The Red Beast

This article contains significant plot details for Grand Theft Auto IV and Red Dead Redemption, so if you have not played through those games, I would avoid reading it.

The marriage of a narrative medium to the story being told is a difficult task.  When reading The Road, I found Cormac McCarthy’s bland tone disconnected from the larger tale that he wrote.  When watching Apocalypse Now, there is a beautiful harmony between the dreamlike descent into hell as conveyed by the film’s structure and the story of madness overtaking a man.

This becomes an even greater challenge when applied to games.  Since a game’s pacing can often be controlled by the player, there are limitations on how much you can shape an experience.  Film, music, and literature are far more direct, and the tone of the author(s) can be very precise.  Even with revered games, there can be a disconnect.  Is there anything about the space pirate storyline of the Metroid that games is specifically complementary to the solitary exploration gameplay, other than the fact that it’s set in mysterious deep space?  There was some dramatic marketing for Halo 3 that spoke of sacrifice and honor, but that didn’t really have anything to do with the sandbox shooting that the game actually presented to the player.  Game designers have to struggle with pacing and visual presentation that a player controls in addition to the layer that interaction provides.  Can you make an interaction complement a narrative?

Braid is a recent example of a phenomenal commitment to an interwoven story and gameplay concept.  The dreamlike narrative tells of past events and their associated regret, and the gameplay is all about rewinding time to erase mistakes or choose alternate paths.  It’s a stroke of genius to combine the two in such a way, and is certainly a reason why the game has become such a critical darling.  Rockstar Games, in its sandbox game series starting with Grand Theft Auto III as its first real attempt at cinematic storytelling, has been struggling with free will and how it relates to gameplay.  For me, they have finally struck gold with Red Dead Redemption.

The storyline in Grand Theft Auto III was filled with ludicrous characters and plenty of commentary on American society, but it didn’t have much heft.  It was a generic revenge storyline punctuated with caricatures.  The same can be said for Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, which expanded the scope but became more about amassing power and wealth for its own sake.  Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas had something a bit more approaching a complementary story arc, with a character being drawn back to their hometown and being thrown into events out of their control, but was also more satire than actual story, and was just as silly as its predecessors were.

Grand Theft Auto IV attempted to change this by making the plot more realistic and focused, and concentrating on main character Niko Bellic’s strive for revenge to quiet the ghosts of his past.  The disconnect came in the way that the character presented himself and the way that the game actually played.  Niko is either a liar or unaware of himself, because the actions that he takes in the game contrast directly with someone taking a new, moral approach to life.  There are moments of moral choice in the game, and they work well, but in contrast to the other thousand terrible things that he’s done, you simply cannot take Niko’s words at face value.

This problem is addressed in Red Dead Redemption by differences in narrative and gameplay.  John Marston is the game’s main character, and comes from a very troubled past of outlaw living, not unlike Clint Eastwood’s William Munny in Unforgiven.  Like Munny, Marston is trying to make a new life for himself.  Marston was betrayed by his gang and left to die, then picked up by federal agents who kidnap his family and force him to chase and kill his former friends.  This fate that resembles that of Robert Ryan’s Deke Thornton in The Wild Bunch, tortured by pressure and caught between two powerful forces preying on his past.

The game does an excellent job of detailing Marston’s intentions and reasons for doing what he does, and gives the player enough space that completely accidental misdeeds are rare.  In Grand Theft Auto IV, escaping pursuer or chasing prey through a very crowded city almost always involved collateral damage.  You might run over a little old lady, but since you have to track down that stolen car, it was considered an acceptable loss and the character did not seem to care.  The space in Red Dead Redemption minimizes this kind of incident.  When I accidentally killed a sheriff in Red Dead Redemption, it was because it was dark in the wilderness, I heard gunfire, and thought that the person I was aiming at was an escaping criminal.  It was a true accident, but involved a conscious decision rather than just being a fault of not being able to control my path of destruction through a town’s populace.  This allows the player to role-play the Marston that the story provides to them, and I found myself able to play through the entire game harming a bare minimum of innocent people, respecting the choices that my Marston told me were his choices.  I don’t see a way that a person could play their Marston as a villain without completely ignoring the provided story.

Not only can the gameplay finally complement the narrative to make the message consistently communicated, but the overall story arc also relates to these ideas.  In the pursuit of peace and freedom with your family, you must interact with several dozen characters through the course of the game in search of intelligence that will lead you to your former gangmates.  As a result, you have to do a lot of their bidding and cater to their agendas.  However, Marston gets very tired of this process, and his anger and frustration build through the course of the game.  He becomes defiant, tired of doing busy work for others when his goal is to see his family again.  Marston’s past has become the noose by which others would hang him, limiting his ability to realize his free will.  When he finally manages to break free of those commitments, the game’s tone changes.  You are finally given access to your family, to your son in particular, for whom you want a better life.  He is rightfully resentful and anxious about your return, and I found myself treating the missions very differently.  I was angry that I had to do busy work for powerful locals, but very happy to go on simpler missions with my son, hunting or driving our cattle back to the ranch.  I was also more careful, paying close attention to make sure that he didn’t come to harm.  This was the reward that I sought; Marston was finally able to live life on his own terms.  It wasn’t a Lamborghini and endless riches, but it had far more meaning than those rewards could have.

Like William Munny, Marston is unable to escape his past.  Later missions have his former overlords hunting him down for his defiance, and in a shocking twist, John Marston dies near the end of the game.  You cannot outgun his fate.  The game gives you a shot, but winning is impossible, and the game shows his family mourning his loss.  It’s a bold and fantastic choice, and gives real gravity to his sacrifice.  In a continuation of that strength, the next part shows you playing as his son, three years later, after his mother has died and he has grown up.  He has his father’s clothes and guns, but his fate is yours to decide.

These design choices, at the last moments of the main part of the game’s story, serve as thoughtful ruminations on the nature of free will and the grip of your past.  In the same vein that you were able to shape John Marston to fit his words or to contrast with his words, you can shape his son, Jack.  Did the violence by which his father met his end haunt him to the point of turning him into a villain, or did he honor his father’s request to be a better man than he was?  The adult Jack Marston does not get much dialogue to define him, so it is up to the player, with their sandbox to play in.  This is a perfect complement to the open-world gameplay that Rockstar has perfected, and makes Red Dead Redemption not only a cut above its competition, but an example of the evolving art form of gaming, where the way that you interact can be complementary to the story you’re being told, forming a complete experience.