Red Dead Redemption

Looks like I've just begun Chapter 6. Living conditions keep getting worse and worse, I've got a cough I can't shake, the neighbors are monsters and people keep dying. But Dutch is planning something! Still, I'd say there have been some subtle hints that maybe this will all not end well. I dunno, just call it a hunch.

make sure to do the optional side missions during chapter 6, they open up arthur's character a lot

I don't skip any of the side missions, save for the more busy work find me every flower kind of missions. But the very fact that not only does playing side missions in a video game help you learn more about the character you are playing, you *want* to learn more, really underscores the quality of the writing.

the new RDO update is half decent. the overall reception has been outrage but i seriously don't know what those weirdos are expecting

I am the slowest gamer in the world, but even so, this game is starting to drag a little bit, not least because it's not like I'm expecting a happy ending. Still loving it, of course, especially the character beats and details, but the occasional mandatory shootout really feels kind of perfunctory and pointless at this point. Like, I got ambushed by the redneck clan, and as I stalked toward them shooting like the TB terminator, unconcerned with whatever damage they could mete, I fell in a hole they dug (!), which was surprising and just had to have been random bad luck on my part. Really, I should have died - I was in a pit surrounded by rednecks with guns - but somehow the game still allowed me to shoot my way out.

After every single gratuitous invincible kill spree I always feel compelled to loot every body on the ground, which is what I started doing after helping Sadie murder the last of the O'Fodder clan and sending her on her way. I've made it through the pockets of a few corpses when I get the "Witness: Crime Reported" (or whatever) flash at the top of the screen. Witness? Crime reported? Someone called 911? Who? Everyone's dead? I figure it's a glitch and keep looting. Then it changes to "Crime Being Investigated" or whatever it says, and I still think, that's weird, there's still no one here. A few more seconds go by and the map alerts me to trouble from the east: indeed, the police are coming. Well, that's that, I think, and hop on my horse to escape notice. Except I forget my horse doesn't automatically jump and I run straight into a fence and fly over the handlebars, getting off my face just in time for the arrival of the police. I figure I'm finished, given I'm standing right there, more or less surrounded by bodies, when one of them exclaims "my god, it's a massacre, what happened here?!" Instead, I get the option of defusing the situation, mumbling an aw shucks "I don't know, officer, it was like this when I got here." And they let me go! Except my horse, after sending me over the fence, is jammed in a tight corner of the pen, and this police is just hanging around it, so when I go press the button to hop on I accidentally punch the officer in the face! Needless to say, the police immediately shoot me a dozen times in the back while I try to catch up with my fleeing horse on foot.

Probably should have just shot back, but it was worth it.

Finished the main game! I suppose the end of Arthur's storyline was inevitable, and maybe because it (I) dragged on for so long a little anticlimactic. Also, I got kicked off the TV literally right in the middle of that gorgeous Daniel Lanois song, so that kind of interrupted the mood a little, too. Regardless, the end really underscored the innate problems with the game's have it both ways morality. You can play as "good" all you want, but it still by necessity compels you into being bad: robbing, stealing, murdering by the dozens. It takes the looming mortality of TB to start to turn him around, as written, but if you've already played him as a relatively good person it feels a little perfunctory. Of course, I'm an easy mark, and still found it all really powerful and moving. There are so many moments of introspection and beauty and humor in this game that I kind of wish his tale didn't essentially end with a fistfight. But good stuff, 10/10. On to the endgame!

BTW, iirc my PS4 had me at something like 25% when I hit the epilogue, so I've got to assume there's a whole bunch of BS I just blew right past.

OK, *now* I'm all done. Again, I'm easy, not least because I am so late to this generation of games that everything impresses me, but I wouldn't change a thing about this. A+. Even the 20 minutes of ending credits were A+, thanks to the Lanois songs and little bits here and there. Even seeing and recognizing so many character names in the cast was impressive, and the musician credits were full of tons of familiar names, including Duane Eddy (!). I've never played the original game so know nothing of its plot, and maybe because of that or despite that enjoyed the chiller vibe of the epilogue. In fact, it's all I can do just to resist playing some more simply because I can, but it's time to move on, I think, if only because this game is huuuuuuuuuuge and I probably need to delete it to play anything else.

slowly working through a runthrough on PC. original is a bit more campy/'rockstar'-esque but is enjoyable. also slightly more challenging, which i enjoyed

the banality of parts of the epilogue set up the first action setpiece for marston so well

Had some free time this morning and Played this today for the first time since January. I just saved Mary’s brother from the Illuminati

I've never played anything from Rockstar. I came into a copy of GTA5, but I've been warned it's not RDR2. Or at least RDR2 was a huge improvement.

BTW, even though I am "done," that just added up to a mere 28% of the game!

I think I’m around 28% and still in the main story afaict

you will like GTA5 a lot, and also not like some things about it, but you will also like it a lot

by the time I get around to gta5 games will be holograms implanted into our brains. but the brain chip shortage will mean I miss that generation, too.

I found GTA5 really quite difficult from the start. Had to have several goes at even the first mission.

I don't think I could in good conscience give RDR2 an A+. It is flawed throughout, it is incredible throughout. But it is just a bit below Witcher 3, Death Stranding and probably Control in terms of games I've played through on PS4 so far.

I suppose from my vantage I just don't see how the graphics, characters, story or music could be any better, and that's what drove me and kept me engaged. Sure, some of the actual gameplay got a little repetitive, but I found that gameplay a means to a narrative end. I also never stopped getting surprised by cool stuff, whether ambushes (like the people that lured me into a pit) or getting attacked by animals or just pleasant diversions and fun tasks/exploration. And I suspect I barely scratched the surface of that stuff, too. Last, factor in that as easy as the game is, I also never really tried that *hard*. If I wanted to I could have made it much more challenging for myself.

I do have copies of Witcher 3 and Control to get to at some point, which I'm looking forward to (next year some time, at this rate). Death Stranding unfortunately looks totally unappealing to me, which is weirdly welcome, given my backlog.

The opening loading screen daguerreotypes (?) are beautiful

I just started to play this a few weeks ago. Still on Chapter 2, taking my time.

I think I've sold Seamus one stagecoach so far. Been going up and down to meet the trapper in the woods. Been up and down the coast, from Annsburg to St. Denis. Went to Strawberry the other night. Again, the only town I've "officially" gone to is Valentine.

I don't want to have too much spoiled, but yet, I don't want to walk through this game blindly either. I know Valentine gets locked down at some point, so if I want to rob that doctor's office, I should do it soon. I also know that the lead POV changes at some point. How and why that happens, I'm still blissfully unaware.

I don't particularly feel like robbing everyone? I see those plumes of smoke like everyone else, but I'm content to hunting. If someone tries to start some shit, sure, I'll take care of it and loot the bodies. I'm really bad at doing anything when there's more than one O'Driscoll involved. It's like a nightmare when they show up and start yelling at me, when all I was doing was riding around, picking Yarrow. Haven't won one of those encounters yet.

Which is weird, because I was really good at picking off the bad guys in GTA-5. Do these 19th century characters have more innocence than the gangsters and cops of Los Santos? I kinda worried about that in myself -- why the modern NPCs were more dispensable. Saying it out loud, was because they were little black characters running around, calling me a bitch if I didn't shoot?

The other night, I came across two guys trying to blow open a safe. I waited until they got something done, and then I blasted them. And then I legitimately felt kinda bad when I realized they were African American. I don't need to be going back to 1899 and killing people already struggling.

Yeah, I'm reading too much into it. Blame Charles. He's the one who taught me to hunt in the first place.

Saw a man get hanged in Valentine, and his soon-to-be widow was wailing. I mean, fuck, I appreciate the realism, and I also appreciate Rockstar going, "Oh, so you thought this was a GAME, didya?"

But damn.

I loved this game, and it's one of the few of its type I totally plan to play again.

From memory, I want to say this one is OK to tackle blind (I think I did?). There's stuff you'll miss, but you'll still be channeled to all the important stuff and have a lot of chances to do stuff you missed, and regardless, there is soooo much to discover (fun stuff, funny stuff, weird stuff) on your own. In terms of robbin' and killin', I think it gives you a good deal of leeway how you want to play it. You'll have opportunities to help people, if you want, or you can be a jerk, if you want (though you don't want too many bounty hunters after you, and starting shit in towns is typically asking for trouble). Of course, as you already suspect, this game is pointing you in a particular (and particularly complex) moral direction, enhanced by the excellent characters and writing. I recall the game having some sort of goodness/morality meter, but I can't remember if it had any real effect.

Oh, also, the NPC dialogue is this game, just random man or woman on the street stuff, is so rich and detailed and full of personality. I don't think I ever got bored, because I was constantly hearing or seeing new things.

Played this a couple times this week after a two year hiatus. Good game

28.9% or something

I've had nights like that "Quiet Time" mission. Trying to avoid guy in bowler hat, standing rigid on the stairs, except in IRL, guy usually turns out to be a coat rack or something.

lol what

The mission where all you do is get wasted, lose your friend Lenny, piss all over the backyard, everyone becomes Lenny, and oh yeah, there's some overgrown leprechaun in a bowler hat trying to start shit.

I think I'm playing the same game as the rest of you.

ah right

I... I would really like to learn in this game how to shoot wolves, O'Driscolls, innocent witnesses... with my guns.

The bullets just seem to make everyone angrier.

hold down L2 while turning R3 in a clockwise direction. Then press A and down on the arrow pad

Don’t forget - you must be standing in a river on a new moon as well

St Denjs at night is prettty
Visited the fence and sold all the rings and jewelry I had accumulated

MICAH: You're a small tree with a large shadow!

ARTHUR: I don't even know what that means.

I went through a Groundhog's Day of annoyance last night.

Grabbed a bounty for former Confederate Lindsey Wofford, holed up in a fort up north from Saint Denis. Rode out there, arriving around two in the morning. Trying to sneak around for some recon, but Arthur's whistling?

Then I realize there's a camp right by the riverbank, in full view of the fort. It's my old buddy William! I bet he's going to ask me to go pick a bunch of herbs that I've already got a million of in my satchel. Well, ok, the fort can wait.

In the distance, gunshots. What, is the sharpshooter guy out here too in the middle of the night?

William asks for some currant. Shit, William. I've been grabbing currant left and right ever since Kieran asked for some too. I hand it over. He gives me a bottle of miracle tonic. We affirm our friendship. I wander back to my horse and hop on.

WANTED! HORSE THIEVERY! What? Oh, shit. My bad! Jumped on the wrong damn horse! My horse is right over there and they both look very much – Fuck! William comes at me with a knife, cursing me. IT WAS A MISTAKE, WILLIAM. DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW COMMON THIS IS? I DRIVE A BLACK HONDA CRV IRL. LIKE, EVERY TRIP TO KROGER!

William's not listening to me. This is either not going to end well or it's not going to end well. Even if I get away from him without killing him, or being killed myself, I doubt we're ever going to shoot the shit over Orelander Sage again. I make the decision to load the previous game back in. Before I do, I tie up William and loot his camp. For what it's worth if you've ever wondered, he's got some more tonic in the horse satchel and a can of peaches.

Load game... I'm up north from Saint Denis. It's dark, around two in the morning. There's the glow from a camp by the river. In the distance, gunshots.

Hey, it's William! Howya doin', old friend? He calls me "Traveler" which I like. Currant? Pfffft. My pockets are full of currant. Anything for you, William. Or can I call you Bill?

I head up to the fort. How they haven't heard me and William carrying on just down the hill, I have no clue. I call out Lindsey Wofford. He makes some peacock speech about sovereign rights, and then his boys start shooting. First time I see a gatling gun in the game, and it stings!

My personal mission is take Lindsey alive back to Saint Denis. The reward's the same either way, but if he's dropped off alive, there's apparently a whole cut scene of him being hanged at a public execution. Neat! Bringing back the body, eh, toss him in the dumpster.

Well you know these types. They don't want to go alive. So without even really trying, I kill the guy. I ponder this for a few moments. No, I want to take this guy downtown, let him enjoy the view of my horse's ass the whole way.

So I quit and load the game. I'm way north of Saint Denis in the middle of the night. Dammit, there's William again. Why didn't I save this after I had my meet-up with him?

In the distance, gunshots. A woman screams. OK, this doesn't sound like the sharpshooter. "They killed him!" I ride past a bewildered William to find a man dead in the road next to his two horses and overturned stagecoach. Two of the ugliest hillbillies are making the worst conversation with each other as they carry off a hogtied woman. I open fire.

The hillbillies are dead, but I can't find the woman. There she is in some bushes. It's very dark out here! I pick her up to carry her out to the road. She's obviously in distress and wants to be put down.

The only option the controller gives me is DROP. "Kinda rough with me, aren't ya?"

I untie her, she tells me her whole sad story and wants to be given a ride to Van Horn. Sheesh, I'd be happy to do so even though it's way out of my way and – well, hold on. She gets on my horse and I ride the 100 yards over to William's to go through that whole currant routine again. Except he's gone, leaving everything including his fire unattended. Smart man, that William.

"This doesn't seem to be the right way to Van Horn!" my backseat driver tells me. OK, screw this. Load game...

It'sthemiddleofthenightinthewoodsnorthofSaintDenis. I try to circle around to William's post without spawning the whole disturbing hillbilly hostage event. Just as I come up to him from the north, there's a gunshot, and William goes, "Hey, friend! Been awhile!" Ok, maybe he aborted the whole hostage thing by beginning his spiel with me.

I take his miracle tonic, go up the road, and there's the two horses. Nothing but tracks anywhere else.

This isn't a good sign. I go up to the fort and go through several different variations of getting tore open by the gatling gun or killing Lindsey Wofford. The times that I do walk across the little bridge to his hideout, throwing my lasso around like I'm Will Rogers, well, even I have to chuckle at how ridiculous this is. Just how badly do I want to see a public hanging anyway, even of this proud soldier of the once-great Southern Army?

At one point, I start snooping around the fort, looking for gold and a certain kind of gun in the basement. All this while racist NPCs are still shooting at me. Clearly, I'm a little shell shocked.

Load game... certainly, I saved it after my last William encounter, right? Or did I? I'm in the woods north of Saint Denis in the middle of the night. William isn't there. No screams or gunshots.

Just the fort up ahead, where at this point, we're all just daring each other to kill us again.

“I’ve got a secret…”
“You’re secretly normal?”

Finished the main missions and epilogue. Still got 15% more to go.

Kinda taken off guard when the three characters got caught in a freeze-frame during a group high-five and "In the City" by Joe Walsh came on.

There was all sorts of stuff I heard about but never experienced, like the supernatural stuff and the like.

"My people... need peace. We cannot afford to wage a war we cannot win. Our spirit... HEY, WATCH IT! YOUR HORSE BUMPED INTO MINE! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? NOW GET BACK UP HERE, YOU'RE TAKING TOO LONG! What was I saying again? Oh, yes. Our spirit can only remain strong if..."

*horse smacks into a tree and Arthur is thrown 20 feet*
"GET BACK HERE! STOP HOLDING UP THE SHOW!"

All it does is rain now. If it wasn't for the fact that I've already seen how this guy dies, I'd say he's going to die from pneumonia.

(Along those lines, I slow walk through Armadillo whenever I'm there, knowing full-well that I'm somehow immune to cholera.)

I've collected a set of cigarette cards. I've found all the bones and dreamcatchers. Don't know what to do now except go look for Bigfoot.

Run into Pearson at the Rhodes General Store.

"Marston! You're alive! How are ya! Yeah, here I am. Lot better than that old butcher's table!"

*Five minutes later*

"So you gonna buy something?"

^^ My life in a nutshell, living in the same town from where I graduated high school.

There is definitely a Bigfoot reference in this game (RDR2).

Man, I hope they give this one a PS5 polish to convince me to play it again. I'll probably end up playing it again sometime anyway.

I think the way I’m meant to play this is just to go from bar to bar in the different towns, drinking and smoking all day and stealing when the money runs out

I think that's definitely *a* way to play, lol. There was a point in St. Denis where I had attracted so many police I wanted to see how long I could hold out and defend myself against/elude them, but they just kept coming and eventually I had to go out in a blaze of glory.

I have still yet to rob a stagecoach on my own. Nobody's given me reason to? Same thing with robbing the stores. The fact that my options when I saunter up to the trapper's tent is buy, sell, or AIM WEAPON is a little disheartening.

I have robbed from campsites, and not just from gang members either. Sometimes I'll mosey up, and the campers will tell me a little story about how you have to trust people in order to make the world a better place. Or, maybe how they're haunted every night by the faces of the Native Americans they imprisoned. Those folks can keep their canned peaches. But when someone tells me I better git and AIMS WEAPON at me, well. Those peaches sure taste good later on.

And oh, how I love the home robberies. It's just like browsing Zillow, except I get to open the drawers and closets. There have only been a couple of guys who have come from out of nowhere to admonish me. And while I'm smashing DEFUSE, they pull out their guns and AIM WEAPON. Dropped one guy, who fell right beside a grave next to his house. Almost too perfect.

For the most part, I don't want to cause too much trouble. Since the missions ended, I've only committed two acts of actual murder. I'd call them mercy killings, but I know what the law would say.

First one was the Englishman looking for Gavin. I was tired of this guy already when Arthur was alive, and when he showed back up on the streets of Blackwater seven years later with the same schtick, I knew something was going to have to happen. I got my chance up near Beaver Hollow. It was either going to be me or the Murfrees. So I tied him up and laid him out on the train track, just on the other side of Ambarino. While I watched him from the woods, he said something like "Well, I certainly don't like this!" and UNTIED HIMSELF. Shot him as he ran across the train bridge and watched as he fell into the ravine below. Passed his body on the way out.

Other guy was the old man in robes who's always standing in the water. Seven years of that is long enough. I roped his feet and drowned him. You could call either of those a mercy killing, but really, I was getting tired of hearing voices and thinking, Oooh, a new stranger to check out! Only to find it was one of those two.

(So of course in Rhodes last night, I hear "Gavin???" Maybe that's your supernatural content.)

I don't think you can ever find Gavin, tbh. I think if you kill the mad preacher in the river he comes back (!), dunno if that's a glitch or intentional.

And yeah, I pretty much shot anybody that pulled a gun on me first. Like, oh, so that's how you want it to be?! I felt the worst when I rescued someone from a cage on the back of a wagon, killed their captors, but then accidentally pointed my gun at the rescued person and scared them away. I wish there was a "no, wait, please come back!" button.

The supernatural stuff, iirc there is something about a vampire, a bit about ghosts, and also a UFO sighting, but a couple of the quests are pretty obscure and convoluted.

Yeah, I've read about the ghosts and vampires, how you have to time it just right and be in the area within a certain window. Nah, let that vampire come and find ME.

I felt the worst when I rescued someone from a cage on the back of a wagon, killed their captors, but then accidentally pointed my gun at the rescued person and scared them away.

Happened to me last night. Came across the Skinner Bros giving a woman a hard time after they had put an arrow through her husband's chest. Killed the Skinners, but instead of bringing up the GREET or ADMONISH choices as she was was kneeling over her husband's body, I aimed my rifle right at her head. This understandably did not improve a bad situation, so I restarted from my last save.

(If I find a nickel, I'm re-saving the game.)

Revisiting online lately (as well as gta too) and having a bit of fun with a mate. We got the collectors bag and just enjoying roaming around looking for stuff.

gta I've been spinning that wheel and winning bundles of cars!