The Long Game
A progress report on the games we just can’t can t quit, featuring persistence in Red Dead Online
Here’s a game that emphasises the ‘persistence’ in persistently online multiplayer. The trail dust had barely settled on Red Dead Redemption 2’ s success before we accepted we’d be saddling up to check out its online iteration, the GTAV parallel having practically eclipsed its offline variant as a phenomenon all its own. But it’s been a rocky road for ourselves and our faithful, though occasionally AWOL, steeds.
If Red Dead Online hasn’t quite enjoyed the success of GTA Online, it’s partly down to the fact that it is a very different game that requires players to genuinely, earnestly roleplay. You have to work at it. Right now, instances contain healthy numbers, with many lowlevel players suggesting the game is attracting new folk – most recently thanks to the inclusion of RDR2 on Xbox Game Pass. But the game has never been welcoming to debutant desperados. The meagre economics, based on pre-inflationary value of the dollar, means making money – needed for equipment and to start the game’s Frontier Pursuits, such as the latest Naturalist role – is frustratingly tough.
Also off-putting for new players is that, despite plenty of anti-griefing measures in place, there are still people who would rather throwdown than hoedown. Fortunately, having a better horse doesn’t equate to power and guns are only as good as your aim. For us, these tense interactions do marry well with the Wild
West conceit. Every encounter with a player has us eye them up and hawk imaginary tobacco into the dust, waiting for the moment they might pull a gun, or try to hogtie us – at which point we draw and land a shot that tells them, when they respawn, they’d better ride on. But it’s a committed grind that allows us the luxury.
Most frustrating are the bugs. Camps vanish; NPCs and horses fail to appear; missions don’t start; servers kick you out with depressing frequency. At the time of writing, a catastrophic update is spinning a greatest hits of the game’s glitches, rendering it unplayable for a couple of days. It’s an instant detterent to new players, and even RDO’s biggest fans are one day likely to hang up their spurs if this continues to blight the game.
We’ve put in the hours since day one despite all this because, when it works, the game provides an absorbing RPG experience in a stunning sandbox with a loyal, like-minded community that understands how this fascinating and brutal world works. Red Dead Online is a game that its fans really want to succeed. Some high-level players have even formed groups that welcome new players and set up ‘businesses’ to share in trading wealth. You can spot a devotee from their behaviour, whether they’re helping you out or chasing you down – if that’s how they’re roleplaying it, that’s fine by us. So persist we shall, in the hope that Red Dead Online will someday reward our patience.