A SURVIVAL HORROR GEARS OF WAR GAME

Gears Tactics was a resoundingly successful experiment in an unfamiliar genre for Gears, but as most series fans would tell you, there’s just as much potential (if not more) in the idea of a survival horror Gears of War spinoff. It’s a series that has often flirted with horror elements, especially in its early years, and were it to double down on that, it could work out rather well. Imagine a slower Gears game that is more focused on horror, where you’re far more vulnerable and far less armed, with a core gameplay loop built around everything that survival horror games are known for, like ammo scarcity and resource management. In the hands of the right development team, something like that would be a treat.

MARIO

The most obvious choice there is. Mainline Mario games are, of course, platformers, but there’s just so much Nintendo has done with this series. From kart racing with Mario Kart to RPGs with Paper Mario and Mario and Luigi, to puzzle games with Dr. Mario, to part games with Mario Party, to sports titles with Mario Tennis, and so, so much more, Mario has tried its hand at an impossible number of things, and proved to be successful in most of its attempts.

RED DEAD REVOLVER WAS ORIGINALLY IN DEVELOPMENT AT CAPCOM

Though Red Dead has become one of Rockstar’s most valuable properties, it was Capcom who first started development on the game. The game was under development at Angel Studios, under the funding and oversight of Capcom, but both companies disagreed on the direction that they wanted Red Dead Revolver to take. As such, the game was cancelled by Capcom in 2003. Recently, however, Angel Studios had been acquired by Rockstar’s parent company, Take-Two Interactive, and rebranded as Rockstar San Diego, and one of Angel Studios’ former projects caught the eye of Rockstar boss Dan Houser. In December of 2003, Rockstar acquired the rights to Red Dead Revolver from Capcom- and the rest is history.

REVOLVER WAS ORIGINALLY GOING TO BE VERY ARCADE-Y

Rockstar isn’t a studio that shies away from bombastic, over-the-top, arcade-y fun, as the Grand Theft Auto games perfectly show, and though Red Dead Redemption itself is very different in style, Revolver was definitely leaning more in that arcade-y direction. However, back when it was still under development under Capcom, it was apparently, much more arcade-y. It was so arcade-y, in fact, that it even had a character that could fly. “The Capcom game was uber-arcade,” Hamish Brown of Rockstar told BBC in an interview in April 2004. “It even had a character who could fly. We kept its arcade roots but gave it a more realistic backdrop. It was a case of taking Capcom’s personality and infusing it with some of our own, taking out things like the four-foot moustaches on the Mexican bandits and adding motion capture cut-scenes and voiceovers that capture our dark sense of humour.”

IT WAS DECIDED NEAR THE END OF REVOLVER’S DEVELOPMENT THAT THE SEQUEL WOULD BE OPEN WORLD

Even though Rockstar probably couldn’t have known just what Red Dead would go on to become and how well it would go on to do for them when they first acquired it, they at least knew that it wasn’t just going to be a one game thing. Because even before Revolver was out, they were already in the planning stages of what they wanted the sequel to be like even while the development on the first game was wrapping up. And during this time, they’d already decided that the game that would go on to become Red Dead Redemption would be an open world title.

RED DEAD REDEMPTION- SPIRITUAL SUCCESSOR

Thanks to its switch to an open world setting, its brand new narrative that was unrelated to the first game, and its switch in tone to a more grounded style of storytelling, even though technically Red Dead Redemption was a sequel to Revolver, Rockstar didn’t look at it that way. They looked at Red Dead Redemption as more of a spiritual successor.

THE VOICE OF JOHN MARSTON

John Marston is without a doubt one of the best and most fiercely loved characters we’ve seen in a video game over the lst decade or so, and a lot of that is thanks to his excellent portrayal by Rob Wiethoff. However, while casting, he was not exactly Rockstar’s first choice. Initially, Rockstar offered the role of John Marston to several well known actors, including Clint Eastwood, Robert Redford and Robert Duvall. They all turned the down- Rockstar eventually offered the role to Wiethoff, and really, we’re quite glad that that turned out the way it did.

RED DEAD REDEMPTION- UNUSED WANTED POSTERS

Seeing wanted posters plastered on walls and structures all across the wild, untamed west of Red Dead Redemption is by no means an uncommon occurrence- it is a game about outlaws and bandits, after all. Apparently, there are also plenty of wanted posters for John Marston and the character Abraham Reyes that were never used in the game, which Rockstar probably placed in the game’s map at some point but eventually removed.

RED DEAD REDEMPTION IN SOUTH KOREA

Localization isn’t something we often give a lot of thought to, but every so often, some games – even the huge ones – don’t get localized in some pretty major markets. Case in point- Red Dead Redemption, which never got dubbing and translation work down for South Korean markets. However, it did come with a guide, which contained translations from the game for players to read while playing.

RED DEAD REDEMPTION- THE ELEGANT SUIT

For all the completionists out there, the Elegant Suit in Red Dead Redemption is something you’re probably familiar with, as one of the nine suits that you need to have if you want 100 per cent completion in the game. That, and the fact that John Marston just looks so darn dapper wearing it, make it a pretty cool outfit. Originally, though, Rockstar intended for it to come without a hat. We’re glad they changed their minds, because that hat makes the outfit ten times cooler.

RED DEAD REDEMPTION- THE DUSTER COAT OUTFIT

This is another outfit completionists are probably familiar with. The Duster Coat, which was literally just a coat that Marston wore over his outfit, was acquired by reaching the Peacemaker Honor rank. As it turns out, it was part of the game since pretty much the beginning of its development. In the teaser released for the game in 2005 (which was the year RDR started development), Rockstar actually even included the Duster Coat outfit.

YOUNGEST AND OLDEST ROCKSTAR PLAYABLE CHARACTERS IN RED DEAD REDEMPTION

Here’s something else about Red Dead Redemption that you might find interesting- at the time of its release, it had both, the youngest and the oldest playable character in a game developed by Rockstar. The youngest being Jack Marston, who was nineteen years of age, and the oldest being the thirty eight year old John Marston. Of course, John Marston is no longer the oldest Rockstar protagonist, having been beaten for age by Grand Theft Auto 5’s 45 year old Michael.

RED DEAD REDEMPTION WAS IN DEVELOPMENT FOR FIVE YEARS

Ideas for what a sequel to Red Dead Revolver would be like had already been kicking around at Rockstar San Diego as the first game neared the end of its development. It launched in 2004, and by 2005, Red Dead Redemption had entered production at the studio. The game was in development for five years, with over 800 people working on it, before it finally launched in 2010.

RED DEAD REDEMPTION 2 WAS IN DEVELOPMENT FOR EIGHT YEARS

Rockstar’s known to be a studio that likes taking its time with the games it works on. As we just mentioned, Red Dead Redemption, which was in development for five years, was a prime example of that. But its sequel, the upcoming Red Dead Redemption 2, has taken things one step further. It began development in 2010, not long after Red Dead Redemption released, and after nearly eight years in development (and some heart-breaking delays), it’s finally almost here.

A COLLABORATION BETWEEN ALL ROCKSTAR STUDIOS

What’s interesting about the development of Red Dead Redemption 2 is that no one single Rockstar Studio is wholly responsible for it. In the past, even though there obviously has been some collaboration between Rockstar’s studios, their games have usually been developed primarily by a single team. GTA 5, for instance, was developed by Rockstar North, while Red Dead Redemption was developed by Rockstar San Diego. However, Red Dead Redemption 2 is a collaborative effort by all Rockstar studios. That’s nine studios across five countries- England, Scotland, United States, India, and Canada. The developers of the games, as such, are not Rockstar North, or Rockstar San Diego, or Rockstar Leeds, but Rockstar Studios- a first for Rockstar.

MORE THAN 1,200 ACTORS INVOLVED

During the development of Red Dead Redemption 2, Rockstar employed over 1,200 actors for motion capture and voice recording purposes. Of these 1,200, over 700 recorded lines for the game. Which, as it turns out, was necessary, because each NPC in the game supposedly has their own mood and personality, and a ton of dialog as well. In fact, every NPC in the game supposedly has over 80 pages of dialog. 

500,000 LINES OF DIALOG

Here are some more interesting figures for you. There are a total of over 500,000 lines in the game, a total of 300,000 animations, while all the motion capture work was spread over 2,200 days of recording. Meanwhile, the game also has a main story script that’s nearly 2,000 pages long. Red Dead Redemption 2 is probably the most ambitious game Rockstar has ever made, and these are just a few of the figures that show just how ambitious.

The narrative that single player games are dead, or close to dying, driven out by the success of multiplayer and games as a service style games, has been pretty pervasive for a while now. For some reason, it is a myth that has continued to persist, in spite of the success of games like The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, The Witcher, Breath of the Wild, Super Mario Odyssey, God of War, Horizon: Zero Dawn, and of course, GTA5.

That kind of selective consideration of the market is not something that Take 2, the parent company of Rockstar, the folks who bring us GTA and Red Dead, wants to engage in. Speaking to GamesBeat, Take-Two Interactive CEO Straus Zelnick said that single player games are nowhere close to being “dead”.

“Historically, in entertainment, people take positions like that, but there are also people saying that it won’t work if it’s not a free-to-play battle royale,” he said “People really are saying that, and not even tongue-in-cheek. I don’t buy that. Single-player, in my opinion, is not dead, not even close. Companies that feel like they’ll just avoid the hard work of building a story and characters and go right to where the money is in multiplayer, I don’t think that’s going to work. I’d be surprised.”

I think Zelnick does have a leg to stand on here- while GTA Online is a multiplayer sensation, which has contributed to its long term success, its multiplayer is rooted in the context built up by the single player campaign, which is extraordinarily high quality to begin with. And the enduring success of games from his companies, and companies such as Nintendo, Sony, Bethesda, and CD Projekt RED, should only serve to reinforce his point further.

Fans of Red Dead Redemption have been long suffering, but it seems as though their patience is about to pay off. We’ve already reported on what may be a new Red Dead project which had its image leaked, and now, it sounds like someone has managed to unearth even more evidence on some new Red Dead related project coming our way.

Gaudynights on Reddit works in a tech company, and very long story very short, he managed to get into the Rockstar website’s source coding, and he managed to find two new pages that can’t yet be accessed relating to Red Dead Redemption and Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare– and these are specifically serially linked to Red Dead, they couldn’t be related to some other project Rockstar may have in the works.

This indicates that two new Red Dead related projects may be in the works- a sequel and a remaster, maybe? Release the remaster to generate excitement for the sequel? Who knows. Let’s just hope that we get an announcement for something Red Dead related some time soon.

Rockstar and Take Two are truly among the most frustrating companies around, albeit in a good way. The games they release are usually incredible, genre and generation defining products, always polished and feature complete, and truly unmatched by most other games on the market. The problem, though, is that they also come out once every five years or so.

That is, according to Take Two president Karl Slatoff, a deliberate and conscious strategy.

“We don’t intend to change annual strategy because of product fatigue. [Take-Two] creates franchise value and [releases have] to be managed deliberately,” he said.

“It’s tempting to have continuous releases and milk a franchise as far as you can, [but] we’ve seen that fatigue in other franchises in the games industry. With almost every single franchise for us, the latest release is bigger than the one before.”

He is absolutely right- Grand Theft Auto 5 alone, for instance, has outsold Assassin’s Creed Revelations, Assassin’s Creed III, Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, Assassin’s Creed Unity, and Assassin’s Creed Syndicate put together- so there is definitely something to be said for Take Two’s model for franchise management (which is so similar to how other companies, like Bethesda, Blizzard, and Nintendo do it).

That said, it is definitely frustrating for us as fans!

It’s Black Friday today! You know what that means, I am sure- it means loads of companies offer some great stuff for some even better prices! And Rockstar is no different- for Black Friday, it will be allowing players the chance to stock up on some cool Red Dead and Grand Theft Auto themed paraphernalia.

This stuff ranges from a GTA themed hoodie, to even a GTA sleeping bag, that you can give little Jimmy to take with him on camping trips and on sleepovers. There really is a lot of stuff on sale, and you are bound to find something or the other that suits your liking there.

You have a lot of time to spend a lot of money, and especially if you live outside the US, you also have a lot of incentive to spend that money- if you purchase over $50 in orders will also qualify for international shipping, with the sale ending at 11:59pm EST on December 1st, 2014.

Rockstar San Diego, the creators of the Red Dead series, and the masterful sandbox game called Red Dead Redemption, “working their socks off” on a new title that “will blow gamers away.”

A new report that has emerged on the internet says Rockstar San Diego is working on a totally new project, that is neither a Red Dead DLC, nor a GTA or a Midnight Club title.

We speculate it is Red Dead 3, or Red Dead Revolution, as it was recently leaked.

Looks like Take-Two have struck gold with their recently released Historic Action Adventure, Mafia II. After industry analyst Michael Pachter’s recent comment that Mafia II will not be successfull, Take-Two came out all guns blazing, saying that not only do they expect Mafia II to be successful, it has also gone off to a spectacular star (see full story here).

Looks like Take-Two were right all along. In the newly released UK Sales Charts, Mafia II topped the list, with highest sales, and newly released titles HAWX 2 and Metroid: Other M debuted at #10 and #12 respectively. Metroid: Other M also claimed the second spot in the full price Wii list, behind Super Mario Galaxy 2. These sales in a matter of just a week look very impressive, especially for a Metroid game, since Metroid games haven’t really sold all that well before.

Kane and Lynch: Dog Days remains at the second spot. Wii Sports Resort, Toy Story 3 and Red Dead Redemption are the next three entries in the list.

Here is the Top 10 list:

01. Mafia II (Take-Two)
02. Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days (Square Enix)
03. Wii Sports Resort (Nintendo)
04. Toy Story 3 (Disney)
05. Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar)
06. Just Dance (Ubisoft)
07. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo)
08. Sniper: Ghost Warrior (City Interactive)
09. Prince Of Persia: The Forgotten Sands (Ubisoft)
10. Tom Clancy’s HAWX 2

“The idea is to make this in the style of an epic Western movie but with a few modern touches.”

Sounds really interesting, and yes, Brad Pitt would fit perfectly in Marston’s role. Red Dead Redemption already shows promise as a movie, so a true movie wouldn’t really be a bad idea.