fun piece of trivia, this is the largest area the company has ever developed in any of their games. That's right, it's a larger area than Vice City or San Andreas. There are several towns and outposts scattered throughout the West, and the three official parts of the world are "New Austin," "Nuevo Paraiso," and "West Elizabeth."
New Austin is – by and large – a near replication of the John Ford western. It's sunny and vibrant, reminiscent of the colourful idealism of the early westerns. Nuevo Paraiso (Mexico) takes its page from the films of Sergio Leone. It's as unapologetically gritty as crushed asphalt.
But for a change of pace, if farmlands, deserts and wastelands get on your nerves, there's West Elizabeth's scenic forest-and-woodland area. Stylistically, it's somewhere between New Austin and Nuevo Paraiso. It's not as vivacious as the former, but not quite as gravelly as the latter. It's a clever shout-out to the dim-lit postmodern westerns of Unforgiven. Each stage is a museum exhibition of locations and character archetypes from the main three epochs of western history in cinema.
It's absolutely beautiful, and by God it does feel big. And in case one gets tired of riding a horse from point a to point b – and since horses don't run on the same horsepower, haha, of sports-cars – there's the merciful mechanic of "making camp." Set up on some patch of dirt off-road, and you can set a marker anywhere on the map. Once you pick a spot, you can fast-travel there Fallout 3 style. Hopefully you don't mind forty-five second loading screens.
But if you prefer the scenic route, you'll enjoy exploring the world of Red Dead Redemption. There's never any shortage of means to acquire money. There are over twenty animals to hunt down and skin, and you can sell their pelts to dealers for a hefty price. It's also the easiest way to make money, provided you have enough bullets.
What is a little annoying, though, is the skinning animation. Occasionally you might cause a glitch that'll skip it, but for the most part you have to watch the same cinematic of Marston skinning downed prey over and over again. It's needlessly time-consuming, and while hunting animals is the fastest way to make fast, heavy money… it's also paradoxically the slowest.
On the subject of hunting, allow me to list the prey worth hunting.
Bears, wolves, coyotes, cougars, rattlesnakes, boars and bobcats. Most other animals will run away from you, these guys however will actively pursue you if you run into their line of vision. Coyotes are the easiest to handle. Once you have Dead Eye and maybe a better handgun, a pack won't cause you any further grievance. A single boar is nothing. Yes, they can kill in two hits, but just aim for the head and you should do fine…
But never be on foot if you have more than three boars running after you. Get on your horse, get some distance and load the rifle.
Rattlesnakes are painfully annoying little bastards. They blend easily into their environment, which is why I'd advise the player not to run around the desert of New Austin on foot unless you're absolutely sure. Because of their nigh-invisibility, they're dangerous opponents. Two bites can kill you.
Bobcats are like coyotes, I wouldn't worry about them.
The dominant predators of RDR are cougars, wolves and bears. A pack of wolves are among the most dangerous animals in the game. There are times when you won't notice they're sneaking up on you until the last second, in which case say goodbye to your steed and your life!
Unlike coyotes, they're not afraid of gunfire, but if you manage to kill one of their own with a heavy weapon – preferably a shotgun – the pack will disperse. Be careful, while wolves – like most animals in the game – have low health, a pack can and will mow you down if you aren't fast enough.
One bear, like a boar, isn't an issue. But again, like a boar or a wolf, a sleuth of these bastards can be – to put it mildly – fairly intimidating. Unless you've got full Dead Eye and some of the best weapons in the game, I would not recommend approaching them on foot.
Cougars are the worst. They're the fastest prey in the game and have a notorious reputation amongst many aggravated players for their silence. They can sneak up, pounce, and you'll be lunch before you know it. They're one to two-shot wonders… and sometimes they'll come in groups of two or three, in which case, mount the horse and run.
Thankfully, cougars can be taken down in one hit with the shotgun or the Bolt-Action Rifle.
As the game generates the number or appearances of animals randomly, it's always a matter of probability. Sometimes it's just one cougar or one bear, or sometimes…
Funny thing. There have been occurrences in which gamers have triggered an endless rush of wave after wave… of wolves, bears and cougars. There are a few spots in the game world where you can engineer these rushes by performing a very specific action (look up online for more info).
So aside from hunting, how else can you make money, outside of story missions? The game will generate random events such as stagecoach robberies (which you can prevent or instigate), heists, and stick-ups. At other points you can find yourself saving lives and getting paid for it.
Official sidequests come with their own cinematics, and can be completed at any point in the game. There's the unofficial constant sidequest of bounty hunting or playing as the night-watchmen in a few towns throughout the game.
Then there are the minigames. Poker and five-finger fillet, to name two. Not much else to say about that, really.
It should also be noted that the game has an endless supply of gang hideouts. Even if you clear one, fifteen minutes later it'll be re-taken over by members of the same gang. Not that I'm complaining. Free ammo and extra money, and it's a good challenge. Oh, even better, vultures tend to congregate at the hideout after you've killed everyone. Take this opportunity to shoot them down and collect their feathers, shops will pay handsomely.
Now that I've handled player mechanics and the plethora of options for a sandbox world… let's tackle one of my biggest peeves about the game.
Horseback-Riding 101.
Believe it or not, it's harder than it looks. Horses will get you where you want to go, but they run like brick walls and they're just as fluid. Try turning a horse, especially if you're in gunfight with other horseback riding bandits. I know a horse isn't a car, but they're just terribly rigid, which doesn't help me at all when I'm in a fast-paced shoot-out.
They could at least improve it.
But speaking of combat mechanics, it's high time we pick that apart for a minute.
For those not-in-the-know, Dead Eye is a helpful little tool that grants the player the ability to enter bullet-time, where Marston's vision perceives the immediate environment as glowing piss-yellow. Time slows enough for you to target specific body parts on your opponents and fire away with precise accuracy. However, to give enemy AI a fair advantage, the Dead Eye meter is relegated to a drain limit, and if you don't have tobacco or Snake Oil the meter will recharge slowly.
If you ever find yourself without, expect life to get a hell of a lot harder when you bump into a posse of outlaws.
Similar to Rockstar's GTA franchise, gunfights boil down to third-person cover based shooting. Want to survive, hide behind a chest-high rock and return fire when the enemy is reloading.
The guns vary in range, power, accuracy and firing rate.
The High Power Pistol (FN M1903, aka the Browning No. 2) is arguably the most effective and powerful handgun in the game. It has surprising long range and it is ungodly brutal in close range. Couple that with a high rate of fire, you have a gamebreaker on your hands. If it couldn't get any cheaper, it's the easiest to reload. While it takes over five seconds to reload a revolver cylinder, the High Power Pistol just needs a fresh clip, and you're ready in an instant.
But the most powerful revolver in the game is the LeMat Revolver. According to stats, it packs the best punch. While the High Power Pistol has the edge in speed and reliability, the LetMat Revolver can kill most characters and even predators in single shots.
The best rifle is the Bolt-Action Rifle. Like the High Power Pistol, it can be relied on for its versatility.
There are a number of guns throughout the game, but to get them you'll have to advance through the story… or cheat. Check the internet for more details.
When the story is over, chances are you'll find yourself a little bored. Without a plot as the catalyst, the drive to explore loses its edge. Which is why there's always one another venue of fun that's always open in this game, and that's the multiplayer. Want to take down gangs with other players, kill other players, defend forts and towns from other players? Hell, want to team up with other players and fend off a zombie apocalypse?
Then I guarantee you will spend hours on Xbox Live. It's fun, addicting, and I wouldn't have it any other way. It keeps interest alive and the game doesn't lose its luster.
We'll cover the plot and the characters in the next chapter of this review, but I'd like to finish this off with an analysis of one of the facets of the game that just… absolutely twists my tits.
"The Honour System."
Remember how in GTA or in Saint's Row (I or II) the more of a dick you were, the higher your wanted meter? And each time you committed more and more atrocities there would be a corresponding escalation of threat levels to take you out? From smalltime beat-cops to the goddamn National Guard.
Remember when they posed a challenge? In Redemption, you only fight posses if you've been a bad boy.
In this game, your acts are measured by an honour meter, again similar to Fallout 3. The meter also correlates with your reputation, which may include discounts at some of the stores you come across. They run the gamut of cut-throat douchebag to "legend of the west."
I have an issue with this system… it has no impact whatsoever. You can act as a truly despicable monster so villainous even Angel Eyes would tell you to take a chill pill, but it doesn't have any relevance on the story, the shops or the NPC's don't act any different towards you and ultimately there are no bonuses.
There isn't even any escalation of a challenge, which is what I liked about pissing off the law in Saint's Row II. I know, there aren't any tanks or helicopters in the Wild West, even in 1911, but give me a break.
Posses, that's it? They're laughably easy.
I once spent an hour bunkered in the Blackwater police station, hidden behind a bulletproof oak desk. Ten seconds prior, I murdered two officers from afar with my Winchester and waited for the incoming swarm to squeeze themselves through the bottleneck that was the station's only door. It was all part of a strategy of mine, and they fell for it.
The same lawmen or posse members kept barging in just begging me to end their miserable existence of minimum income, and I happily obliged. But they didn't have, say, an escalation of increasingly potent weapons. I had everything from the LeMat Revolver to the pump action shotgun to the Explosive Rifle. Couldn't my enemies be equipped with slightly better weaponry as well? I wanted a challenge, dammit.
Except, I reiterate, I had spent some time in my strategical position laying waste to hundreds of lawmen until it got boring. At which point, I walked out of the station, called my horse and rode out of town with a posse hot on my wheels… all of whom I promptly shot down.
And then I used one of the government pardons I had been saving up and I received in-return a get-out-of-jail free card. Suddenly they stopped chasing, as if nothing happened. Weak.
What I liked about Fallout 3 or the Mass Effect games were how all of your actions held significant weight. They could change the outcome of the plot and the gaming world in cool and interesting ways. At least in GTA or the Saint's Row, while actions had no relevance and the story and the sandbox universe were segregated, there was – as I have mentioned – a threat level escalation.
A single posse of five guys doesn't measure to the army, and that just infuriates me. The army features in a significant story mission, and there was a point where you could use a Gatling gun while allied NPC's could drive an armoured car.
Why couldn't they be my enemies? It baffles me that they wasted an opportunity for some fun mass mayhem.
There isn't really anything to gain, no tangible reward that could benefit the player. No special weapon, no body armour (Fistful of Dollars style), nothing. There isn't any reward for being good or evil, and the satisfaction out of committing heinous acts of merciless bastardry loses its luster after the first ten bodies.
This made acts of heroism seem fruitful, when all was said and done. I remember I once tied a bandit to train tracks, and watched with glee as he was splattered into a geyser of gore and body parts as the train ran over his body. Aaah… sociopathy is justified and fun when it's directed at criminals.
To paraphrase Marv from Sin City, "I love hitmen. You can do horrible things to 'em and you don't have to feel bad about it."
Kidding aside… time to finish the review with this positive number.
It's made one of my old childhood dreams come true. I got to be a gunslinging cowboy, a knight with a revolver, heroically saving innocents and shooting down punks and murderers like a badass. Despite its many flaws, this is a dream world of six-shooters, horses, sunsets and romanticized, rugged heroism. The sensation alone, after finishing the game, was all I needed to feel that I had spent my time on something worthwhile.
It is easily the best game Rockstar has created, and while on gameplay alone it isn't that distinct from their GTA library, I'll go on to show how when we take a gander at the plot, story and narrative structure of Red Dead Redemption in the next chapter.
If I had to be frank… if I made a top ten list, this game would be number seven. Hell yeah.
Until next time, my friends.