Red Dead Redemption Video Review
Grindspine
Moderator
Nice!
Keep the reviews comin!
Keep the reviews comin!
MegaDrive20XX
Segatron Genesis... call me the wizard.
Man, Rockstar really outdid themselves.
stealth toilet
Moderator
To counterpoint...
The game is incredible, but it improves on none of GTA IV's failings. The biggest criticism I have of Red Dead Redemption is that while the visuals are spectacular, they are nothing but window-dressing, and are secondary to the experience. The real game takes place in the bottom left hand corner of the screen, on the radar. The world of RDR is indecipherable most of the time, that is, the game must be interpreted through the radar in order to understand what in the world one can interact with, and how it can be interacted with. Red dots must be eliminated, x's can be skinned/looted, yellow dots can be activated by moving toward them, and so forth. Rockstar stills leans on a simplified 2d crutch in order to talk to the person playing their game, and when that fails, text across the bottom of the screen explicitly states what needs to be achieved and how to achieve it (this too, by the way, is color coded). Therefore, the game presents a world that is brilliantly lush and vibrant, but fails to convey any sort of meaning or context to the player on its own.
To effectively play the game, all one needs to do is focus on the radar and menus in the game - there and only there can one make sense of the open world environment. Move white triangle to yellow dot. Keep an eye out for x's, 3-leaf symbols, and blue dots. Occasionally glance at the rest of the screen to see something pretty. Enter menu system to discover what looted items actually do. Use map to determine direction, distance, and place. Put marker on map in menu system. Move white triangle along red line on radar. Etc., etc.
The real game takes place on a 2d plane between white triangle and various colored dots. It's classic style versus substance. 90% of the screen is used to display the game's style (how it looks), while the remaining 10% is used to convey its substance (what it is). Say what you will about Fable 2, but at least that game tried to develop elements in the game world that made sense of the game world (the dog is the most prominent example). Red Dead does nothing of the sort.
Just a thought.
The game is incredible, but it improves on none of GTA IV's failings. The biggest criticism I have of Red Dead Redemption is that while the visuals are spectacular, they are nothing but window-dressing, and are secondary to the experience. The real game takes place in the bottom left hand corner of the screen, on the radar. The world of RDR is indecipherable most of the time, that is, the game must be interpreted through the radar in order to understand what in the world one can interact with, and how it can be interacted with. Red dots must be eliminated, x's can be skinned/looted, yellow dots can be activated by moving toward them, and so forth. Rockstar stills leans on a simplified 2d crutch in order to talk to the person playing their game, and when that fails, text across the bottom of the screen explicitly states what needs to be achieved and how to achieve it (this too, by the way, is color coded). Therefore, the game presents a world that is brilliantly lush and vibrant, but fails to convey any sort of meaning or context to the player on its own.
To effectively play the game, all one needs to do is focus on the radar and menus in the game - there and only there can one make sense of the open world environment. Move white triangle to yellow dot. Keep an eye out for x's, 3-leaf symbols, and blue dots. Occasionally glance at the rest of the screen to see something pretty. Enter menu system to discover what looted items actually do. Use map to determine direction, distance, and place. Put marker on map in menu system. Move white triangle along red line on radar. Etc., etc.
The real game takes place on a 2d plane between white triangle and various colored dots. It's classic style versus substance. 90% of the screen is used to display the game's style (how it looks), while the remaining 10% is used to convey its substance (what it is). Say what you will about Fable 2, but at least that game tried to develop elements in the game world that made sense of the game world (the dog is the most prominent example). Red Dead does nothing of the sort.
Just a thought.