Just before the first COVID-19 lockdown started in Melbourne, Patrick Stokes ran out and bought an Xbox – “for the kids,” you understand…
Red Dead Redemption 2, released in October 2018, spent more than seven years in development (sometimes in controversial working conditions). The sheer scale of the thing is overawing. Depending how you play there’s 80 plus hours of game-play, held together by a 2,000 page script for the main story alone. Every kind of terrain, from snowy mountains to swamps to city streets, is lovingly detailed and populated by around 200 species of animal.
You never quite stop being astonished at the technical achievement, the strength of the acting (done over 2,200 days in a motion capture studio by 1,200 actors, 700 with dialogue), the hyperreal beauty of the landscapes and the granular details, like how your footfalls squelch in the mud. Even the weather is spectacular.
There’s also any number of moral decisions and uncomfortable compromises to be made.
Read his philosophical insights at Art for trying times: how a philosopher found solace playing Red Dead Redemption 2
Playing Red Dead Redemption 2 during a pandemic is a surprisingly moving experience. The game is a haunting meditation on time, death, and the persistence of the past.