What didn't you like about RDR2?

[44Orca]

I see many others are annoyed by this, the witnesses and the random cops spawning all over was the most annoying part. I could be in the middle of nowhere and somehow a witness spawned right behind me. I don't know if it's a glitch it really looked like that to me but there were times I was getting out of the area they were chasing me and then many spawn again very near me, even though I wasn't in a populated area.

 

Some side missions are very repetitive, mostly with chasing someone or something, I was playing some like the side mission with the photographer and thought how I could be of help to photograph animals and give it to him in specific ways he want would be better, or really something else other than chasing a coyote that stole his bag. At least his other missions were  sort of fun with the horses and wolves.

Will I replay it? Well not anytime soon, I remember a lot. It was an awesome game, not much else really I found bad about it, just those two things which in terms of the overall game are very little. In the future I will replay it.

[billiejoearmstrong8]

15 hours ago, slowmo2zomo said:

games can be slow and still not be a chore to replay. RDR2 couldve kept its same tone and not have been so hand holdy and restrictive. its not mutually exclusive. and i was a big fan of the first game and loved my first playthrough of the 2nd one. the issue is not that its "not for me" it just has flaws. like lots of games.  no shame in acknowledging its not perfect

I think we're on a similar page because I agree that missions are too hand holdy and restrictive, that would be my biggest criticism of the game. But when a mission is just on the slower side and providing a necessary tutorial I don't mind. Stuff like a long conversation with Hosea in a non-action type mission is fine with me. Being very restricted when it's unnecessary or once the action starts is what's annoying.

Edited February 27, 2023 by billiejoearmstrong8

[Artio]

There not being a cap on how much moneh Arthur can carry. Doesn’t make sense story wise for them to be struggling to have enough money to support the entire gang and get them set up in Tahiti when my Arthur has $20,000.

[billiejoearmstrong8]

Just a map nitpick but I don't like that Cumberland Forest is part of New Hanover. It really doesn't deserve to be its own region at all and especially not when the other two regions of the state (The Heartlands and Roanoke Ridge) are so much bigger and more substantial. It should've been part of Ambarino, feels like Ambarino there anyway and would've added more to that state. 

 

Bluewater Marsh doesn't earn its place as a region either imo, should've just been part of the same region as Bayou Nwa. 

 

Also I'm sad that they got rid of that weird freaky pointy little bit of map above the train tunnel in northern Hennigan's Stead from RDR1 that went so far north it extended past the map border and even had snow in it, as seen here https://i.redd.it/mfrjfrn7sjv51.jpg. Granted it was there for seemingly no reason (except they put a treasure location there in Undead Nightmare) and very odd and I get they wouldn't have wanted snow there since they removed the snow from Tall Trees. But it's a fun thing to discover/explore and I wanted to see if they did anything interesting with it. Instead they just removed it, boo.

Edited April 21, 2023 by billiejoearmstrong8

[Gannon Oceanis]

Edited September 5, 2024 by Gannon Oceanis

[Lemoyne outlaw]

On 4/4/2023 at 10:13 AM, billiejoearmstrong8 said:

Just a map nitpick but I don't like that Cumberland Forest is part of New Hanover. It really doesn't deserve to be its own region at all and especially not when the other two regions of the state (The Heartlands and Roanoke Ridge) are so much bigger and more substantial. It should've been part of Ambarino, feels like Ambarino there anyway and would've added more to that state. 

 

Bluewater Marsh doesn't earn its place as a region either imo, should've just been part of the same region as Bayou Nwa. 

yes i agree. cumberland forest looks cool. but there is nothing to do there. no towns or activities. there is fort wallace. but it's nowhere near as cool as el presidio was in rdr1. if it was easily enterable and had cannons and gatling guns. it would make a fun place to have posse wars. i spent hours on the cannons defending el presidio in rdr1. and i know many others loved fighting there as well. you would think rockstar would have made fort wallace the new el presidio. but instead its very disappointing. 

and yes i think it is stupid to make bluewater marsh. considering that its literally just bayou nwa with a different name. it doesn't feel different and it doesn't have any towns. it's the smallest region of all the states. at least cumberland forest looks and feels different than the other two regions of new hanover.

 

as much as i love rdr2. they definitely could have done better with some parts of the map. i still don't understand why ambarino is such a huge state. and there isn't even one town. and there is very little reason to ever go up there. it's such a waste of space. especially since it has some beautiful scenery and landscapes. but aside from looking pretty it's such a useless part of the map. and you have new austin. which is a nice nostalgic location. but like ambarino there is very little to do. and they also messed up a lot of the buildings. and they made armadillo a disgrace. with hardly any stores open or things to do. and everyone there is dying and there are all those graves and fires. 

[RedDeadOutlaw1863]

There's one thing i don't like about this masterpiece of a game, its the lack of activities and story, aside the main story. I know there is like 10 sides missions that are really great in their own way and some randoms events that are insane but i find a big portion of the map not really being used like they should have, like in blackwater. 

Edited April 9, 2023 by RedDeadOutlaw1863
Sorry i didn't read the above message

[billiejoearmstrong8]

All they had to do to solve a lot of both of the above problems was make all random events repeat (and add a few more of them in New Austin/south West Elizabeth/Ambarino/all towns). Worked for RDR1, just simply doing that kept the map feeling alive extremely effectively. I don't understand why they decided against that. There's multiple other pieces of dialogue/situations in the game that repeat infinitely and every time you play you constantly hear and see repeated things, so if the reason was because it's unrealistic for the same random events to repeat that was a dumb reason.

Edited April 9, 2023 by billiejoearmstrong8

[JB1982]

On 4/9/2023 at 2:21 PM, billiejoearmstrong8 said:

All they had to do to solve a lot of both of the above problems was make all random events repeat (and add a few more of them in New Austin/south West Elizabeth/Ambarino/all towns). Worked for RDR1, just simply doing that kept the map feeling alive extremely effectively. I don't understand why they decided against that. There's multiple other pieces of dialogue/situations in the game that repeat infinitely and every time you play you constantly hear and see repeated things, so if the reason was because it's unrealistic for the same random events to repeat that was a dumb reason.

I'm currently playing RDR1 for the first time and the repeatable random events is something that really stands out compared to RDR2.

 

Really enjoying New Austin too. Was always disappointed that RDR2 has such a large part of the map hidden until the Epilogue only for it to then not have a lot going on in those areas. Now I'm on RDR1, I am even more disappointed!  

[billiejoearmstrong8]

5 hours ago, JB1982 said:

I'm currently playing RDR1 for the first time and the repeatable random events is something that really stands out compared to RDR2.

 

Really enjoying New Austin too. Was always disappointed that RDR2 has such a large part of the map hidden until the Epilogue only for it to then not have a lot going on in those areas. Now I'm on RDR1, I am even more disappointed!  

Awesome, hope you love it as much as I do! Definitely a lot more going on in New Austin (and Mexico lol).

[Archangelsky]

I am playing the single-player part of the game for the second time. Seeing as I love this game I thought I would play it really slow as I did the first time but this time do all the side missions and go all gold on the main missions. I am nearly there, but oh my not being able to skip many of the sequences leading up the the missions can be quite frustrating. Yes it is nice to skip some cinematic cut scenes but very often  you have to ride out of camp to some area etc. Its fun the first time, maybe even the third time, but when you are replaying a mission because you perhaps missed one thing in getting the gold medal for the 9th time, well then I get tired

 

Love the game to bits though.

 

And yes I know that I do not have to replay a mission several times in a row, but everyone who have done this knows that simetimes "you have to" because you are on a roll and get closer and closer on each playthrough of a mission.

I have over 70 gold medals now so I will make it in the end so not worries

[billiejoearmstrong8]

I really wish that awful autotag deadeye wasn't a thing. At least in RDR1 there was a level before it so you could choose to do side stuff before unlocking the sh*tty autotag level 2 and then just do missions to get to level 3 as fast as possible. In RDR2 you're stuck with it from level 1. I'd love to complete all the hunting tasks and challenges and explore as much as possible as soon as I start chapter 2 but doing that with that useless and annoying form of deadeye that does nothing but take control away from the player wouldn't be fun. I would take the RDR1 style level one deadeye (where you just slow time and can take a shot without painting targets) over the "upgraded" autotag level one in RDR2 any day. 

 

Does anyone like it? It's so bad. I always forget about it when I go to replay a chapter 1 or 2 mission and get reminded of what dogsh*t it is. Makes trying to complete headshot or accuracy medal objectives torture and is just generally annoying as hell. I'd hoped they would've realised it was terrible in RDR1 and got rid of it.

Edited April 19, 2023 by billiejoearmstrong8

[The-Ghost]

One of the best games I have ever played, if not the best, nearly everything about it is brilliant, however, there are a few things I don't like, or think could've been done better.

 

Micah... I hate him, surprising, I know... I hate how obvious they made him be, he is shady the entire time he was with the gang, his stay with them was very questionable and contrasts with Dutch/Hosea's intelligence, I think if any other character in the gang pulled the same crap Micah did, he would've been shot and left to bleed out, yet this rat somehow remains with them the entire time, and not only that, Dutch also believes him and trusts him, he even saw him shoot Grimshaw, no eyebrow raise, no questions asked, it goes against Dutch, even with how morally defective he is by that point in the story - I think Rockstar took an easy route and made Micah the "generic bad guy", just a shallow, one-dimensional punk with no actual motives, and he stands out like a sore thumb in this meticulously written and handcrafted game.

 

Controls... I know, git-gud bro... nah, I think I am very good with the game, but nobody can actually sit here and tell me the weapon bloom/sway is a good idea while keeping a straight face, no... just no. And while I am at it, the controls can sometimes be very irresponsive, there has been many instances where I had to pop up the weapon/items wheel again to reselect something just because the game decided otherwise in the first time, that's not something you get good at, that's just broken.

 

 

This is it really, other than these two above, I can't think of anything else I don't like about it, I've played it in and out, yet each time I load it up I am still impressed just as I was back in 2018 when I played it, just a brilliant production by Rockstar.

[billiejoearmstrong8]

23 hours ago, MaddenedGhost said:

Dutch also believes him and trusts him

 

I don't find this hard to believe at all because Dutch is an idiot and driven purely by ego. I agree about controls being unresponsive though.

[Sanctuary II]

RDR2 has one of the best written and realized stories I've ever got the pleasure to experience in the medium imo. However, I think everything regarding how it handled being a prequel to the first game was underwhelming, inconsistent and contradictory. I don't see it as this symbiotic (Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul) prequel/sequel that enhances RDR1 in every way like people keep saying. Rather, it feels to me a bit like Rockstar were on the fence between making a new story about a different gang, or tying it into the established Van der Linde gang story for the established brand factor; and so they clunkily merged both ideas as a compromise.

 

Every OG cast member is sidelined and has their personality fundamentally retconned to the point where they feel like completely different people as opposed to simply younger versions who've yet harden into their RDR1 selves. The exception being Dutch imo, who's the only major character enhanced by the prequel. Not to mention, they often feel like side characters to the new gang member characters when this supposed to be a prequel to their story too, maybe mainly that.

 

John: Is depicted as a passive gunman who's a young, oafish punk rather than one of Dutch's ruthless right-hand men and an educated outlaw in his own right. He's also lacking his definable personality traits like his dry sarcasm, eloquence and insight. Those have little to do with character development or maturation as much as they're part of his fundamental make-up brought upon by his time in the gang and Dutch's teachings at a young age, according to the first game. He's also missing his arc of being a loyal right-hand of Dutch turned disillusioned skeptic and voice of reason as the gang ways change more towards violence and it becomes to clear to him everything they're doing and might've ever done was an excuse. This arc is stripped away and spread out to the new characters, mainly Arthur (no wonder people think he's far more interesting now), leaving John with a more barebones arc about learning to care for his family which is already sort of resolved halfway through and should've been more of a b-developmental journey imo. 

 

Javier: Is a completely different person. And while I get adding dimension to his character rather than making him a "sketchy Mexican stereotype" as people generally put it, I think what seemingly many also overlook is that even in RDR1, John calls Javier a torn man who had lots of passion but no love and a cynic who wanted to be a romantic (supposedly John's opposite in that regard)- which could've factored in how we see him holding on to faith in Dutch's vision. So it's clear to me that how we see him in that game, isn't all there is to him. RDR2 oppositely, makes him a lot less stereotypical but simplifies him into this nice guy who suddenly turns a bit aggressive towards the anti-Dutch side by Chapter 6. I don't think retconning him was necessarily the best move, instead, I feel we should've explored that aforementioned inner conflict. Flesh him out as this passionate revolutionary who tries to be better, but struggles with his inner demons, and his cynical, sketchy side. Eventually ending the game with the inner demon winning after he loses Dutch and the gang; becoming his broken, bitter RDR1 self.

 

Bill: Is the closest personality-wise to his first game counterpart, however he suffers from that latter issue of being sidelined to the newer characters. Meaning he never gets the screen time to see how he turns into the raping, pillaging monster from RDR1. He's only consistent because he retains that same smooth-brained and frustrated disposition. Although he does get some interesting extra backstory and inner conflict, which is why it's a shame we never got more time with this more in-depth Bill imo. 

 

-The gang: While great on their own, is very different from its portrayal in RDR1. That's the version that I think would've made for more complex & morally ambiguous lead cast. The gang in RDR2 is more like a large circus of likeable misfits and outcasts who rob and kill to survive, while in RDR1 they're depicted like a tight-knit band of ruffian freedom fighters that do of all of that in order to reform America in Dutch's vision. The familial and brotherly aspect was still very much there, but a greater mission was their fundamental goal. I get that RDR2 takes place in the last troubled period where they started compromising and focusing on their survival, but even in that regard, it never feels like this gang were ever revolutionaries to me. The bits of backstory we hear implies they mostly operated as free-living hippies who'd occasionally give away the money they stole to the poor "we EVEN use to give away some of the money" (potentially paraphrasing) says John, but that they never had greater political ambitions to ever change America through violence.

 

-The needless timeline changes and retcons: again, may've been results of its potential identity crisis it suffered from as a prequel; as if they wanted to tell its own story but also tacked on RDR1 continuity, lore and characters on top. The Blackwater Massacre (a background event that served as backstory for Ricketts originally) is merged with the fateful ferry robbery where Dutch kills Heidi McCourt and John was shot and left to die. Now I know that last part may be up for debate, as some on other topics have argued that 1). RDR1 never explicitly states that the ferry was final heist where John was abandoned and 2). Technically, RDR2 reworks this consistently because he's shot in Blackwater at the beginning of the game. However, my counter-argument to that is that I believe RDR1 was clearly alluding from all directions to it being THE robbery. John only ever talks about the one heist where he was left to die, and Strange Man says McCourt was killed in the same one he was shot in. Why would he be ominously referencing to any robbery other than the one the player has been teased with several times throughout the story. It's one of those, "technically-makes-sense" but clearly retconned elements that I feel are common in prequels and here particularly because of a lot of the backstory was shrouded in mystery and they may've not looked back at it deeply in the conception stages.

Edited October 29, 2024 by Sanctuary II

[Dmk86BG]

 I feel like Rockstar dropped the series. Years passed and the first part was never released for PC.
We haven't seen any new content... What else don't I like?
That there are hidden parts of the map, even at the end of the game. Lockdown zones, bounty hunters, super agents, invisible snipers... The ironic thing is that the game is open world type... Open world? I do not think so!
We have cheats that are created by the developer, but if we use them we can't save our progress! Another irony! And one more redundant measure... Disabling achievements is one thing, but disabling your saves is crazy!
Why were they created at all?

Edited May 16, 2023 by Dmk86BG

[billiejoearmstrong8]

I don't like how half the gang members are missing from or unavailable at camp at any given time, just so they can be standing there waiting for you to come and start a mission with them either at camp or elsewhere. I know it's probably more realistic that not everyone's there at once but it's annoying that being able to interact with the different gang members or see them interact with each other is limited in that way.

 

They could have just had it that they were all in camp all the time (unless in prison or whatever), and if you went to a marker to start a mission in camp it started with them walking over to you instead of them already being there waiting, and if you went to a marker elsewhere they were supposed to have travelled there just before you. I wonder are there ever times when every gang member available to interact with at camp? Doesn't seem like it.

Edited May 22, 2023 by billiejoearmstrong8

[Dmk86BG]

I don't like it either. There are many bugs, missing mission icons...
I had to read on the Internet if there was anything I could do and how to do it.
Skipping time doesn't always help!
Reloading saves too...
Under normal circumstances, when the time comes when the specified member is there, the icon should appear.
Yes, but it doesn't always happen... Just like reloading the save should solve the problems, but it doesn't always happen either. It's strange how a game this old has such absurd patches (which ruins people's fun) but nothing is done about the bugs.
When I talk about absurd patches and ruining the fun I mean things like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ss2oOFRrs8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7nmnrT5UCs

 

Edited May 22, 2023 by Dmk86BG

[Augensteps]

There are not many things I dislike about RDR2. Here's a few:

 

1.) Wanted / bounty / witness system, these are ridiculously bad and annoying.

2.) Sunset and sunrise end too soon, the transition from day to night and vice versa is unrealistically fast.

 

That's it. The game is pretty much a masterpiece.

[Sneaky Queeky]

Spoiler

I don't like the low honor ending for Arthur. Going after the money is ridiculously stupid and against character at that point in the story.  For some reason Rocksta keep shoehorning in these clumsy multiple endings in their games for no real reason. The result is no different anyway; Arthur dies facing the west after a fight with Micah. But one example is perfect and the other is boneheaded.  

 

[SM-W]

Okay, so overall, I went into RDR2 with very cynical expectations after trudging through most of GTA5 and its online missions.  And overall, I was left surprised and extremely happy with the result.  WITH THAT BEING SAID, there were a couple of main things I didn't like - two regarding certain story elements, and one regarding the gameplay itself.  Let me start off with the gameplay issue:

 

The game is not really a full-on sandbox, it's a story-driven game with an open world.  You can't even rob a train without accruing a bounty that'll be worth more than what you'll be able to steal from the occupants making it more trouble than it's worth (unless you know how to cheese the system), and the fact that the intricacies of the wanted system is never fully explained kind of adds to my point. For me, going around the world committing crimes never really feels like a main way of playing the game, but rather something to do until you finally get around to completing the next story mission or stranger mission.  Stealing wagons for Shamus felt like the one part of the sandbox that had the most freedom and reward, aside from hunting legendary animals (but there's really no tangible reward except a sense of completion).  It's not to say it's a bad sandbox or that there's no freedom at all, mind you - - I simply wish there had been a bit more focus the free roaming parts.

 

 

Now, regarding the story, there's a lot to love, don't get me wrong at all. However, I'd like to touch on two of the story / plot elements that rubbed me the wrong way - and more importantly, more than just whining about them, I'd like to offer my suggestions of how I would have fixed them:  (SPOILERS AHEAD, just on the off chance you're somehow this far into a RDR2 whining and complaining thread but also haven't beaten the game and don't want the plot spoiled for you...)

- - - - - - - - -

First off is the bit in Guarma with Gloria, "the old crone."  To start with, the whole escapade in Guarma felt like a really weird and unrelated tangent, and gave me some serious Kane & Lynch: Dead Men flashbacks, where the gritty urban crime shooter suddenly and without warning becomes a South American guerilla insurgency game.  Both Guarma and the last 3rd of K&L feel completely disconnected from everything that happens in the rest of their respective games ...

Spoiler

(The reason for that in K&L is because the devs, IO Interactive (most known for the Hitman series), were working on a sequel to their game Freedom Fighters, which got canned mid-development. So, rather than throw away all the assets they made for it, they repurposed them and added them to Kane & Lynch. While I can appreciate the devs not wanting to waste all the hours they spent making those things, it genuinely does not feel like it's a part of the rest of the game.  I know Rockstar originally planned for Guarma to be an actual place you could visit in the game, and I agree with others that going directly from the Saint Denis bank robbery to the following part would be a little too abrupt, but I personally think Rockstar should have just canned the whole Guarma chapter with something else.)

... but the biggest issue of that whole Guarma chapter is the mission with Gloria.  Yes, I am fully aware of what that bit is supposed to represent in the story, the plot, and the character development of both Dutch and Arthur.  The problem is that, as that scene stands, it just does not work and really needed a 2nd draft.

 

First off, she gets paid with a bar of gold - in 1899, probably the equivalent of 5 lifetimes worth of wages in Guarma - just to lead us down a linear cave that has no divergent paths.  Hell, the woman doesn't even take us to the cave and show us where it is, we meet her there at the entrance! She doesn't even help us avoid booby traps or anything that would warrant the use of her guidance. We literally paid her for walking 100 feet down a linear path.  And then, after having been given a small fortune for nothing, she proceeds to extort us for more money ... and then draws a weapon on us.  And somehow, Dutch is the bad guy for killing her? (And honestly, he wasn't even that violent, he just bumped her head a little on the ladder a couple times. I was genuinely shocked that a little rough housing was enough to have made her give up the ghost. I remember staring at my screen going, "THAT killed her?! Arthur, aren't you even going to check for a pulse or see if she's breathing before declaring her dead???")

 

She got greedy. There was no need for her to extort us for more money. There was no reason for her to go with us into the ladder room except to try and rob us. And the moment she drew a weapon, she became an enemy combatant and that was the end for her. I know it's supposed to be "Dutch going violent and betraying his morals," but A: that scene already happened with Angelo Bronte and was done much better, and B: that doesn't work when it's a genuine instance of self-defense against someone trying to rob him with nowhere to go. "But she's an old lady!!" Doesn't matter. You pull a knife on someone, they have a right to defend themselves. She shouldn't have tried that on someone much stronger than her - imagine you pulling a knife on a professional MMA fighter and being surprised when they floor you with a single punch. It was absolutely a case of justifiable self-defense, and the fact that she died in the process feels more accidental than purposeful.  Dutch didn't go into that encounter trying to kill her, but she went into the ladder room with the premeditated intention of extortion and violence against us.

 

And then - AND THEN!! - Arthur has the absolute gall to ask "How did you know she was going to betray us?"  I almost yelled at my screen! "WHAT DO YOU MEAN 'GOING TO' YOU f*ckING DOPE, SHE WAS ALREADY DOING IT! SHE WAS IN THE PROCESS OF BETRAYING YOU, IN THE PRESENT TENSE!!" It's like Arthur's line there was written for an entirely different sequence of events than what actually occurred. I honestly wanted Dutch to tell him, "Look Orrthur, I don't tell you how you should conduct yourself when you're running around robbing and murdering random people just so you can afford better horses and clothes, do I? The guards who are trying to kill us have families, but do you mourn when you shoot them? No?? Exactly. So when you're done turning wives into widows and children into orphans, THEN you can whine about this. The only hypocrite in this cave is you."  Dutch did absolutely nothing wrong (aside from not taking the gold back from her, which feels more like a writer/dev oversight than anything else.)

It's pretty dissonant when Arthur is upset Dutch defended himself when I would have American History X'd that old crone into the cavern floor.

[I've had the mental image of this in my mind for a while, and I'm happy with how this edit turned out.]

 

HOW I WOULD HAVE FIXED IT:  We meet her at the rebel base, and she's the one who takes us all the way to where the cave is, which is so out-of-the-way and well-hidden that there's a clear sense that without her help (even as overpaid as she was) we'd have never found that secret route without her.  The whole extortion attempt with the knife can still happen, but I'd have had Dutch quickly step back and draw a gun on her (stolen from the guards from earlier). Gloria, realizing that she has no chance of winning, relents, throws her knife down, begrudgingly puts her hands up and backs away ....... AND THEN DUTCH SHOOTS HER WHILE SHE'S BOTH UNARMED AND HAS SURRENDERED.

There's still a small sense of moral ambiguity. After all, Dutch's point that she could have immediately run off and alerted the guards to our presence is still just as valid ... but now there's a genuine sense that it was completely unwarranted to kill her, and he shot her dead purely out of spite than any kind of genuine need for survival. AT THE VERY LEAST, I'd have made it where low-honor Arthur really isn't bothered by it, but Dutch overreacts harshly to him and that's what gets him thinking about how Dutch is changing.

 

- - - - - - - - -

Micah.  Ugh.  Micah Bell.  Some people think he's a great villain. I personally think he's terrible and one of the most obvious "betrayals-in-waiting" in the history of written fiction.  I honestly can't figure out if he's from the original pitch and then never got fleshed out like the other characters, or if he came later into production. For one thing, I refuse to believe that a camp full of close-knit outlaws - thieves, murderers, kidnappers and general low-lives - would put up with that kind of sh*t from one of the more recent recruits. The moment Micah started messing with "the womenfolk", I don't care how close he was with Dutch, they would have absolutely banded together and lynched his ass in the middle of the night while Dutch was sound asleep curled up next to his teddy bear.  They'd have gagged him, grabbed him, strung him up on the nearest tree and put an end to his bullsh*t for good.  At minimum, they'd have tricked him into getting passed-out drunk and then all of them would gone into his tent and each taken a turn stabbing him ala Murder on the Orient Express. (spoiler warning for a 100+ year old book, sorry everyone.)

Considering everybody else in the group has some amount of depth, character, backstory and positive attributes, Micah comes across a child's crayon drawing of Judas on DaVinci's "The Last Supper". Gee, I wonder which one of these people at the table is going to betray Jesus...

 

And on that note, the entire concept of "a rat in the group" being such a central concept is dumb when you think about it. Nobody needs to sell out the gang to the Pinkertons when Dutch is doing a fantastic job of leading them around with all the chaos and bullsh*t he brings wherever he goes. What do you mean "Someone must have told them about the bank job" Dutch? You literally killed the most powerful man in Saint Denis a few days ago in a big firefight shortly after he sold you out on the trolly car robbery where you killed a bunch of cops. I'm pretty sure the Pinkertons knew exactly who was responsible for that and were probably just waiting around for you to come back and do your thing. THINK, DUTCH, THINK!  (And honestly, the inclusion of a rat in the group kind of takes away Dutch's agency, accountability and responsibility for "going crazy" and "destroying the gang" as John put it and becoming the man we see in RDR1.)

 

The thing is, with Molly, the Pinkertons extending her the option of ratting them out in exchange for a reprieve makes sense from their perspective, because she's both a woman and someone who's not actually involved in their criminal activity. She's an innocent bystander who's being strung along by an egomaniac trying to be some kind of American Jesus. Plus, considering how Micah is obviously set-up to be the eventual "bad guy", her being the one who claimed to have sold them out felt like an actual twist.

But Micah? You mean, the guy who's been a criminal since the day he plopped out from between his mama's legs, and very recently massacred the whole town of Strawberry? They offered HIM a full-on, unsupervised "catch and release" deal??  Yeeeaaah, I've only got one thing to say to that about that:

My suspension of disbelief is incapable of accepting that plot thread. It's akin to the idea of the FBI in the 1990's letting Tim McVeigh out of prison to act as a double agent to try and snitch out others planning similar attacks ....... and then he goes around bombing more federal buildings and killing innocent people in the process for years afterwards. There is just no way, man. Funnily enough, even before I played the game, I knew there was going to be some sort of betrayal just based on the themes of the game, but I thought the betrayal would come as a need for survival because "Our way of life is over! Don't you get it?! This is the only chance to survive!"

But somehow, Micah betrays the gang - not as a means of escaping that life - but in order to elude justice and continue outlawing around the country without any consequences. I'm sorry game, but ... u wot bruv? Lay off the cocaine drops and horse stimulants.

 

HOW I WOULD HAVE FIXED IT: Okay, so I honestly can't really suggest too much without making major changes to the ending of the game ...

Spoiler

(Personally, I wouldn't have even had the epilogue and just ended the game with Arthur's death. We honestly didn't need to play as John shoveling horse sh*t and be a henpecked husband and then finally killing Micah who honestly had no business being alive past 1899 anyway. I'd have rather left John's life between then and 1914 up to our imaginations.)  To me, the only thing the epilogue has going for it is the House Building Theme, which has no right being as good as it is.

... so I'll suggest something more simple:

 

At a bare minimum, I would have made Micah a much longer-running member of the gang, but more of an "on-again, off-again" member like Trelawny. He's someone who's proven themselves in the past to be reliable and trustworthy, so even though he's a complete f*ckhead with overly violent tendencies, he's a got history that explains why the long-term members of the VDL Gang tolerate him. I can even hear Arthur explaining to either Sadie or Lenny, "Oh Micah? Yeahh, he's a pain in tha ass, but he's always been there for us the last 6 or so years he's been helpin' us. And he sure as sh*t's a lot better at hittin' what he's aimin' at than Bill. So, we put up with him as best we can ... and smack him around a lil' when he starts t' get outta line, heh..."

 

Regarding the Blackwater Ferry Job - instead of meeting Dutch by saving his life in a bar, he saves Dutch's life during the robbery, making Dutch's overwhelming faith in him much more recent and pertinent, especially when he sticks with the gang through their desperate escape into the mountains during the harsh blizzard, basically cementing that he's now become a full-time part of the gang.

 

/rant over

Edited May 24, 2023 by SM-W

[Sneaky Queeky]

12 hours ago, SM-W said:

Okay, so overall, I went into RDR2 with very cynical expectations after trudging through most of GTA5 and its online missions.  And overall, I was left surprised and extremely happy with the result.  WITH THAT BEING SAID, there were a couple of main things I didn't like - two regarding certain story elements, and one regarding the gameplay itself.  Let me start off with the gameplay issue:

 

The game is not really a full-on sandbox, it's a story-driven game with an open world.  You can't even rob a train without accruing a bounty that'll be worth more than what you'll be able to steal from the occupants making it more trouble than it's worth (unless you know how to cheese the system), and the fact that the intricacies of the wanted system is never fully explained kind of adds to my point. For me, going around the world committing crimes never really feels like a main way of playing the game, but rather something to do until you finally get around to completing the next story mission or stranger mission.  Stealing wagons for Shamus felt like the one part of the sandbox that had the most freedom and reward, aside from hunting legendary animals (but there's really no tangible reward except a sense of completion).  It's not to say it's a bad sandbox or that there's no freedom at all, mind you - - I simply wish there had been a bit more focus the free roaming parts.

 

 

Now, regarding the story, there's a lot to love, don't get me wrong at all. However, I'd like to touch on two of the story / plot elements that rubbed me the wrong way - and more importantly, more than just whining about them, I'd like to offer my suggestions of how I would have fixed them:  (SPOILERS AHEAD, just on the off chance you're somehow this far into a RDR2 whining and complaining thread but also haven't beaten the game and don't want the plot spoiled for you...)

- - - - - - - - -

First off is the bit in Guarma with Gloria, "the old crone."  To start with, the whole escapade in Guarma felt like a really weird and unrelated tangent, and gave me some serious Kane & Lynch: Dead Men flashbacks, where the gritty urban crime shooter suddenly and without warning becomes a South American guerilla insurgency game.  Both Guarma and the last 3rd of K&L feel completely disconnected from everything that happens in the rest of their respective games ...

  Hide contents

(The reason for that in K&L is because the devs, IO Interactive (most known for the Hitman series), were working on a sequel to their game Freedom Fighters, which got canned mid-development. So, rather than throw away all the assets they made for it, they repurposed them and added them to Kane & Lynch. While I can appreciate the devs not wanting to waste all the hours they spent making those things, it genuinely does not feel like it's a part of the rest of the game.  I know Rockstar originally planned for Guarma to be an actual place you could visit in the game, and I agree with others that going directly from the Saint Denis bank robbery to the following part would be a little too abrupt, but I personally think Rockstar should have just canned the whole Guarma chapter with something else.)

... but the biggest issue of that whole Guarma chapter is the mission with Gloria.  Yes, I am fully aware of what that bit is supposed to represent in the story, the plot, and the character development of both Dutch and Arthur.  The problem is that, as that scene stands, it just does not work and really needed a 2nd draft.

 

First off, she gets paid with a bar of gold - in 1899, probably the equivalent of 5 lifetimes worth of wages in Guarma - just to lead us down a linear cave that has no divergent paths.  Hell, the woman doesn't even take us to the cave and show us where it is, we meet her there at the entrance! She doesn't even help us avoid booby traps or anything that would warrant the use of her guidance. We literally paid her for walking 100 feet down a linear path.  And then, after having been given a small fortune for nothing, she proceeds to extort us for more money ... and then draws a weapon on us.  And somehow, Dutch is the bad guy for killing her? (And honestly, he wasn't even that violent, he just bumped her head a little on the ladder a couple times. I was genuinely shocked that a little rough housing was enough to have made her give up the ghost. I remember staring at my screen going, "THAT killed her?! Arthur, aren't you even going to check for a pulse or see if she's breathing before declaring her dead???")

 

She got greedy. There was no need for her to extort us for more money. There was no reason for her to go with us into the ladder room except to try and rob us. And the moment she drew a weapon, she became an enemy combatant and that was the end for her. I know it's supposed to be "Dutch going violent and betraying his morals," but A: that scene already happened with Angelo Bronte and was done much better, and B: that doesn't work when it's a genuine instance of self-defense against someone trying to rob him with nowhere to go. "But she's an old lady!!" Doesn't matter. You pull a knife on someone, they have a right to defend themselves. She shouldn't have tried that on someone much stronger than her - imagine you pulling a knife on a professional MMA fighter and being surprised when they floor you with a single punch. It was absolutely a case of justifiable self-defense, and the fact that she died in the process feels more accidental than purposeful.  Dutch didn't go into that encounter trying to kill her, but she went into the ladder room with the premeditated intention of extortion and violence against us.

 

And then - AND THEN!! - Arthur has the absolute gall to ask "How did you know she was going to betray us?"  I almost yelled at my screen! "WHAT DO YOU MEAN 'GOING TO' YOU f*ckING DOPE, SHE WAS ALREADY DOING IT! SHE WAS IN THE PROCESS OF BETRAYING YOU, IN THE PRESENT TENSE!!" It's like Arthur's line there was written for an entirely different sequence of events than what actually occurred. I honestly wanted Dutch to tell him, "Look Orrthur, I don't tell you how you should conduct yourself when you're running around robbing and murdering random people just so you can afford better horses and clothes, do I? The guards who are trying to kill us have families, but do you mourn when you shoot them? No?? Exactly. So when you're done turning wives into widows and children into orphans, THEN you can whine about this. The only hypocrite in this cave is you."  Dutch did absolutely nothing wrong (aside from not taking the gold back from her, which feels more like a writer/dev oversight than anything else.)

It's pretty dissonant when Arthur is upset Dutch defended himself when I would have American History X'd that old crone into the cavern floor.

[I've had the mental image of this in my mind for a while, and I'm happy with how this edit turned out.]

 

HOW I WOULD HAVE FIXED IT:  We meet her at the rebel base, and she's the one who takes us all the way to where the cave is, which is so out-of-the-way and well-hidden that there's a clear sense that without her help (even as overpaid as she was) we'd have never found that secret route without her.  The whole extortion attempt with the knife can still happen, but I'd have had Dutch quickly step back and draw a gun on her (stolen from the guards from earlier). Gloria, realizing that she has no chance of winning, relents, throws her knife down, begrudgingly puts her hands up and backs away ....... AND THEN DUTCH SHOOTS HER WHILE SHE'S BOTH UNARMED AND HAS SURRENDERED.

There's still a small sense of moral ambiguity. After all, Dutch's point that she could have immediately run off and alerted the guards to our presence is still just as valid ... but now there's a genuine sense that it was completely unwarranted to kill her, and he shot her dead purely out of spite than any kind of genuine need for survival. AT THE VERY LEAST, I'd have made it where low-honor Arthur really isn't bothered by it, but Dutch overreacts harshly to him and that's what gets him thinking about how Dutch is changing.

 

- - - - - - - - -

Micah.  Ugh.  Micah Bell.  Some people think he's a great villain. I personally think he's terrible and one of the most obvious "betrayals-in-waiting" in the history of written fiction.  I honestly can't figure out if he's from the original pitch and then never got fleshed out like the other characters, or if he came later into production. For one thing, I refuse to believe that a camp full of close-knit outlaws - thieves, murderers, kidnappers and general low-lives - would put up with that kind of sh*t from one of the more recent recruits. The moment Micah started messing with "the womenfolk", I don't care how close he was with Dutch, they would have absolutely banded together and lynched his ass in the middle of the night while Dutch was sound asleep curled up next to his teddy bear.  They'd have gagged him, grabbed him, strung him up on the nearest tree and put an end to his bullsh*t for good.  At minimum, they'd have tricked him into getting passed-out drunk and then all of them would gone into his tent and each taken a turn stabbing him ala Murder on the Orient Express. (spoiler warning for a 100+ year old book, sorry everyone.)

Considering everybody else in the group has some amount of depth, character, backstory and positive attributes, Micah comes across a child's crayon drawing of Judas on DaVinci's "The Last Supper". Gee, I wonder which one of these people at the table is going to betray Jesus...

 

And on that note, the entire concept of "a rat in the group" being such a central concept is dumb when you think about it. Nobody needs to sell out the gang to the Pinkertons when Dutch is doing a fantastic job of leading them around with all the chaos and bullsh*t he brings wherever he goes. What do you mean "Someone must have told them about the bank job" Dutch? You literally killed the most powerful man in Saint Denis a few days ago in a big firefight shortly after he sold you out on the trolly car robbery where you killed a bunch of cops. I'm pretty sure the Pinkertons knew exactly who was responsible for that and were probably just waiting around for you to come back and do your thing. THINK, DUTCH, THINK!  (And honestly, the inclusion of a rat in the group kind of takes away Dutch's agency, accountability and responsibility for "going crazy" and "destroying the gang" as John put it and becoming the man we see in RDR1.)

 

The thing is, with Molly, the Pinkertons extending her the option of ratting them out in exchange for a reprieve makes sense from their perspective, because she's both a woman and someone who's not actually involved in their criminal activity. She's an innocent bystander who's being strung along by an egomaniac trying to be some kind of American Jesus. Plus, considering how Micah is obviously set-up to be the eventual "bad guy", her being the one who claimed to have sold them out felt like an actual twist.

But Micah? You mean, the guy who's been a criminal since the day he plopped out from between his mama's legs, and very recently massacred the whole town of Strawberry? They offered HIM a full-on, unsupervised "catch and release" deal??  Yeeeaaah, I've only got one thing to say to that about that:

My suspension of disbelief is incapable of accepting that plot thread. It's akin to the idea of the FBI in the 1990's letting Tim McVeigh out of prison to act as a double agent to try and snitch out others planning similar attacks ....... and then he goes around bombing more federal buildings and killing innocent people in the process for years afterwards. There is just no way, man. Funnily enough, even before I played the game, I knew there was going to be some sort of betrayal just based on the themes of the game, but I thought the betrayal would come as a need for survival because "Our way of life is over! Don't you get it?! This is the only chance to survive!"

But somehow, Micah betrays the gang - not as a means of escaping that life - but in order to elude justice and continue outlawing around the country without any consequences. I'm sorry game, but ... u wot bruv? Lay off the cocaine drops and horse stimulants.

 

HOW I WOULD HAVE FIXED IT: Okay, so I honestly can't really suggest too much without making major changes to the ending of the game ...

  Hide contents

(Personally, I wouldn't have even had the epilogue and just ended the game with Arthur's death. We honestly didn't need to play as John shoveling horse sh*t and be a henpecked husband and then finally killing Micah who honestly had no business being alive past 1899 anyway. I'd have rather left John's life between then and 1914 up to our imaginations.)  To me, the only thing the epilogue has going for it is the House Building Theme, which has no right being as good as it is.

... so I'll suggest something more simple:

 

At a bare minimum, I would have made Micah a much longer-running member of the gang, but more of an "on-again, off-again" member like Trelawny. He's someone who's proven themselves in the past to be reliable and trustworthy, so even though he's a complete f*ckhead with overly violent tendencies, he's a got history that explains why the long-term members of the VDL Gang tolerate him. I can even hear Arthur explaining to either Sadie or Lenny, "Oh Micah? Yeahh, he's a pain in tha ass, but he's always been there for us the last 6 or so years he's been helpin' us. And he sure as sh*t's a lot better at hittin' what he's aimin' at than Bill. So, we put up with him as best we can ... and smack him around a lil' when he starts t' get outta line, heh..."

 

Regarding the Blackwater Ferry Job - instead of meeting Dutch by saving his life in a bar, he saves Dutch's life during the robbery, making Dutch's overwhelming faith in him much more recent and pertinent, especially when he sticks with the gang through their desperate escape into the mountains during the harsh blizzard, basically cementing that he's now become a full-time part of the gang.

 

/rant over

I agree with most everything you say and especially this part about Micah. He's not a great vilain, just a transparent dick. I've gone through four playthroughs now and each one I have argued that Arthur would have shot Micah in the middle of camp like a dog long before he ever gained any influence over Dutch.  

 

I think Arthur would never have bothered to break him out of Strawberry jail. Would it have even been realistic to do that considering the heat that would bring on the gang, over someone who has only been with the gang under a year? And who almost everyone in the gang dislikes? I have my doubts. 

 

Regarding the "rat" plot, unfortunately the story did get rewritten a bit. In fact a LOT if you go all the way back through the files found on the PC version. The story was worked on in some form or another from as early as 2010/11 to 2018. With some major edits in the last year.

 

Early leaks suggested a lot of the story was going to focus on there being a rat in the gang but it's clear the story struggles to implement this properly. 

 

Some examples of a possible rat:

 

The Pinkertons show up at the Blackwater Ferry robbery. 

You rob the train in the middle of nowhere in Scarlet Meadows in chapter 2, and the cops arrive pretty darn quickly.

Cornwall seems to know Dutch is just hanging out in the local saloon at that very moment and arrives with the Pinkertons.

The Pinkertons know they are near Horseshoe and confront Arthur while he's fishing with Jack. 

The Pinkertons show up at Clemens Point camp and threaten the gang to leave. 

Jack is somehow kidnapped from right under the nose of his mother and a full camp of itchy trigger cowboys and cowgirls and not counting whoever was on guard duty. 

The O'driscols attack Shady Belle.

The Pinkertons are ready at the bank heist (We blame Molly for that) 

The Pinkertons attack Lakay as soon as Dutch arrives there. The gang blames Bill for leading them there. 

 

It would seem like someone in the gang is talking all the way from the start, which was I believe part of the original plan. BUT, it doesn't work either; because as you said, it's absurd to believe that Micah had been given immunity to kill, rob and cause general chaos all the while reporting to the Pinkertons like a good boy. And the newspaper clippings you find regarding Micah's previous exploits tell me the Pinkertons would have loved to take down this prick as soon as possible like everyone else in the gang, so I find it hard to believe they would have made any deal with him. They knew he was a unreliable and stupid, sociopath.

 

But even more so, as you also said, the gang makes SO MUCH NOISE, starting from the ferry job, that the story didn't need a rat. The gang leave a trail of bodies behind them everywhere they go. With Dutch in particular acting very impulsive and sloppy from Chapter 4. Hell, Dutch just decides to kill Cornwall in front of all his guards and the Pinkertons and the whole town of Annesberg. Talk about noise! It's so ridiculous.  

 

Regarding Micah again; Colm O'driscoll actually had the right idea; when he kidnapped Arthur his plan was that Dutch and the gang would rush over to save Arthur and Colm would lead them right into the Pinkertons and then Colm's gang could get all the attention away from them and slip away. 

 

Now, IF Micah had a similar plan like that, that in chapter 6; he finally sees the ship is sinking, to preserve his own skin at the end, he tells the Pinkertons where the gang is in exchange for his freedom, I could MAYBE buy that. 

 

But then he didn't need to tell the Pinkertons anything or help them in any way. Everyone knew where the gang was at that point. I had a $900 bucks bounty just in that region alone by that point lol. 

 

They basically should have scraped the whole rat story!

[SM-W]

7 hours ago, SneakyDeaky said:

I agree with most everything you say and especially this part about Micah. He's not a great vilain, just a transparent dick. I've gone through four playthroughs now and each one I have argued that Arthur would have shot Micah in the middle of camp like a dog long before he ever gained any influence over Dutch.  

 

I think Arthur would never have bothered to break him out of Strawberry jail. Would it have even been realistic to do that considering the heat that would bring on the gang, over someone who has only been with the gang under a year? And who almost everyone in the gang dislikes? I have my doubts. 

 

Regarding the "rat" plot, unfortunately the story did get rewritten a bit. In fact a LOT if you go all the way back through the files found on the PC version. The story was worked on in some form or another from as early as 2010/11 to 2018. With some major edits in the last year.

 

Early leaks suggested a lot of the story was going to focus on there being a rat in the gang but it's clear the story struggles to implement this properly. 

 

Some examples of a possible rat:

 

The Pinkertons show up at the Blackwater Ferry robbery. 

You rob the train in the middle of nowhere in Scarlet Meadows in chapter 2, and the cops arrive pretty darn quickly.

Cornwall seems to know Dutch is just hanging out in the local saloon at that very moment and arrives with the Pinkertons.

The Pinkertons know they are near Horseshoe and confront Arthur while he's fishing with Jack. 

The Pinkertons show up at Clemens Point camp and threaten the gang to leave. 

Jack is somehow kidnapped from right under the nose of his mother and a full camp of itchy trigger cowboys and cowgirls and not counting whoever was on guard duty. 

The O'driscols attack Shady Belle.

The Pinkertons are ready at the bank heist (We blame Molly for that) 

The Pinkertons attack Lakay as soon as Dutch arrives there. The gang blames Bill for leading them there. 

 

It would seem like someone in the gang is talking all the way from the start, which was I believe part of the original plan. BUT, it doesn't work either; because as you said, it's absurd to believe that Micah had been given immunity to kill, rob and cause general chaos all the while reporting to the Pinkertons like a good boy. And the newspaper clippings you find regarding Micah's previous exploits tell me the Pinkertons would have loved to take down this prick as soon as possible like everyone else in the gang, so I find it hard to believe they would have made any deal with him. They knew he was a unreliable and stupid, sociopath.

 

But even more so, as you also said, the gang makes SO MUCH NOISE, starting from the ferry job, that the story didn't need a rat. The gang leave a trail of bodies behind them everywhere they go. With Dutch in particular acting very impulsive and sloppy from Chapter 4. Hell, Dutch just decides to kill Cornwall in front of all his guards and the Pinkertons and the whole town of Annesberg. Talk about noise! It's so ridiculous.  

 

Regarding Micah again; Colm O'driscoll actually had the right idea; when he kidnapped Arthur his plan was that Dutch and the gang would rush over to save Arthur and Colm would lead them right into the Pinkertons and then Colm's gang could get all the attention away from them and slip away. 

 

Now, IF Micah had a similar plan like that, that in chapter 6; he finally sees the ship is sinking, to preserve his own skin at the end, he tells the Pinkertons where the gang is in exchange for his freedom, I could MAYBE buy that. 

 

But then he didn't need to tell the Pinkertons anything or help them in any way. Everyone knew where the gang was at that point. I had a $900 bucks bounty just in that region alone by that point lol. 

 

They basically should have scraped the whole rat story!

As much as I enjoyed my first playthrough, I honestly couldn't force myself to go through a 2nd one for very long. I just flat out refused to rescue Micah from jail, so I just did some wagon stealing for Seamus for a bit until my interest petered out and I moved on to another game.

 

When I think about Micah being so obnoxiously, blatantly the "twist villain", I think about someone telling me that Micah didn't need to be better written because "there's nothing wrong with a bad guy who's evil for the sake of being evil." It honestly dumbfounded me, because while I agree, at the same time, that kind of villain absolutely does not fit in with the world RDR2 has created, or the level of writing you see in the rest of the game. The writers went through so much trouble to give even tiny, minor one-scene bit characters a sense of depth that Micah's complete lack thereof just makes him stick out like a sore thumb compared to basically every other person in the game.  He's so blatantly "the guy who's going to betray you" to the level of being amateurishly written.  Like I said, it's akin to DaVinci's Last Supper painting with a crayon drawing of Judas.

Regarding his actions at camp, one parallel I love to draw is this: There were many instances where U.S. soldiers in the Vietnam War - regular young men who were drafted to fight in a war - would kill their own commanding officers with grenades for sending them out into battle zones with zero regard for their lives. If those guys would go so far as to kill their own Lt.'s while in a warzone just for issuing orders that put their lives at risk, Micah would have absolutely been killed by life-long criminals for being an obnoxious POS. A small amount of restraint and some more "normal" interactions (rather than just making him "Trevor Phillips 1899 edition") would have done a world of good - or at the very least, giving him some more history with the gang instead of just having been with them a few months.

 

It also drives me crazy when people say "Micah tipped them off about the Blackwater Ferry Robbery" because not only does Milton confirm it (canonically) only started after Guarma, but then why would Micah tip them off about a job where he was going to be an active part of the robbery and take a chance of getting shot by the Pinkertons? (While also, himself, shooting law enforcement / innocent civilians in the escape and then making a getaway with Dutch's group.) Why didn't the Pinkerton's nab Micah when he was arrested in Strawberry and have him lead them to Dutch's camp while they were still at Horseshoe Overlook? And after going through the rampage in Strawberry, I'm preeeetty sure that would have ended his whole double-agent deal.

Funnily enough, referring to what you were saying about the hints of there being a rat tipping off the authorities throughout the game, I always just assumed it was related to the main theme of "the wild west was basically over" and you just couldn't get away with crime like you used to in the more civilized parts of the country they found themselves in. (The same way you can't rob banks anymore with any chance of success, unlike how criminals could pull it off as recently as the 80's and 90's. Hell, Larry Phillips Jr. and Emil Mătăsăreanu successfully robbed multiple banks before the fateful day they hit that one North Hollywood Bank of America in 1997.)

Besides, in the sandbox you can't even rob a train in the remote regions of the Ambarino mountains without the law showing up in force - why would I suspect that committing crimes in less remote regions during missions would be any different?

 

 

Like you said, I wish they had scrapped the whole rat plot, and made it where Dutch's fear of betrayal was simply the result of his growing paranoia and mental instability. Unfortunately the rat plot is tied so heavily to the end-game that you can't remove that without a major overhaul and change of the ending. You don't get to have that scene of Arthur Morgan's Last Ride or the confrontation at camp after rescuing Abagail, or that bit with Dutch on the mountain. They're good scenes, sure, but it still doesn't make Micah being the rat (or the fact that he gets away and continues being an outlaw for another eight years) make any kind of sense.  Plus, I think about how Dutch in RDR1 is described as "a charismatic leader who went crazy," but RDR2 changes that story into "a charismatic leader who got led astray by a brown-noser who sold out the group".

The writers were just way too married to that concept to change it, and I feel like the overall story suffered for it.

Edited May 25, 2023 by SM-W

[Agent Edward]

On 5/24/2023 at 9:20 PM, SM-W said:

As much as I enjoyed my first playthrough, I honestly couldn't force myself to go through a 2nd one for very long. I just flat out refused to rescue Micah from jail, so I just did some wagon stealing for Seamus for a bit until my interest petered out and I moved on to another game.

 

When I think about Micah being so obnoxiously, blatantly the "twist villain", I think about someone telling me that Micah didn't need to be better written because "there's nothing wrong with a bad guy who's evil for the sake of being evil." It honestly dumbfounded me, because while I agree, at the same time, that kind of villain absolutely does not fit in with the world RDR2 has created, or the level of writing you see in the rest of the game. The writers went through so much trouble to give even tiny, minor one-scene bit characters a sense of depth that Micah's complete lack thereof just makes him stick out like a sore thumb compared to basically every other person in the game.  He's so blatantly "the guy who's going to betray you" to the level of being amateurishly written.  Like I said, it's akin to DaVinci's Last Supper painting with a crayon drawing of Judas.

Regarding his actions at camp, one parallel I love to draw is this: There were many instances where U.S. soldiers in the Vietnam War - regular young men who were drafted to fight in a war - would kill their own commanding officers with grenades for sending them out into battle zones with zero regard for their lives. If those guys would go so far as to kill their own Lt.'s while in a warzone just for issuing orders that put their lives at risk, Micah would have absolutely been killed by life-long criminals for being an obnoxious POS. A small amount of restraint and some more "normal" interactions (rather than just making him "Trevor Phillips 1899 edition") would have done a world of good - or at the very least, giving him some more history with the gang instead of just having been with them a few months.

 

It also drives me crazy when people say "Micah tipped them off about the Blackwater Ferry Robbery" because not only does Milton confirm it (canonically) only started after Guarma, but then why would Micah tip them off about a job where he was going to be an active part of the robbery and take a chance of getting shot by the Pinkertons? (While also, himself, shooting law enforcement / innocent civilians in the escape and then making a getaway with Dutch's group.) Why didn't the Pinkerton's nab Micah when he was arrested in Strawberry and have him lead them to Dutch's camp while they were still at Horseshoe Overlook? And after going through the rampage in Strawberry, I'm preeeetty sure that would have ended his whole double-agent deal.

Funnily enough, referring to what you were saying about the hints of there being a rat tipping off the authorities throughout the game, I always just assumed it was related to the main theme of "the wild west was basically over" and you just couldn't get away with crime like you used to in the more civilized parts of the country they found themselves in. (The same way you can't rob banks anymore with any chance of success, unlike how criminals could pull it off as recently as the 80's and 90's. Hell, Larry Phillips Jr. and Emil Mătăsăreanu successfully robbed multiple banks before the fateful day they hit that one North Hollywood Bank of America in 1997.)

Besides, in the sandbox you can't even rob a train in the remote regions of the Ambarino mountains without the law showing up in force - why would I suspect that committing crimes in less remote regions during missions would be any different?

 

 

Like you said, I wish they had scrapped the whole rat plot, and made it where Dutch's fear of betrayal was simply the result of his growing paranoia and mental instability. Unfortunately the rat plot is tied so heavily to the end-game that you can't remove that without a major overhaul and change of the ending. You don't get to have that scene of Arthur Morgan's Last Ride or the confrontation at camp after rescuing Abagail, or that bit with Dutch on the mountain. They're good scenes, sure, but it still doesn't make Micah being the rat (or the fact that he gets away and continues being an outlaw for another eight years) make any kind of sense.  Plus, I think about how Dutch in RDR1 is described as "a charismatic leader who went crazy," but RDR2 changes that story into "a charismatic leader who got led astray by a brown-noser who sold out the group".

The writers were just way too married to that concept to change it, and I feel like the overall story suffered for it.

I think that either Micah only made a deal with the pinkertons after they came back from Guarma, between the missions "Paradise Mercifully Departed" and "Dear Uncle Tacitus" or that he wasn't the traitor at all and Agent Milton was just protecting someone else when he said that Micah did this, *cough* Abigail *cough*, Micah being alongside Dutch and Arthur killing pinkertons right after they kill Leviticus Cornwall in Annesburg is just one more reason for me to doubt him being the traitor, it must either be Abigail or Molly herself and Agent Milton was just messing with Arthur's mind when he said it wasn't her.

[SM-W]

1 minute ago, Edward RDRIII said:

I think that either Micah only made a deal with the pinkertons after they came back from Guarma, between the missions "Paradise Mercifully Departed" and "Dear Uncle Tacitus" or that he wasn't the traitor at all and Agent Milton was just protecting someone else when he said that Micah did this, *cough* Abigail *cough*, Micah being alongside Dutch and Arthur killing pinkertons right after they kill Leviticus Cornwall in Annesburg is just one more reason for me to doubt him being the traitor, it must either be Abigail or Molly herself and Agent Milton was just messing with Arthur's mind when he said it wasn't her.

Well, according to Milton that's when Micah starting ratting them out - but it still feels nonsensical that they'd just do a catch-and-release sort of deal with him gives his past history with the law, and the kinds of crimes he's committed. While I like to believe that Milton was just lying about it being, it also doesn't make much sense why Milton would lie to a dying man he's about to kill anyway.

And yeah, I agree that Abagail being the traitor makes far more sense (even though it puts John at far more risk.)

I still go back to what Arthur said to Dutch in the mission "Just A Social Visit": "We don't need a rat! We got sloppier than the town drunk, and they know who we are, and where we are, and what we're doin'."

[Sneaky Queeky]

18 minutes ago, SM-W said:

I still go back to what Arthur said to Dutch in the mission "Just A Social Visit": "We don't need a rat! We got sloppier than the town drunk, and they know who we are, and where we are, and what we're doin'."

Yeah I forgot that quote and it sums up the situation perfectly. 

 

The game was over written instead of under written, if that makes any sense. 6-7 years of constant work. The cast started recording lines at the studio in 2013. I feel like it contributed to some of the messy writing at times. 

 

I wonder how much Micah changed as a personality, because he really is just Trevor. I like to hope there was a more serious version of him in script, but I don't know. I don't blame the actor, Peter Blomquist, as he is more than capable of playing a more nuanced character, judging by his creepy performance as Doctor Fontaine in LA Noire.  

 

There are some hilarious moments in camp with Micah though; if he had had a lot less bearing on the story and its outcome, I would enjoy them more. Charles and Javier knock him on his ass a couple times and some of his creepy attempts to "woo" the women in camp and their responses are great.

 

He's almost a comic relief in camp. Yet treated like a heart attack in the story cutscenes. It's a shame. I wish I could just enjoy him as "that dick in camp everyone wants to take a swipe at, but at least he brings home the bacon."  Bill is treated that way, but Micah suits that role perfectly. 

[Agent Edward]

58 minutes ago, SM-W said:

Well, according to Milton that's when Micah starting ratting them out - but it still feels nonsensical that they'd just do a catch-and-release sort of deal with him gives his past history with the law, and the kinds of crimes he's committed. While I like to believe that Milton was just lying about it being, it also doesn't make much sense why Milton would lie to a dying man he's about to kill anyway.

And yeah, I agree that Abagail being the traitor makes far more sense (even though it puts John at far more risk.)

I still go back to what Arthur said to Dutch in the mission "Just A Social Visit": "We don't need a rat! We got sloppier than the town drunk, and they know who we are, and where we are, and what we're doin'."

Yeah, I also think that Arthur was right about them not needing a traitor because of all the mayhem Dutch puts them through, also, even when Arthur and Micah are fighting each other, either on Beaver Hollow or on the top of the mount, Micah never admits that he is the traitor to Arthur, and it isn't because Dutch may be nearby because he says things such as "I'm gonna take every cent of that money." and what not, which Dutch wouldn't really like to hear either.

Edited May 26, 2023 by Edward RDRIII

[Dmk86BG]

Yeah... they could definitely do better. Especially with the scene with Gloria! Someone above mentioned that the game is too limited... True! We should have more options for choices, for response...

[Old Man With No Name]

On 11/2/2022 at 2:20 PM, cant remember said:

 

 

- Too many characters, when a gang member or antagonist died I sometimes couldn't even remember who they were exactly other than vaguely having heard their name dropped before or seeing them wander the camp. In Guarma I didn't even realise there was supposed to be an antagonist until after I had killed him in a quicktime event and read about him on the wiki. IMO it would have been better if your gang out of outlaws comprised of 4-5 members from the start. John Marston, Dutch, Micah, Arthur and maybe another one that dies mid-game.

Having too many characters is a good thing. This is why GTA IV have best story setting amoung other gta games.

This is the game about an outlaw gang. I think dutch's gang should've have more than 30 members but its 22.

 

 

[FRIDA_KAHLO]

I didn't like that it didn't have its own name like revolver and redemption, and try to reuse the fame of "redemption" with a story of arthur which I found completely much less compelling than John.

 

And I didn't like playing Arthur instead of my same custom character I made for online.