I've finished RDR2 and epilogue. What i can say -it's a rockstar quality kind of game.
Deconstructing the game by constituents:
1. Graphics and engine
There's nothing much to say -the game is beautiful with right settings. The biggest problem that PC players will notice, who don't use MSAA or higher rendering scale, is the vaseline effect of TAA when you move. It's horrible, it strains your eye until you adapt. There are many settings that won't increase visual fidelity much but take performance -the game literally needs a youtube guide to be set properly to have acceptable ie. 80 fps frames. Other than that, the engine is great, animations are top notch, physics is top notch. Textures, models are great. Overall as i said, rockstar quality!
2. Sound
As it should be -it's there when it needs to be. The musical tunes complement the quest atmopshere. Nothing to fret about it -it's great.
3. UI and controls
As we know, good UI makes the game. For PC version, RDR2 UI and controls are horrible. From the get go you need to change the horse camera and controls. Still the horse handling will be terrible.The item and gun wheel that force you to use lots of keys and scrolling through items is good for consoles, but for PCs its horrible. Game takes your weapons into your horse, despite setting default equipment. It's annoying to take of the guns from horse -worse if you forgot them and mission already started. Re equipping hat-ugh, why not do this automatically when i get on a horse?
4. Gameplay elements and difficulty
Gameplay mechanics are just...OK. Combat is extremely easy with deadeye and amount of consumables you can carry. You can make 16 headshot with lancaster gun with deadeye in no time, while you won't take any damage. You can whitstand like 20 shots, before you need to eat anything. There's no gun sway unless you drink alcohol, and its still easy to manage. I mean i understand they wanted the cinematic feel and you being invincible, but common, gameplay make the game! At least give players a hard mode, even simple changes like:
- Lower health
- Increase energy loss
- Disable dead eye, or make it very sparse
- No aim help with deadeye
- Reduce loot on corpses
- Reduce the quantity of consumables that we can transport
- Reduce the amount of ammo
This changes don't need gameplay/engine rework to be implemented.
Hunting is annoying because you need certain weapons for certain animals, and these weapons will be unlocked only at the end of game, therefore you are cockblocked to hunt for legendary/pristine pelts... Pelts also pay poorly compared to robberies and other activities, so why bother beside crafting? Fishing is another "immersion" game that doesn't pay well or contribute to the game in meaningful way. Is this a fishing simulator or gunslinger simulator? Why instead of these useless activities, give us possibility to start a gang, hire people, upgrade hideout -a good money sink, because you have no other way to spend big money other than buying...clothes. Why not add free roam after the epilogue, with proceduraly generated quests and gang management al'a ETS? Even stupid courier game where you deliver packages, spice it with gang attacks.Might squeeze few more hours from players doing things that are more interesting than fishing or playing poker...and poker and blackjack i can understand, but why domino? :D
About mature aspects: There's no explicit nudity in the game or sex scenes, which is kinda weird. Not enough whoring for a life of a gunslinger. The whole dutch band could be described as homosexuals if it wasn't for John
. Maybe that's some rockstar crude joke that "cowboys" do it with cows or horses? Idk, the man has his needs. You can go on date with your exwife, help a lady in the woods, but there's nothing more to it. You feel like a cuck doing this.
Game is not even a looter shooter, it's a mindless cover shooter[well you don't need cover with deadeye and decent aim]. There's no character progression, there are no stats, no abilities, the gun selection doesn't matter, horses have similar speed -all of these options are very bland. It feels like it's just a filler to claim the game is sandbox, while what it should be -a story focused gunslinger simulator with all necessary elements to it.From combatfag persepctive the game is just poor.So we continue to...
5. Story
If i had to describe story with one word it would be: dissatisfying. The story arc is very simple it's a tale of betrayal that we saw many times in literature or movies. But the execution of the story is lackluster. There are no plot twist along the way, the character that should be our antagonist, or we could choose as antagonist, never really become one. You can't kill him, instead you focus on his minion that was feeding him and his grandiose ego, seeing opportunity for exploitation as the leader is a hotheaded idiot with agenda on mind. There is a situation where you are offered betrayal, and from that time, the game should let you make a decision and split -either you work with dutch or betray him. This is of course if we assume that the story that rockstar conceived should stay in place and not be scrapped completely for something that is a proper gunslinger story -a band of hardened men that plunder people. Instead we got a story about a soft hearthed socialist-anarchist-primitivist idiot, whose true agenda is to pit industrialists, bourgeouise, government and indiands against each other, because of "social justice" and hatred toward modern, industrialist, capitalist world with developing civilization. There's also just plain stupid revenge that get Dutch into trouble and starting from scratch once again. During the game we partake in a lot of activities of babysitting other people and doing selfless acts, which is contrary to what a true gunslinger/bandit would do. Game just like most of the games of 2020 panders to certain ideological viewpoints, albeit in semi ambigious way, redeeming it with sane snarky comments during the SJW missions. The prominent ideological theme in the game are: antiracism pandering[trying to make you friends with lennyt], feminist pandering[mission with escorting feminists], the myth of noble savage[indians are literally saint in the game, always provoked by US government], socialist commentary from dutch, anticapitalist action against bourgeouise concocted by dutch, slave[?]/socialist uprising in Guarma. Then there's the whole theme of inbreed rednecks, stupid uneducated, backward bigots of south, how retarded and stupid and worthless these people are. It's not targeted just at certain individual, there are disrespectful comments about whole town[Rhodes] and its inhabitants -a collective responsibility. Imagine a game, where characters would talk about black community saying: low iq, worthless, lazy retard welfare monkeys. There would be outrage.
Arthur metamorphosis in the story also feel forced. He goes from being very obedient to being unruly very quickly and it feels fake. He nag and complains way too much, and that was probably rockstar decision to strongly emphasis that he has changed and doesn't believe dutch anymore. But it's so hamfisted and too frequent it started to annoy me a little. If you are so torn up and complaining, why the hell you even go along with his plan? Why won't you leave, or help the people you wanted and confront Dutch, maybe even killing him, as he clearly went of rails and endangers other people? It doesn't make sense. I haven't played as evil character so i don't know if there is a big change in plot. From what i've seen on youtube, there's only minor change, but i might be wrong. Still the same problems are left, with Dutch being alive and no true resolution.
I've actually enjoyed epilogue more than the main plot, bar the ending which was as i said unfulfilling. Epilogue actually felt more like a gunslinger tale -you have a clear goal, you work and earn for yourself. I would actually like to see a main plot like that -you start as a farm boy, the farm gets robbed and you get yourself acquainted with the gunslinger profession by accident as you defend the farm and then try to oust the competitor on the orders of landowner. Then you see that throwing cowshit on wheelbarrow is not for you and you move out from farm, possibly taking someone with you. You then start a band of robbers. I understand that rockstar wanted to continue the story from first RDR, so that's why they accomodated old characters. I think that's a mistake, but i haven't played first game so i can't decisively judge this.
But...even through all these pitfalls, the story was interesting enough for me, and cling me to the screen, hoping for a resolution, as the conflict arised. It's rare for me to not skip cutscenes in games today, and i haven't skipped one in RDR2. This speaks that the pacing, and plot was interesting enough, characters well made, and were acting well. And of course as rockstar games have get us used to -the story was cinematic as hell. The variety of missions, activities made up for other game problems. There was even a balloon mission, with balloon chase. Such moments encited you to play more and see what screenwriters had come up with.
My overall score of the game -it's 8+/10. I've scored high just because the game graphic and world feels very authentic. It's a very well done game in that regards. Without these elements it would be 7/10 at most.
