In typical Rockstar fashion, the large, dense world of Red Dead Redemption 2 is full of amazing secrets for players to discover, and there’s a large chance that even after doing a full 60 hour playthrough, you might not even have run across a vast majority of them. They’re out there, hidden and tucked away in throughout the entire map, and they’re absolutely worth going out of your way to look for. Some are a little more freaky than others, also in true Rockstar fashion, and in this feature, we’re going to be talking about fifteen of those freaky, disturbing things in the game. So let’s get to it.
UNDER THE BRIDGE
Red Dead Redemption 2’s world is a world full of bandits, thieves, murderers, and outlaws, but one particular serial killer has caught the fancy of a large number of players already. The killer leaves clues and gruesome trails of dead bodies throughout the map- one particular location stands out more than the others though. Under a particular bridge, you can see hanging a headless torso, with the body’s bottom half lying on the ground not far away, and the head nailed to one of the bridge’s supports. Chancing upon the scene is truly an unsettling experience.
WEREWOLF WOODS
Red Dead Redemption 2’s wilds are full of all manner of animals, some docile and small, others not so much, and others still absolutely huge and hulking. One particular beast, though, is not exactly an animal. While roaming about in the woods, you might hear a sound that sounds like the howling of a wolf, but also sounds kind of human- because it kind of is. Look around a bit more, and you’ll find a crazy wolf man running about the woods, which are also populated quite densely by actual wolves.
CREEPY HOUSE
To the east of Emerald Ranch, there’s a lone house that looks quite ordinary from the outside, but from the inside, it’s silently creepy. Because inside the house is a strange looking, half-decomposed corpse of a woman in a chair. Her death or even her presence in the house is completely unexplained, which makes the entire thing all the more unsettling.
RITUAL
West of Strawberry, right in the centre of a clearing in the forest, you can find what looks like a Pagan ritual site, with eerie looking symbols drawn on the ground, and what is clearly the corpse of a sacrificed person right in the centre. This, too, is something that goes unexplained, even after Arthur makes a note of it in his journal.
FROZEN COUPLE
This can be found near the very beginning of the game. East of Spider Gorge, close to the ruins of the Adler Ranch, you can find the snowed in remains of a camp. Trudge around the snow a little, and you’ll find the frozen bodies of a couple sitting up, buried in the snow, still holding each other. On the outskirts of the camp, you can also see the corpse what must have been the couple’s horse.
GHOST TRAIN
There’s tons of trains in the budding industrial world of Red Dead Redemption 2, and robbing these is always a whole lot of fun. Robbing this particular train might prove a little tougher though- because it’s phantasmal. You can see the ghostly shape of this train running on the tracks, and you can even hear it- and it’s definitely an eerie sight.
GHOST LADY
The swamps north of Saint Denis are perhaps the creepiest area in the entirety of Red Dead Redemption 2, and not just because they’re crawling with alligators. Of the many creepy sights to behold in this area, among the creepiest has to be the pale, ghost lady. You can spot and hear her from a distance, furiously rambling about mysterious things, and as you approach her, she simply fades away. Chancing upon her in the swamps, especially in the middle of the night, is one of the spookiest things that’ll happen to you in the entire game.
NIGHT FOLK
But that’s not it, as far as the creepiness of the marshland goes. Sure, the ghost lady is freaky as hell, and sure, the alligators are nightmare-material, but the Night Folk are probably the most dangerous and terrifying thing about the entire area. They leave bodies strewn about everywhere, sometimes hanging from trees, sometimes tied to them. These people, wearing white paint, can creep up on you in the swamps with surprising agility and silence, and can even ambush in unpredictable and scary ways that are best left unspoiled. If you’re looking for some genuine thrills, make sure you seek out the questline involving the Night Folk in the swamps.
WITCH’S CAULDRON
North east of Fort Wallace, there’s a small shack off the road, labelled on the map as “Witch’s Cauldron”. It definitely lives up to its name. Even from a distance it looks quite spooky, completely overgrown and rundown as it is. Head inside and you can see the interiors adorned by weird decorations, with dozens of candles burning on the ground and surrounding a large cauldron. Take a sip of the thick, bubbling liquid inside the cauldron, and you’ll immediately fall over and lose consciousness.
DEVIL’S CAVE
The Devil’s cave can be found near the Little Creek river, to the north of the town of Strawberry, and this place is as bizarre as it’s unsettling. While you’re navigating the caves, you’ll see a bunch of hieroglyphics and patterns on the walls. Eventually, a character claiming to be the devil starts shouting at you, telling you to go away and find your own cave. Of course, the person immediately comes into view after that, and admits to not being the devil (nor does he look the part), so that kind of ruins the effect…
ABANDONED PRISON
Abandoned asylums are freaky as shit, sure, but abandoned prisons are a close second. This particular prison is completely rundown, and has a foreboding air about it. With broken down walls, overgrown structures, chains and broken gates lying about, this location can send a chill up your spine without every trying to hard to do so- especially if you visit it in nighttime.
GUNSMITH’S BASEMENT
This one is a bit creepy. At the gunsmith’s shop in Rhodes, there’s a dark secret to uncover. Head around the building’s exterior, and you’ll see a small barred window on ground level, where a person is peeking out and begging you to help him. As it turns out, the gunsmith has been keeping this person locked inside his basement, under the delusion that he’s his son.
TALKING GIANT
This one isn’t quite as spooky as it’s a little sad (and also kinda funny), though it definitely is at least a little eerie. Close to the Wapiti rersevation in the map’s north-eastern section, there’s a secluded spot in the mountains where you can come across what is, on paper at least, nothing more than a disembodied voice conversing with you from behind a pile of rocks. The voice claims to be a giant who’s had to lock himself away from people due to being persecuted by them.
THE GIRL IN THE WINDOW
You know what’s one of the creepiest things in the world? People staring at you for no reason from a window a distance away. Which is exactly what this is. There’s a huge house in Emerald Ranch, and if you head to it at night, you’ll see a light in one of its windows. Take a look at it through the scope of your gun or with your binoculars, and you’ll see a girl standing at the window, simply staring in your direction, non-stop, and doing nothing else.
CHAINED OUTHOUSE, UFO, METEOR HOUSE
We’ve already spoken about all three of these in our easter eggs feature from a few days back (you can read it through here), but given how creepy all three of these are, we felt they deserved mentioning here as well. The small outhouse with chains wrapped around it and a crazed, freaky looking woman inside; the shack full of melted ritualistic candles and skeletons where you can see a UFO at nighttime; and an abandoned house with burned bodies inside of it with smoke still rising off of them, and holes in the roof and the floor, where you can see the meteorite that crashed through and killed the family- these things are nothing if not creepy.