from Hacker News

How the West Was Digitized: The Making of Rockstar Games’ Red Dead Redemption 2

by pcestrada on 12/1/18, 12:18 PM with 85 comments

• by tkiley on 12/1/18, 3:21 PM

  I haven't played a big-budget game in years, but I decided to give RDR2 a try, specifically because reviewers described it as slow and boring.

  I think it's great, for the exact reason that other people think it's slow and boring. It's specifically designed to quash your tendency to speedrun or minmax: It requires you to simply come along for the ride.

  On the one hand, this is a bit annoying sometimes. On the other hand, it revives the sense of wonder that I haven't felt since I learned to treat games as something to win rather than something to get lost in.

• by empath75 on 12/1/18, 4:21 PM

  I’m sort of ambivalent about the game and it’s largely because I have two young kids at home and have maybe an hour at a time to play and the amount of what I would call ‘empty’ time in the game really stands out.

  There have been times where I’ve done all the work I need to do to get some unbroken alone time, spent 40 minutes playing and gotten absolute nothing accomplished which really sucks given that it might be the only time I could play that week.

  I get that it’s atmospheric but as a dad game it just sucks.

  I’d like to be able to load the game and play through a couple of missions quickly without all the faffing about brushing my horse and crafting and hunting and what not.

  Basically my life is full of enough chores that I don’t need games that simulate doing more chores.

• by cletus on 12/1/18, 2:30 PM

  Lots of respect for Rockstar but... Add FL I alone on that I thought GTAV was at best soulless and at worst terrible. I almost stopped playing when Trevor became available.

  Whereas GTA4 was genuine satire (Republican space rangers anyone?) the sequel had poor characters and I honestly have never gone back to it since finishing the main storyline, the first time this was true in the series.

  Anyway RDR2 Looks amazing. I bought an Xbox just to play it. Who knows how long it'll take to get to PC but I'll buy it again when it does.

• by shocks on 12/1/18, 11:03 PM

  The game is good but the controls are so bad it's comical.

  Don't try and get on your horse if someone is standing near it because triangle is also "get into a fight with that person". You can back out of the fight, but not with the circle button (which is so often the "go back" button) - this time circle is the punch button!

  Basically the core game loop is: move a bit, look in the bottom right to see if you can press some buttons to do a thing, do a thing or move a bit more.

• by pier25 on 12/1/18, 5:40 PM

  Just today I started playing it, and it's really impressive. It's like being in a Cormac McCarty novel.

  I imagine the pacing, realism, and atmosphere is not for everyone, but if it is your cup of tea this is (so far) a masterpiece in single player gaming.

• by kordlessagain on 12/1/18, 7:22 PM

  I used a video's frames of myself playing RDR2 to train a neural network. I then showed it a photo my son took of some cows at the in-law's place. Here's what happened: https://photos.app.goo.gl/sDTofashQdDSUJMdA

  The network was trained with https://nanonets.com, if anyone is interested. Interesting stuff, given the knowledge came from synthesized horses.

  I did not train or segment any other entities other than Arthur and his horse. Labels were 'horse' and 'human'.

• by corysama on 12/1/18, 6:51 PM

  If you like this, you can find more at https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMakingOfGames/

• by mlthoughts2018 on 12/1/18, 7:59 PM

  RDR2 starts out almost as an anti-game, then progresses through a phase that feels like a stereotype of old westerns. I think it jerks you between the two extremes to set up the second half of the game, which involves much more drama, racial overtones, and more examination of the death of outlaw life that the game’s promise is built on.

  There are two main criticisms to me.

  (1) the dialogue is very cheesy and superficial too often when it would be better to just not have it at all. More segments of deep sparsity, even when other characters are around you (think Shadow of the Collossus) would make it even more desolate and impactful.

  (2) The mechanics of the controls and indicated special instructions are sometimes clunky to the point that you fail missions or miss out on things accidentally just due to the control system. I know this will never be perfect, but it is frequently so bad in RDR2 that you are very aware of it and frustrated by it as you complete tasks.

  Despite this, it’s easily one of the best games I’ve ever played on multiple dimensions.

  It makes me very excited for Death Stranding as well, which I think will be something of a sci-fi / dystopian variation of what RDR2 is.