Red Dead Redemption

Red Dead Redemption is a Western action-adventure game developed by Rockstar San Diego as the spiritual successor to Red Dead Revolver. It was released for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on May 18, 2010 in North America, and May 21, 2010 in Europe.

Synopsis
John Marston is a partially reformed outlaw in America in 1911. When federal agents threaten his family, Marston is sent across the American West to help uphold the law. He must kill or capture his former gang members, including his old friend and gang partner Bill Williamson, or his family will pay the ultimate price.

Along the way through frontier towns, deserts, prairies, and mountain passes, Marston is given work as he explores the free-roaming sandbox environments. The game features thirty-six species of animals that can be hunted, including cattle, bears, rattlesnakes, wolves, vultures, bighorn sheep, owls, cougars, buffalo, and more.

Background Detail
The game takes place in 1911, which is the middle of the 30-year end of the Western American Frontier (also known as the Wild West). As players see in the opening of the game, many new and "unfamiliar" people are moving into the West on the train. The town of Blackwater has noticeable modernized differences in architecture and technology compared to other gritty towns like Armadillo and Thieve's Landing. Electric line poles are also noticeable along roads. Marshal Leigh Johnson is seen fussing with a telephone in one of his mission cutscenes, showing the unfamiliarity with such technology people of his generation and likeness have.

Some people have a hard time accepting this new lifestyle, as many want to fight to preserve their way of life. Players can see the frustration many characters have with the Federal Government and eastern folk. Being so far away from the modern America gave the West a sense of self reliance and makeshift law and order which would be hard to comply with the Federal Government. It was inevitable, as more and more people poured in from the east, that every corner of the American West would be populated. It wasn't until the 20's that the untamed Wild West would forever become an icon in American history.

Information

 * Characters
 * John Marston
 * Jack Marston
 * Locations
 * West Elizabeth
 * New Austin
 * Nuevo Paraiso
 * Animals
 * Horses
 * Storyline missions
 * Weapons
 * Outfits
 * Activities
 * Hunting
 * Transport
 * Multiplayer
 * Trailers
 * Achievements
 * Cheats

Themes
Like Rockstars crime epic Grand Theft Auto IV, Red Dead Redemption has many deep themes. There are many, but there seem to be four main themes.

The first is the battle between an old world facing change from a new world. The Old West in the game is being introduced to technology, gaudy clothing, airplanes, and ultimately civilization. While some, like the folk in Blackwater, accept that change some characters in the game such as Dutch van der Linde, Bill Williamson, Javier Escuela, and ultimately John Marston do not accept it. The main two factions in the game appear to be outlaws and the government. Both sides are equally bad, seeing how even though the outlaws kill and steal to live their lives, the government takes money and fills the Old West's heads with empty promises. At the ending of the game, John Marston faces his last target Dutch van der Linde on the edge of a cliff and points a gun at him. Dutch tells John that you can't fight change, and even if the Old West is over, another monster will just be found.

The second theme appears to be a question that falls under the moral choice of good, neutral, and evil. The government agents in Blackwater (minus Edgar Ross and Archer Fordham) believe they are good even though they usually ruin and interfere with the Wild West more than they help it. The outlaws in Dutch's Gang killed and stole from the rich, but then gave to the poor. This raises the question: Is it acceptable to be evil and brutal in the present in order to achieve a better future? And if both sides are evil, then that makes John Marston neutral to good and evil. John has killed hundreds of people, abducted people, and stolen from the government his whole life. But yet, he tries restarting his life with his family and forgetting about the past. He no longer cares which side is right, and that makes him neutral. Of course, the game does not answer this question and it is up to the player to decide if the question is right or wrong.

The third theme of Red Dead Redemption appears to be that there are no clean getaways. John Marston, as said above, lived a life of crime in his younger years, and now tries to put all of it behind him and start a ranch. But there are no clean getaways from your past when you live the life of an outlaw, and the past always catches up with you. To get rid of his past, John must achieve ''Redemption. ''Justify his sins. And he achieves this in the ending when he sacrifices himself to let his wife Abigail and son Jack escape from government agents who have come to assassinate him.

And the fourth and final theme of the game is shown through the character of Dutch van der Linde, self-destruction. The people from the New West are brightly dressed, own motorvehicles, and are bringing in new technology. While most accept this, Dutch van der Linde seems to want to destroy the new society. In Dutch's eyes, the world is meant to be brutal and a true fight for survival like it was in the Old West. This is also shown through Dutch's followers, savages who come from a bloody and brutal background. Dutch thinks that technology, social order, and government brings nothing but corruption, and this is why he sets out to destroy the town of Blackwater.

Gameplay
The gameplay of Red Dead Redemption is vast. The use of guns in the game is very similar to that of Grand Theft Auto IV, another game developed by Rockstar Studios. There are a variety of pistols, revolvers, shotguns and rifles available to the player as the game progresses. Ammo can be purchased in stores across the landscape.

Prices for items vary from which settlement you are in and depending on what you are selling. Players can make money by doing random encounter missions, which present themselves as the player travels. Players can help capture or kill escaped criminals or search for treasure or hunt animals. There are many animals available to hunt ranging from boar, bears, cougars, wolfs, coyotes, and even legendary animals such as Lobo the Wolf or Gordo the Boar.

A change from Grand Theft Auto's system of a wanted level is the bounty system. As players, commit crimes, their bounty increases. Certain crimes raise the bounty more than others like murder of a sheriff do. Players with high bounties will be tracked down by either the Mexican Army or the US Marshalls depending on if the player is in the US or Mexico. Players can surrender themselves to officers at which point they will enter jail. If players cannot pay the bounty, they will be sent on a bounty hunter mission. It is best to capture the bounty alive so the player can get more money to pay off the bounty. If a player can get close enough to a law officer that is currently in pursuit of Marston, they can bribe the officer for a much larger fee than what it is to pay a citizen. This will stop all officers from chasing you but your bounty remains.

Players can get rid of their bounty by going to posts and paying off their bounty piece by piece. Another option that can be used is to give pardon letters, which eliminates all of a player’s bounty.

Development
A trailer of the project was sent to a select number of people at a Sony conference in 2005, promoting the release of the PlayStation 3 system. The trailer was a tech demo of RAGE set in a western setting referred to as Old West Project and a direct sequel to Red Dead Revolver. The trailer circulated throughout the internet. In the April edition of Game Informer, Red Dead Redemption was listed as being for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC. On February 3, 2009, Rockstar Games announced the first official trailer. Resulting trailers showcased numerous characters, gameplay features, and multiplayer modes that will be featured in the final release.

Film
A half-hour feature film was released on FOX TV on May 29, 2010. It is directed by John Hillcoat. The story takes place on the alternate take in the storyline's first act. Shortly after release, the whole film became downloadable officially through Rockstar's official website.

Downloadable Content
Shortly after the release of Redemption, on June 22, 2010, Rockstar released the first DLC, Outlaws To The End. The content includes six new cooperative side missions ranging from raiding a mine and stealing the gold to riding down a river to secure a town's weapon cache. New multiplayer challenges as well as new trophies/achievements are also included. The downloadable content is free for all users on PlayStation Network and Xbox Live.

Also, Rockstar has announced three upcoming DLC; in chronological order, Legends and Killers, Liars and Cheats and Undead Nightmare. A Free-Roam pack had been announced earlier, which was going to be released for free. Although, Microsoft's and Sony's rules regarding the amount of free DLC a game can have have put this to a halt. The contents of the free-roam pack now reside in the Liars and Cheats pack.

Reception
The game has received extremely positive reviews from all over the gaming industry. Aside from a few graphical glitches (noted by IGN), its presentation, sound, and multiplayer have been universally praised. While others such as GamePro have criticized the "occasional pop-in and repetitive missions", they also said it "expertly captures the Wild West", with 1UP giving similar praise and complaints. While several magazines and websites are yet to post their reviews, the average score so far, according to Metacritic, is 95 out of 100.

Trivia

 * The font used for the Red Dead Redemption logo is called "Chinese Rocks". You can download the font here.
 * After they've been killed, some enemies will let out a distinctive scream that's been heard in action films for decades, in films such as Star Wars and Indiana Jones. This scream is called the "Wilhelm Scream". It originally came from the western movie "The Charge On Feather River"
 * Red Dead Redemption is the first sandbox game from Rockstar that allows the player to enter an entirely different country (Mexico) later on in the game.

Gallery
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