‘Red Dead Redemption 2’: What We Know, And What We Can Guess

Red Dead Redemption is one of Rockstar’s most beloved games. Started as little more than a lark, it went on to sell millions of copies and become incredibly popular, it’s popularity going through the roof when it became backwards-compatible on the Xbox One. And now, if Rockstar’s Twitter is any indication, we’re getting back in the saddle. So what do we actually know about the game?

First off, it’s a prequel, which makes sense considering the original’s themes of the West fading into history, riffing somewhat on the classic Once Upon A Time In The West. That said, of course, protagonist John Marston has a checkered history, and one of Rockstar’s teasers hints that there may be multiple protagonists, so Marston might still pop up, if only in a supporting role.

Secondly, a leak back in April revealed that the setting will shift a bit from the Texas and Mexican territories, or at least areas resembling them, to the Gulf Coast and Louisiana. There’s also a lot of water on the map, hinting that we might be getting into boats this time around. Interestingly, a region on the map, New Bordeaux, shares a name with the setting for Mafia III, also published by 2K Games, although it seems unlikely the two will share more than a tangential connection.

Beyond that, we’re mostly in the realm of speculation, but we can make a few guesses. The first is that it’ll likely resemble Grand Theft Auto V , much like that game borrowed some mechanics and ideas from Red Dead itself. It will also almost certainly have a deeper, richer online mode, especially considering even Rockstar was blindsided by how popular Grand Theft Auto Online has been. The band of seven in the most recent teaser suggests it’s likely the game will let you hop between protagonists, as the Grand Theft Auto V engine is built to handle that.

As for a release date, holiday 2017 seems like a good bet. If Rockstar has a new game coming out, it’s likely going to be the big event for Rockstar publisher 2K, and they’re going to spend a lot of time hyping it. So, yeah, expect to hear a lot about this game between now and its 2017 release.

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