While Red Dead Redemption 2 was a big hit, Rockstar has yet to hint whether a new Red Dead Redemption game might be in the works. With Red Dead Redemption Online in maintenance mode and Rockstar presumably focused on Grand Theft Auto 6, it might be a while until fans get another trip to the Wild West. Still, the franchise is too big a hit for Rockstar to abandon it forever, and new Red Dead Redemption games will probably arrive sooner or later.

Rockstar has plenty of options for where to take the eventual release of Red Dead Redemption 3. However, the franchise will likely benefit from continuing to take inspiration from other westerns. The Yellowstone series, in particular, took a relatively unique approach to spin-offs that future Red Dead Redemption games might want to take advantage of.

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How Red Dead Redemption Can Take Inspiration from Yellowstone

Yellowstone Prequel 1886

First airing on Paramount Network in 2018, Yellowstone is a popular neo-western TV drama set in modern-day Montana. It follows several members of the Dutton family, which owns the largest ranch in the state and faces conflict from real estate developers and bordering Broken Rock Indian Reservation and Yellowstone National Park. However, part of what makes the show stand out is not the original series itself but the franchise's approach to spin-offs, which depict various generations of the family across multiple time periods.

This started with the prequel series 1883, which debuted on paramount plus in 2022 and showed an earlier generation of Duttons as they embarked on the arduous journey to Montana during the times of the Old West. It was followed by 1923 and 1944, which likewise followed members of the Dutton family during those years. While the franchise has other spin-offs following characters who aren't members of the Dutton family, Yellowstone is interesting because of how its various installments follow the same family across multiple periods.

Red Dead Redemption might benefit from taking a similar approach to its new installments. One might argue that Red Dead Redemption 2 already did this to a certain degree, with the second game being a prequel set in 1899. However, the games still broadly take place within the same general period, depicting the closing days of the Wild West and the beginning of the 20th century.

Jack Marston and Red Dead Redemption 3

An adult Jack Marston in the Red Dead Redemption epilogue

The most obvious direction for Red Dead Redemption 3 is continuing the story of Jack Marston, John's son. After John's death at the end of Red Dead Redemption, players can continue exploring the game world as Jack in 1914. After tracking down and killing the man who killed his father, players aren't left with much closure for Jack's story, other than the unsettling implication that he seems to be going down the same path his father tried so hard to escape. And while that is a good, if tragic, ending for the original game, it leaves the possibility of continued adventures open.

1914 was hardly an uneventful year, with World War One breaking out in July. One could argue that conflict was the real beginning of the 20th century, ushering in the modern world that had been merely encroaching during the events of the first two Red Dead Redemption games. With Red Dead Redemption's Jack Marston being about 19 in the game's epilogue, there's a good chance he may have fought in the war himself.

The First World War might not fit Red Dead Redemption 3. However, it's not as if nothing happened in America after the war ended, with prohibition going into effect in 1920 when Jack was around 25. This would usher in a new era of criminal activity, with gangsters like Al Capone building criminal empires on the illegal sale of alcohol. Although the crime of that era is usually associated with cities, plenty of bootlegging occurred in less-populated regions of America. It would even be possible to keep the end of an era motif by setting the game at the onset of the Great Depression.

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New Eras for Red Dead Redemption

GTA 5 Los Santos sunset

It would also be perfectly possible to bring Red Dead Redemption closer to the present day. The family still seems to be around, as players can even choose to be the child of a John Marston while creating their character in Grand Theft Auto Online. And while that's not the same John from Red Dead Redemption, the implication is that the character is one of Jack's descendants. A modern-day Red Dead Redemption might veer perilously close to just being Grand Theft Auto, and that's a direction that Rockstar could go if it ever decided to tie its series together more explicitly.

However, with over 100 years between Red Dead Redemption and the present day, Rockstar has plenty of eras to choose from. Alternatively, new Red Dead Redemption games could continue moving further into the past, following the lives of John's ancestors. His father was a Scottish immigrant born on the boat to New York in 1873, was blinded in a Chicago bar fight, and died when John was 8. While John's dad might not sound much like protagonist material on the surface, Red Dead Redemption certainly has a thing for tragic anti-heroes, and he sounds like fertile ground for the kind of stories told by Rockstar Games.

Alternatively, 1855 at the tail end of California Gold Rush sounds like a good fit for the same "end of an era" motif that previous games embraced. This wouldn't work with John's direct ancestors, but his brothers or uncles might have made their way over in time. Of course, that's assuming Red Dead Redemption needs to take place in America at all. Eighteenth and nineteenth-century Scotland was hardly a place where nothing happened, and perhaps the Marstons have a Scottish highwayman or two in their family tree.

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