Should RDR3 have a psycho protagonist like Micah Bell and Trevor Philips?

[Agent Edward]

Taking a look at the GTA5 section here on GTAForums, I came across a topic discussing Trevor's behavior and @Lemoyne outlaw's comment caught my attention, he basically said that Trevor is loved for the same reasons that Micah is hated.

 

So this got me thinking, the most obvious reason behind players' hatred for Micah is because he is Arthur's arch enemy, but what if both of them were playable characters or even the complete opposite, with Micah being the protagonist and Arthur being the main antagonist of the game? This without changing their personalities one bit, with Arthur still being the "less bad" guy of the gang and Micah still being the very same barstard we know.

 

Obviously the main objective of the game would be different, playing as Micah it would be to destroy the Van der Linde gang and then create his very own later.

 

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With all of this being said, let's get to the matter at hand, with both RDR1 and RDR2 we were used to play as protagonist with a very clear redemption arch, who once were bad men and now are trying to do one last noble deed before their ultimate demise...

 

But what if this changes completely in RDR3? With us playing as the bad guy throughout the entire story? Someone who gets progressively meaner as we advance in the story, a literal backstabber who don't shy away from lying, being dirty and ruthless whenever he sees fit, and all of this while still being a exceptional fighter, the most dangerous kind of person you could stumble across.

 

I know what you people may be thinking, where the "Redemption" part comes in, he probably would have a family or close friends who he would have to protect using his abilities, we can discuss about this later, I want to kickstart this idea as a whole first.

[Lemoyne outlaw]

yes i would love to have a more evil type of protagonist. we kind of get that with arthur for the first couple of chapters. i remember seeing the second trailer. and when he threatened archie about killing him to keep his mom in black. that was such a cold and horrible threat. but of course when arthur gets his TB diagnosis. he changes and tries to do good. even though there's a low honor option. it just doesn't feel right. his bad honor dialogue feels forced. and he loses his antagonistic personality. it's obvious that he's meant to be a better person and redeem himself. so it feels weird to play as low honor arthur in chapter 6. 

 

the problem with making a totally evil antagonist is that rockstar wants us to bond and relate to them. so it would be hard for a lot of players to like someone like that. we all love arthur and niko. even though they are killers and criminals. we still have a huge bond with them. because at the end of the day they still have some humanity and regret. if we played as a guy who goes around killing, r*ping, torturing, kidnapping all while enjoying it. we wouldn't like this person much. most people who play these games are law abiding people. so even though we might enjoy going on a killing spree in these games. it's just our way of blowing off steam and having fun. but we would never do it in real life. but to see someone truly enjoy it because it's real in their universe would be disgusting. sure it's a video game. but in the gta universe. trevor literally did all the things i mentioned above. i would imagine anyone in the gta universe would be disgusted by him. and want him in the electric chair. 

 

i think a total evil antagonist could be good. i still think micah would be an awesome protagonist. but rockstar would have to find a sweet spot to do it. it would be nice to see him have a couple moments of emotional weakness or even a tiny bit of compassion. as much as i don't like trevor much. i will say i liked the moments when he cried. because he showed some emotion. he wasn't just a robot but someone who was in actual emotional pain. i wish we saw something like that with micah.  i really wish we could learn more of his backstory. what was his childhood like? what happened to his parents? maybe he's only racist because a colored man killed his dad or something like that. so much of that could tell us how he became the badass gunslinging outlaw he is in 1899. he would still be evil. but we would have some more depth to his personality and story.

[Agent Edward]

5 hours ago, Lemoyne outlaw said:

yes i would love to have a more evil type of protagonist. we kind of get that with arthur for the first couple of chapters. i remember seeing the second trailer. and when he threatened archie about killing him to keep his mom in black. that was such a cold and horrible threat. but of course when arthur gets his TB diagnosis. he changes and tries to do good. even though there's a low honor option. it just doesn't feel right. his bad honor dialogue feels forced. and he loses his antagonistic personality. it's obvious that he's meant to be a better person and redeem himself. so it feels weird to play as low honor arthur in chapter 6. 

 

the problem with making a totally evil antagonist is that rockstar wants us to bond and relate to them. so it would be hard for a lot of players to like someone like that. we all love arthur and niko. even though they are killers and criminals. we still have a huge bond with them. because at the end of the day they still have some humanity and regret. if we played as a guy who goes around killing, r*ping, torturing, kidnapping all while enjoying it. we wouldn't like this person much. most people who play these games are law abiding people. so even though we might enjoy going on a killing spree in these games. it's just our way of blowing off steam and having fun. but we would never do it in real life. but to see someone truly enjoy it because it's real in their universe would be disgusting. sure it's a video game. but in the gta universe. trevor literally did all the things i mentioned above. i would imagine anyone in the gta universe would be disgusted by him. and want him in the electric chair. 

 

i think a total evil antagonist could be good. i still think micah would be an awesome protagonist. but rockstar would have to find a sweet spot to do it. it would be nice to see him have a couple moments of emotional weakness or even a tiny bit of compassion. as much as i don't like trevor much. i will say i liked the moments when he cried. because he showed some emotion. he wasn't just a robot but someone who was in actual emotional pain. i wish we saw something like that with micah.  i really wish we could learn more of his backstory. what was his childhood like? what happened to his parents? maybe he's only racist because a colored man killed his dad or something like that. so much of that could tell us how he became the badass gunslinging outlaw he is in 1899. he would still be evil. but we would have some more depth to his personality and story.

Yeah, I totally agree, if Micah or someone like him was the actual protagonist of a game, Rockstar would definitely have to tone down some of his characteristics, like making him a little more relatable, removing the racist part (not to the point of being a activist though) and what not.

 

Think of such a protagonist like a GTA character in the wild west, who kills other people regardless of gender, ethnicity, etc. I know this is a simplistic explanation, but it helps understanding what I mean.

[JB1982]

I think that Lemoyne Outlaw's comments are correct. It will be very difficult to create a completely evil protagonist because you have to create a character that players enjoy playing as, build that bond and relate to. A sole protagonist in this kind of game needs to have almost universal appeal, particularly with the amount of money that these companies pour into these games. Trevor might have his fans but he also has his haters so would a full GTA V game with Trevor as the sole protagonist have worked? I kind of feel that Trevor only really works because Michael and Franklin are there to balance it all out. If you don't like Trevor, you have somewhere else to go.

 

To Trevor's credit as a protagonist, in all that crazy psychoticness there's also a quirky somewhat comedic character as well as a character that has emotion and feelings (again I'm echoing what Lemoyne Outlaw said). You can see there's stuff going on with Trevor beneath the surface that make him the way he is (abandonment issues for one) so there's depth to him. You would absolutely need your protagonist to be more a Trevor than a Micah in my opinion.

 

But again, I wonder about could a Trevor/Micah type protagonist work as a game's sole protagonist? I wonder if the better solution would be to have twin protagonists (as Agent Edward poses in his original post)? That way you have something to counter the evil psychotic protagonist. Perhaps that right there is your redemptive arc. An incident occurs at the start of the game (like the Blackwater heist) which puts the two protagonists (let's say they are brothers/best friends) at odds with each other and sets them off on different paths. One descends into a full psycho whilst the other tries to make amends by redeeming themself. The two protagonists either stick together but are increasingly at odds with each other or split up and the game follows their two storylines in parallel to each other with the climax being a confrontation between the pair, the outcome of which is the players choice based on their preferred character. You carry on as that preferred character in the game's epilogue.

[wqx]

I feel like that a character like this would be more suitable for a single player DLC, because such DLC would be shorter, wouldn't need a perfectly created protagonist (imo) and thus R* could go a riskier route with a non-mainline title.

[WellingtonSwain]

John Marston and Arthur Morgan deserve to be mentioned alongside the greatest Western fictional characters...Angel Eyes, Man With No Name, Doc Holliday, Al Swearengen, Liberty Vance, Judge Holden...I do not put any Red Dead villian into such standing. I compare Micah to Johnny Ringo...a very good villian overshadowed by a generational counterpart. 

 

Rockstar can absolutely make a legendary playable villian and I liken their potential to that of Henry Fonda's portrayal as Frank in Once Upon A Time In The West.

 

Henry Fonda was a powerful movie star known for his "good guy" roles. And Sergio Leone opened Once Upon A Time with...

 

Spoiler

Frank murdering a 9 year old.

 

Frank was similar to The Man With No Name in that he was a killer and a thief. But shared no affinity with The Man's honor and morality and Frank had no desire for redemption.

 

Of course this would be one option for what will likely be multiple playable characters and possibly your own created character and your own choices dictating the narrative. I don't know. Just talking shop with my fellow enthusiasts is all. Great topic. Cheers.

[Pistol Bobcat]

Frankly I just want one major Red Dead game (not counting Revolver because it's in its own separate world) where the protagonist lives, heck make it Landon Ricketts since he has to live long enough to hang with John and then dies off screen later.

 

In my opinion the story of Dutch's gang has been fleshed out enough, Landon as we know was once the quintessential gunslinger and a prequel about him could flesh out some of the rich life and struggles he hints at with John.

 

Also it'd be nice to have a game set in the definitive years of the Old West for a change and not when the era is almost over

Edited January 15 by Pistol Bobcat