The video game industry is lucky to have the wide variety of titles that it does. Particularly in recent years, where indie outfits have become more prominent thanks in part to the democratization of game-making tools, as well as an ever-growing appetite for video games. There are still the popular AAA titles and long-running franchises, but now more than ever the range of available games is astounding. Games like the epic Western adventure Red Dead Redemption 2 can exist alongside smaller, puzzle-based games like Valiant Hearts: The Great War, but both explore their historical settings in beautiful detail.
While there are lots of games that feature historical real-world settings, none of them do it quite like Red Dead Redemption 2. There is a plethora of WWI and WWII games, with series like Call of Duty and Medal of Honor using these era-defining conflicts as settings for their action, but games that explore their various historical settings away from battlefields and combat scenarios are much rarer. Red Dead Redemption 2 was a nuanced, detailed look at a very specific moment in time with a setting-specific storyline, and more games should follow in its footsteps.
How Red Dead Approaches Its Setting
Red Dead Redemption 2 was a ridiculously ambitious game. It's not only huge, but its story is expansive and sets out to completely encapsulate a moment and place in time to perfection. Set in 1899 as a prequel to Red Dead Redemption, the game follows the Van der Linde gang through the eyes of outlaw Arthur Morgan. A layer of sadness and poignancy is present throughout the game, as players will know how this story ends and the fates of the various characters (for the most part) if they've played its predecessor.
This echoes throughout the game's historical setting as well, as gamers will probably also know that the turn of the century began to introduce a great many changes to the world of Arthur Morgan and his companions, and Red Dead Redemption 2 represents the dying gasps of their way of life. In amongst the fast-paced action and the thrilling heists that players can undertake, there's a chance to simply explore the stunning landscapes and see first-hand what life was like in the Western, Midwestern, and Southern United States at this time.
The Impact It Has On The Game
Many players may have thought they were already familiar with the tropes of the Western genre and knew what a story about outlaws and cowboys would entail, but Red Dead Redemption 2 undercuts this effectively. It overturns assumptions of heroic Western nomads and their law-defying antics and presents players with a bittersweet elegy of the West and those who tried desperately to carve out their own space there. The historical setting is such a major part of the storytelling, and it's hard to imagine the narrative of Red Dead Redemption 2 working in any other time or place.
It's not only the breathtaking vistas and diverse environments of Red Dead Redemption 2's setting that elevate the title, but also its embrace of the fast-changing world where it takes place. It interrogates the twisted morality at the heart of outlaw life and the balance of power on the frontiers and edges of civilization. It tells the stories of those that are often overlooked and uses its historical setting as a convincing backdrop for its narrative of power, betrayal, found family, and justice.
In a game as big as Red Dead Redemption 2, players will naturally be spending a lot of time in its setting. It needs to be compelling, authentic, and immersive, and luckily the game nails all three. Its world not only makes players feel like they're actually saddling up their horse and traveling across vast landscapes, but it also begs to be explored.
Why Other Games Should Follow Suit
Futuristic, neon-drenched settings like Cyberpunk 2077's Night City or No Man's Sky's expansive planetary playroom can be amazing places to explore, but real-world historical settings can offer an incredibly rich experience and are relatively underused. What Red Dead Redemption 2 highlighted so perfectly is that emotional, unforgettable stories can be told in these beautifully-realized environments, and they can have additional significance because they're based in the player's own world. But it's also their own world as they've probably never seen it, and this offers just as much excitement and adventure as a fantasy or sci-fi setting.
With open-world game settings becoming so ubiquitous, and with the rapid advancement of technology that lets in-game worlds become even more realistic and breathtaking, historical settings lend themselves perfectly to the medium. Red Dead Redemption 2 is a technical marvel, but it marries its impressive graphics and digital advancements with a story that has its setting at its heart. There have been plenty of technically great games with stunning visuals before, but translating real-world environments into this format is an extra special feat. Particularly historical ones, that are at once familiar and alien to players, and creating these worlds that also have beautifully told stories at their heart is rare.
There are games with historical settings, and then there are games that do historical settings like Red Dead Redemption 2. Games like that make their setting almost an additional character with as much importance as the protagonist, and infuse their narratives with every facet of their locations. There have been some similar titles that have struck this kind of balance, like Sucker Punch Productions' historical epic Ghost of Tsushima set during the first Mongol invasion of Japan, but they're still few and far between.
Most historical games seem to focus on similar time periods, and there are plenty set in the last century that don't offer a lot of variation on what's come before. There are literally countless places and thousands of years worth of human history to explore, and a game with a similar format to Red Dead Redemption 2 could do these historical settings justice. It would be great to shift the focus away from North American and European narratives as well, as these histories tend to dominate Western media and exclude the other diverse perspectives that exist around the world.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is out now for PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One.