Red Dead Redemption: the best videogame ever?
Will a game based in the wild west, by the team behind Grand Theft Auto, take the genre to a whole new level?
Keith Stuart
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 9 May 2010 21.00 BST
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The gaming community is gearing up for its biggest cultural event since the launch of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City eight years ago. That ushered in a new era of "open world" games, with cool soundtracks, multiple cinematic influences and rounded characters. Next week that game's creator, Rockstar, launches Red Dead Redemption, a sweeping open-world adventure, which is already topping the pre-order charts on Amazon.
Here, the player becomes an ex-outlaw making his way through a violent, lawless society. This will all sound familiar to Grand Theft Auto veterans. But Red Dead Redemption promises something much more intriguing. Set during the dying days of the old west, it's an elegiac investigation of a vanishing culture. As players ride through the game's spectacularly detailed environments, from the endless dusty scrublands of the Mexican border territories to the mountains of West Elizabeth, the sun realistically rises and sets in the looming skies. An eagle swoops overhead, its shadow falling across a corpse – a grisly touch Sergio Leone would have appreciated.
Game magazines have wondered for years why there have been so few western-themed titles, but I think it's obvious. Until now, the technology hasn't been there to replicate the scale of a John Ford landscape. It's much easier to model a skyscraper than a tree. Or indeed a cactus. This could be the first widescreen, giant LCD display cinematic gaming experience.
Perhaps what's most interesting though, is a sense of individual responsibility in the narrative. Lead character John Marston must find his own route through the madness of the Mexican revolution, and that might not necessarily mean perpetrating the sort of criminal carnage we're used to in the GTA series. He can help civilians in distress, and has an honour rating that rises with every good deed – the tabloids will doubtless be disgusted.
There is a step forward too in terms of storytelling and characterisation. While Grand Theft Auto is filled with comedy gangsters, Red Dead Redemption has wizened old snake-oil salesmen, cowardly drunks and educated prospectors scared senseless of the nightmare in which they find themselves. All are rendered in delicate detail – a long way from the jolting bug-eyed marionettes so often seen in games.
Although there is an overarching story, I suspect many gamers will spend more time simply camping, riding, shooting and foiling bank robberies. That is why Read Dead Redemption promises to have real cultural impact. Like the psychological thriller Heavy Rain, released earlier this year, it says that games really have grown up: they can present us with moral choices, they can make us experience living virtual worlds.
