Red Dead Redemption

Are Westerns just out of fashion at the moment? Gun was brilliant in its day, but since then, Xbox gaming has been all about space marines, ninjas, and the other usual fare. Rockstar clearly aims to change that with Red Dead Redemption. By returning to the days of the good ol’ Wild West shootout, it’s giving the genre the full-on sandbox treatment. In fact, in a demo, Rockstar PR director Simon Ramsey called it “as ambitious in scope and scale as anything we’ve done with GTA.”

Them’s bold words, but from our first glimpse of the game, the series has come a long way from the so-so third-person shooter that was Red Dead Revolver on Xbox. Instead of retreading that ground, Redemption constructs a vast landscape set in the early 1900s — a time that Rockstar selected because increasing industrialization and a bigger government presence were starting to make the West not so wild anymore. Revolving around John Marston, Redemption’s story is all about mingling the notions of right and wrong or good and evil in a way that sounds a lot like the TV show The Shield. Marston himself embodies that notion — as the former member of a really vicious gang, he just wants to settle into a quiet life with his family. But the Feds have other ideas, drafting him to work for an early version of the FBI called The Bureau. Problem is, Marston can’t usually tell whether their assignments and orders are more noble or just than anything his former gang had him do.

Sounds like dark — and hopefully compelling — stuff, and Rockstar’s creating a pretty sweet backdrop for it. The environments we saw were vast and impressive, and we’re told that Redemption’s landscapes are bigger than those in any game Rockstar’s made before. Broken into three segments — Mexico, the Frontier, and the North — they each have their own look and vibe. The North is greener in that California-redwoods way, while Mexico is all sand and red rocks, just like it should be in that era. Everything from tiny settlements to decent-sized towns dot all three landscapes, and you can walk right up to any building and stroll inside without loading.

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