How Red Dead Redemption Should Have Begun

The start was very tame, the ending was great but the whole time playing RDR i thought there was going to be a weird twist at the end, as he is always on about his family but you never see or hear from them til the end, and when people spoke of them like the fbi guys they seemed funny about it. I thought that perhaps his family was dead and he's a bit crazy, so they were using him.

lol The voice acting was a bit lacking, but yeah RDR would have benefit greatly if they had an opening like this to motivate the players to progress through the game.

oh its on shit is gona hit the fan give me a gun and lets kick some ass

Yeah, the beginning to Outlaws was great compared to RDR. Definitely made you care about the characters more.

I agree totally with this, Joseph.
I played Outlawz back when i was around 10 and fell in love with the game, it has to be one of my favourite games of all time. Had RDR have a more compleing opening like Outlawz, it may have been more enjoyable for me personally. Don't get me wrong, i did enjoy RDR anyway, but the story was lacking in some areas.

Indeed Joseph, RDR's opening compared to this one is lacking some emotional attachment with the main character.

If you want a better source of inspiration, look up The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, or any movie made by Sergio Leone for that matter.

I thoroughly enjoyed RDR, but this opening would have been perfect for the game.

I loved Red Dead Redemption, but your right it would have been better this way.

Holy mother, Outlaws! Chasing bad guy, by selecting the wanted poster.... remember that? Sound familiar right?

Dang, I'm old...

I've never played Read Dead Revolver and I've only played through about half of Redemption, so I probably don't know John Marston well enough as a character to comment on this. This is just the way I currently see it.

Perhaps Rockstar thought that an opening like this would have been cliche. Suppose they wanted to portray Marston as a calm, collective character despite the situation with his family. But a more dramatic opening sequence in general would have been a little more fun. I have to agree with that. Most of Rockstar's games have somewhat calm beginnings anyway. I assume it's an attempt to show the more casual side of the character(if that's the right way to describe it). "To know the man BEHIND the gun", in a way, rather than playing as "the guy with the gun." I personally find that way better than the character that goes, "I'm pissed off, so I'm gonna shoot some people."

I really like RDR's story, and I like many of the characters as well. I suppose I'm just a sucker for western themed stuff because I've always liked the movies though. In other words, I'm fine with the way RDR is.

Always wanted to play this...wonder if its on Steam?

Sorry Joseph, I'm going to have to disagree with you on this. You’re right that this opening would be more emotionally driven and exciting, but I don’t think you’re really thinking about how it would fully pan out in a game like Red Dead Redemption.

First of all, you’re discarding the actual plot itself. It’s a story about the decline of the Wild West, being shaped by technological and industrial changes. You’re set out to hunt down and bring your former gang to justice. You yourself are the catalyst of this change into the modern world. John’s family being held hostage and his criminal slate being wiped clean is merely his motivation for doing this. The whole revenge tale storyline has been done before and become so cliché. Hell, it was even done in Red Dead Revolver. Really what you’re asking for is a less methodical and unique set up and more of the same. It’s Red Dead Redemption, not Red Dead Retribution.

The opening of the game is great in how it establishes the world you’re going in to. Not with the obvious banter from the passenger’s talking about how modern the west is becoming, but from John Marstons stoic manner. You don’t know what this man is like. You don’t know what his angle is. But from playing more of the game and seeing his actions you start to learn more about his character. In contrast to that opening of Outlaw, we just instantly see this guy’s a family man, very likable and his family gets all murdered up. We’re basically forced to like the dude. -_-

Finally, think about the pacing. The game is easily 15-20 hours in length. You’re playing as Marston for a rather long time. For a revenge tale that’s going to be a lot of brooding and anger to contend with. People already complain about how often Marston talks about his family, to have him always end his stories with “...and I’m gonna kill the man who murdered them” would be more tiring. With Marstons family simply being detained by government agents it’s not so much an urgent situation as it is just his last job. You’re not in any rush, but you still have some incentive to finish. This is why the Mass Effect games always has those cut off points that rush you into the final act and prohibit you from your side quests. I have issues with how they choose to do them, but I understand for pacing reason why they do it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not circle jerking the game as a faultless masterpiece. There’s plenty about the games storyline that could do with some polish, stuff that needed to be outright cut, and I have a few idea’s of my own which I would have liked to have seen done. Despite all this, however, I still think Rockstar San Diego deserve props for handling the story the way they wanted to tell it, and with how well they did it.

Long post is loooooooooooooooooooooong.

This would have worked better as an ending in my opinion. I'm one of those rare individuals that really love abrupt endings, because they make you think. I think the killing of the government dude while you played as Jack was a little boring and it submitted the end of the "West". It maybe would have been cooler to see Jack (assuming John is still killed) ride off with fiery vengeance in his eyes searching for the agents signifying that the West itself may be over but the spirit lives on.

Haha, The girl is voiced by the same person who did Tommy Pickle from Rugrats.

The voice actor for the little kid was the same as the one from Rugrats. Lil I think.

I don't know Joseph...I understand what you are saying but I quite like the way the game opened.

Many people complain about the slow pace of Red Dead Redemption but that is one of it's big draws for me. The calmness of the atmosphere(for the most part) really allowed me breathing room to soak in the atmosphere. That opening for Outlaws is epic...but stereotypical? Yes, it is that too.

I think having Marston's family get killed in the beginning may have made him like a typical 'out-for-revenge' type persona the West is known for...but, frankly that is just not the Marston I wanted to see. Sure he may act like that if circumstances had played out that way...but I think his personality may have lead him to do otherwise as well.

John Marston, while talented in the gunslinger arts always has come off to me as a very flawed, somewhat understated individual, not a badass. The way he was raised leads one to know he is uneducated and allows himself to be kind of 'lead around like a dog' in many cases as he has done most of his life by living in gangs. He doesn't have the most shining personality, again because of his 'omega' character traits. Therefore, saying this stoic character is supposed to have more 'fire in his belly' doesn't seem to match the way Marston seems to act aggressively only when 'shot at first'.

He's not the 'best in the West', he is simply a remnant of a passing age; one of the reasons why I really liked about this game and especially it's ending. Simply put, I like the beginning of the game because of the theme it establishes from the start.

How very Outlaw Josse Wales