Red Dead Redemption 2 looks to be amazing, but it launches in a very different landscape than most Rockstar games before it. In the past, Rockstar was basically the only meaningful high quality open world game in town. That has since changed, with Ubisoft, Bethesda, CD Projekt RED, and Nintendo (to name just a few) all having turned out critically acclaimed open world games in the years since Grand Theft Auto 5’s release.
Launching in a market with so many open world games, how does Rockstar intend for its game to stand out? Speaking to EDGE (December 2018, Issue 325), Art Director Aaron Garbut pointed out that the development team is looking at the game not as a collection of missions and activities for the players to engage in, but an actual place for them to inhabit and discover, eschewing common open world tropes along the way.
“We have moved away from typical open-world tropes. This is not a collection of missions inside a big world filled with blips for pick-ups and minigames. It’s much more subtle, and much more real. We don’t think of it as a game to be played through. It’s a place for you to get lost in,” Garbut said.
Given how well Rockstar excels at making great open worlds, I think we can all safely assume that Red Dead Redemption 2 will land in the upper echelon of open world games once it launches on October 26 for PS4 and Xbox One. If you are interested in learning more about the game, check out some of the newest details for it, including about its musical score.