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Jan. 17th, 2019 02:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
between_time_and_42 I was trying to wait until I had watched the epilogue of Red Dead Redemption 2 to make another post about it, but the epilogue isn't coming soon because I just miss my boy too much and I had some thoughts I forgot to put into my last post, plus a few thoughts on scenes that weren't present in the playthrough that I watched, and neither of them can wait.
"My boy" is Arthur Morgan; even though I doubt the folks subscribed to me care much, I'm still observing proper spoiler etiquette (mostly because I'm still pissed at the assholes who spoiled it for me). I watched the beginning of the epilogue with John as the protagonist, and although I want to see where the story is going and how it's all going to end, I still need a bit of time to recover from my favorite character's death. I can only imagine how gut-punching it must be for those who actually played the game themselves, seeing as Arthur is the player character which means, in a way, he's you.
The thoughts I forgot to add to the last post were these:
-I don't know if anyone else felt like this, but the few times Arthur called out to Dutch for help- when he was on the sinking ship and the doorway was blocked, and then when he was caught by the lawmen and Dutch just walked away- were, to me, some of the saddest moments in the story. Arthur sounded like a terrified child yelling for his father to come and make it better. Just... fuck Dutch, man. Arthur deserved better than what that fool had to offer. I hope, even if no one kills him, that he at least eventually realizes the extent and the implications of all the damage and destruction he caused, and is forced to live with that knowledge for the rest of his days.
(I wanted to add, too, as I mentioned in the earlier post, that I really can't get over how resonant the themes of nature vs. nurture and breaking free from the influence of flawed authority figures in this game are with my fanfic, The Path of a Kingsman- which was an element I added based on the real-life experience of realizing that a person I used to love is now someone I want little do to with. Like, did this story come into my life at the right time or what... This isn't even the first time this week that something's inspired me to start writing Kingsman fic again, but we most definitely will get to that later, in a different post)
-I obviously wasn't the one playing so I can't make any accurate judgment, but I do want to say, from the way it looked, I hate that the game railroaded the player into a certain plot point at the end. Namely, the death of Arthur's horse. I'm not sure if I correctly interpreted what I was watching, but it looked like the gamer I was watching was maxed out on horse revival and all sort of health tonics for the horse, but when he went to access them, he couldn't use them. True, the cutscene of the horse's death happened pretty quickly after the horse was shot, so maybe the game mechanics weren't accounting for someone to try to use the health tonics that fast, but it seemed pretty unfair to let that happen. (Not to mention, now that I'm thinking about this scene, I take back what I said about how gut-punching Arthur's death must have been for an active player. There's no way it could have been any more gut-punching than the horse's death. I'd have probably cried were I playing that part. People dying is fine, just leave the animals alone!!)
That leads me into one of the things I wanted to mention that I discovered from watching scenes that other gamers had recorded. I looked up the alternate endings- they change depending on whether you played Arthur as a good guy or a bad guy- and... hm. Hmmmm. No matter how many terrible acts you commit in the game, I really can't believe that Arthur deserves an ending where Micah kills him. Apparently that's what happens if you're dishonorable, and something just feels way off about that. The way I see it is, the game was called Red Dead REDEMPTION for a reason. Once Arthur is diagnosed with TB, it doesn't matter how many towns you've shot up or innocent people you've murdered or stores you've robbed- in the canon of the story, he starts trying to make amends for his criminal lifestyle by helping the innocent members of the gang escape Dutch. So when he helps John escape, successfully convinces Dutch to cut ties with Micah (even though they'd already done too much damage and Dutch had already lost too much control for that to really matter), and then dies peacefully watching the sunrise- that's Arthur's redemption. There is no point to having him save John and do other canon acts of kindness (by canon, I mean they occur in a cutscene- as far as I know, the only cutscenes that really change depending on honor level are the ending and I think a few others, but across the board, the acts of kindness I referred to all still occur), only to have Micah shoot him or stab him. The good ending implies that by freeing himself from Dutch's influence and doing good deeds out of his own free will instead of following orders, Arthur atoned for everything bad that he had done. But the bad ending implies that no matter what good he tried to do in the world, it doesn't matter- he was still a criminal, and criminals deserve justice. I mean, when you look at it that way, it makes you think Arthur was no better than Micah and Dutch. And that's just bullshit. Not to mention it's a terrible lesson to take away from the story- that you're doomed because of who you are- whereas the other ending has almost the exact opposite lesson. I'm really not sure if I like that, and I'm just glad that the gamer I was watching decided to play the good guy. (Also, I really don't know why anyone playing the game would want to just fuck around and kill random NPCs like that, but... well... I'm really not surprised.)
Also, one more thought from supplemental material. Arthur keeps a journal throughout the story, which if one chooses to read it apparently reveals a lot about his thoughts and feelings and suggests that he's a much more intelligent, talented, and sensitive person than one would give him credit for (and that he gives himself credit for...), but while I'm dying to read it, apparently it's only accessible if you have the game. And I'm not going to waste time and money buying the game, then buying the controller, then learning how to use it, then playing the game all the way up to the end, just to learn more about Arthur. However, I did find a few screenshots from it that some folks had shared online, and while I mostly enjoyed what I read, there was one thing that really didn't ring true for me. The last entry in the journal is about how Arthur is no longer afraid to die and how he hopes someday he'll see his loved one Mary again in the great beyond (she's still alive by the time he dies, but she sent back his ring and wrote him a letter explaining how she can't be with him). Maybe it's because I didn't read the entire journal (which presumably goes further into Arthur's thoughts on Mary), or maybe it's because the gamer I was watching only completed one of two optional missions involving Mary, but the idea that Mary should be the person Arthur thinks about toward the end of his life came completely out of left field for me. Obviously he was in love with her, but I really didn't think she had that much influence on his life and ending the journal by talking about a lost love seemed way too cheesy for me. But then again I wasn't really invested in that relationship at all to begin with, so... maybe if I were somehow able to read the full journal I would appreciate it more in context. (Now I'm starting to wonder if my friends who own the game would like to help me out in that respect... though it's pretty hard to impress the importance of such a thing on friends who aren't involved in any kind of fandom-y activities...)
"My boy" is Arthur Morgan; even though I doubt the folks subscribed to me care much, I'm still observing proper spoiler etiquette (mostly because I'm still pissed at the assholes who spoiled it for me). I watched the beginning of the epilogue with John as the protagonist, and although I want to see where the story is going and how it's all going to end, I still need a bit of time to recover from my favorite character's death. I can only imagine how gut-punching it must be for those who actually played the game themselves, seeing as Arthur is the player character which means, in a way, he's you.
The thoughts I forgot to add to the last post were these:
-I don't know if anyone else felt like this, but the few times Arthur called out to Dutch for help- when he was on the sinking ship and the doorway was blocked, and then when he was caught by the lawmen and Dutch just walked away- were, to me, some of the saddest moments in the story. Arthur sounded like a terrified child yelling for his father to come and make it better. Just... fuck Dutch, man. Arthur deserved better than what that fool had to offer. I hope, even if no one kills him, that he at least eventually realizes the extent and the implications of all the damage and destruction he caused, and is forced to live with that knowledge for the rest of his days.
(I wanted to add, too, as I mentioned in the earlier post, that I really can't get over how resonant the themes of nature vs. nurture and breaking free from the influence of flawed authority figures in this game are with my fanfic, The Path of a Kingsman- which was an element I added based on the real-life experience of realizing that a person I used to love is now someone I want little do to with. Like, did this story come into my life at the right time or what... This isn't even the first time this week that something's inspired me to start writing Kingsman fic again, but we most definitely will get to that later, in a different post)
-I obviously wasn't the one playing so I can't make any accurate judgment, but I do want to say, from the way it looked, I hate that the game railroaded the player into a certain plot point at the end. Namely, the death of Arthur's horse. I'm not sure if I correctly interpreted what I was watching, but it looked like the gamer I was watching was maxed out on horse revival and all sort of health tonics for the horse, but when he went to access them, he couldn't use them. True, the cutscene of the horse's death happened pretty quickly after the horse was shot, so maybe the game mechanics weren't accounting for someone to try to use the health tonics that fast, but it seemed pretty unfair to let that happen. (Not to mention, now that I'm thinking about this scene, I take back what I said about how gut-punching Arthur's death must have been for an active player. There's no way it could have been any more gut-punching than the horse's death. I'd have probably cried were I playing that part. People dying is fine, just leave the animals alone!!)
That leads me into one of the things I wanted to mention that I discovered from watching scenes that other gamers had recorded. I looked up the alternate endings- they change depending on whether you played Arthur as a good guy or a bad guy- and... hm. Hmmmm. No matter how many terrible acts you commit in the game, I really can't believe that Arthur deserves an ending where Micah kills him. Apparently that's what happens if you're dishonorable, and something just feels way off about that. The way I see it is, the game was called Red Dead REDEMPTION for a reason. Once Arthur is diagnosed with TB, it doesn't matter how many towns you've shot up or innocent people you've murdered or stores you've robbed- in the canon of the story, he starts trying to make amends for his criminal lifestyle by helping the innocent members of the gang escape Dutch. So when he helps John escape, successfully convinces Dutch to cut ties with Micah (even though they'd already done too much damage and Dutch had already lost too much control for that to really matter), and then dies peacefully watching the sunrise- that's Arthur's redemption. There is no point to having him save John and do other canon acts of kindness (by canon, I mean they occur in a cutscene- as far as I know, the only cutscenes that really change depending on honor level are the ending and I think a few others, but across the board, the acts of kindness I referred to all still occur), only to have Micah shoot him or stab him. The good ending implies that by freeing himself from Dutch's influence and doing good deeds out of his own free will instead of following orders, Arthur atoned for everything bad that he had done. But the bad ending implies that no matter what good he tried to do in the world, it doesn't matter- he was still a criminal, and criminals deserve justice. I mean, when you look at it that way, it makes you think Arthur was no better than Micah and Dutch. And that's just bullshit. Not to mention it's a terrible lesson to take away from the story- that you're doomed because of who you are- whereas the other ending has almost the exact opposite lesson. I'm really not sure if I like that, and I'm just glad that the gamer I was watching decided to play the good guy. (Also, I really don't know why anyone playing the game would want to just fuck around and kill random NPCs like that, but... well... I'm really not surprised.)
Also, one more thought from supplemental material. Arthur keeps a journal throughout the story, which if one chooses to read it apparently reveals a lot about his thoughts and feelings and suggests that he's a much more intelligent, talented, and sensitive person than one would give him credit for (and that he gives himself credit for...), but while I'm dying to read it, apparently it's only accessible if you have the game. And I'm not going to waste time and money buying the game, then buying the controller, then learning how to use it, then playing the game all the way up to the end, just to learn more about Arthur. However, I did find a few screenshots from it that some folks had shared online, and while I mostly enjoyed what I read, there was one thing that really didn't ring true for me. The last entry in the journal is about how Arthur is no longer afraid to die and how he hopes someday he'll see his loved one Mary again in the great beyond (she's still alive by the time he dies, but she sent back his ring and wrote him a letter explaining how she can't be with him). Maybe it's because I didn't read the entire journal (which presumably goes further into Arthur's thoughts on Mary), or maybe it's because the gamer I was watching only completed one of two optional missions involving Mary, but the idea that Mary should be the person Arthur thinks about toward the end of his life came completely out of left field for me. Obviously he was in love with her, but I really didn't think she had that much influence on his life and ending the journal by talking about a lost love seemed way too cheesy for me. But then again I wasn't really invested in that relationship at all to begin with, so... maybe if I were somehow able to read the full journal I would appreciate it more in context. (Now I'm starting to wonder if my friends who own the game would like to help me out in that respect... though it's pretty hard to impress the importance of such a thing on friends who aren't involved in any kind of fandom-y activities...)
