Did you think it was just Nintendo who liked to spoil the party for ambitious fan projects? Because no, it looks like Rockstar likes doing it, too! Red Dead Redemption is one of the most beloved games of all time- but it never launched on PC. It’s been seven years since it launched, and there was no PC version, ever. Later this year, Red Dead Redemption 2 is coming (also announced just for consoles).
Some PC fans of Rockstar and Red Dead apparently decided to at least make it easier to sort of play through Red Dead on the platform- no, not via something shady like illegal emulation or anything, but something as simple and harmless as recreating the Red Dead Redemption map in the PC version of GTA5, sort of like Morrowind was recreated in Skyrim, as a mod. It was a cool homage to the game, and something I am sure a lot of people would have loved playing through- but now they can’t. Rockstar has shut the whole thing down.
Lead Programmer Mr. Leisurewear wrote on the GTAForums thread, “I know this is a hard pill to swallow, but as you may have noticed we did get contacted and we sadly have to say we are stopping this project. So thanks guys, we were all so happy to see this, but it isn’t going to happen, sorry.
“For the record this was never going to be a “PC port”, it was just gonna be the map … Undertaking this sort of a project with additional content ported over was never feasible, we were only gonna get a way to convert the map with both legal copies of each game and some custom scripted additional content, there was never any intention or mention to either port a story mode over from RDR to V.”
It’s a bummer that this happened, and it’s kind of weird that Rockstar will do this. But then again it’s their IP but when will companies understand that this sort of fan engagement and work is good for your IP’s long term success?
