Red Dead Redemption

You do gain rank and fame as you progress through certain hunting challenges. Same is true for sharpshooting, treasure hunting, and other progressive challenges.

In game, thus far, they're good for cash, and once or twice for missions. But I'm not very far yet, haven't been able to play much the past few days.

Mostly you sell them for money. But they are also used for some mission stuff and challenges.

aren't they just for selling?

I haven't yet gotten into the joy of hunting in this game yet. Is it just more badass with a knife?

it's badass because you skin animals and then sell their parts for cash. and sometimes when you get stuck fighting off wolves for an hour, that's pretty badass too.

so, when do i get to take out some bears?

i didn't even realise there were so many rank challenges in the journal section until today. i haven't done a mission all day, just been rambling around getting my ranks up. but now i can't find any boars. i need boar tusks.

I NEED to get this fucking game.

I'm getting a PS3 for my b-day and this needs to come with it.

You won't get to bears until you're out of Mexico.

Also, from you're original post

i went and bought GTA's liberty city stories today. i actually almost bought an xbox solely so i could play the Lost & Damned episode, luckily i didn't. while i was there i was talking to the clerk for about half hour about this game. came home juiced up and frothed at the mouth watching videos.

What's funny is, you can see where their experimenting with The Lost & The Damned really helped shape RDR. Riding with your gang was the most fun thing in that game and it was certainly the prototype for riding with a posse. Plus, all the things to make life less irritating, like calling for a new bike.

TL&TD was in many ways, better than GTA4 and is totally worth playing if you haven't.

TONS of boar north of macfarlane's ranch where you start the game. see the giant boar on the map brother? that's not a sculpted tourist attraction, no world's biggest ball of twine.

you're exactly right. TL&TD was my favourite GTA by far. and you can definitely tell that all the GTAs where simply a buld up to RDR. i think i even read somewhere that they [GTA guys] said they only made GTA so they could eventually mak RDR.

speaking of biker games, and i was telling Berto about this the other day, there's a new game in the works. a biker game. it's set in 1969, you start out as a prospect of a gang (obviously it's the hell's angels, but they're called someting else). you've came back from vietnam and you can't fit in with society anymore, so you join the gang and work your way up to president. sounds awesome.

ahhh, so that's what the boar looks like. we don't have them downunder. like you said, we just have a bunch of giant things. pretty cool though. shiiiiiiit!

thank, brother.

oh, and thanks for the tall trees advice, Kirk. you must be killing it. have you finished it yet?

I'm at like 70% complete. Which means I'm probably about 80% complete in the story. Depending on my beer activities this weekend, I might complete the story.

just. one. more. fucking. cougar.

ive gone to all their regular haunts and can't find another to kill with my knife

that's weird. normally they come chasing you if you're even remotely near their space.

and as for the boars, well, i found them, but i'd hardly call it an abundance. i've been riding around for about 40 minutes and i've only found 2. i need 5. i think it's the first time i've been up that section of the world, too. it's nice.

Boar tend to come out at night. Also, I had better luck finding them just NW of Thieve's Landing.

lovely. thanks, Kirk.

and, is it just me, or did Nate just post here asking what the in-game use for hunting was ad now it's gone? maybe i'm going mad, but i was typing up a reply about the ranks and selling and whatnot and then all of a sudden the age directed, without me touching anything but the keyboard, away to another page. weird. maybe he deleted it or something?

Sounds like all you do on this game is hunt. Might as well get wasted and play Buck Hunter at the bar instead. At least then you might get laid. OOOoooooohhhhhh.

hahahaa, nice one.

and just so you all know, the nate post was from page one. yep, i'm a dickhead.

it's not all you do, but it is so much fun that i find myself doing it too much. hunting cougars with your melee knife is freakin' hard. i keep dying.

Have you done any up close kills?

Like get right in front of a dude and waste him with your shotgun? There are some pretty brutal custom animations it goes into. I keep running into more and more stuff like this just by screwing around.

Good example in this video at 0:50

Actually, Nate. There is an Xbox Achievement that you can unlock called "Manifest Destiny". You earn it by killing all of the buffalo.

oh man. PETA is gonna shit themselves when they find out.

Rockstar has only ever sold more copies of their games due to negative publicity. PETA would be helping them more than hurting.

definitely, but that's still a lot of soiled pantsuits that are gonna have to be laundered.

ahahahaa. peta ladies.
either they're naked or they're buying their clothes at the lady republican shop.

Anyone get the "Dastardly" Achievement? You get it when you hogtie a woman and lay her on some train tracks and watch a train run her over.

you lie!

*runs to tie up women and put them on train tracks*

You'll see then.

i didn't watch that whole video, but yes, i have done this, Kirk.

i discovered it by doing one of those up-close type missions. must've been going through a house or something. anyway, i was using a shotgun and got close to one of the guys, face-to-face, and pulled the trigger and it oomed into one of those cool shots of me putting thegun under his chin and 'splodin' his head off.

another cool one i noticed was i shot someone in dead eye relatively close in the face and they did a turn and spin with a massive exit wound in the back of their head all tyler durden-esque.

pretty cool.

Finished the story line tonight... WOW. Very awesome ending. They do some things that are really effective.

Whatever you do, don't read any spoilers for this game, so you don't accidentally ruin it.

that's why i like going into games, books, and movies as blind as possible. for alan wake, i didnt read a single article, review, or forum post 6 months prior to the release window - didn't watch any gameplay footage either, just the AWESOME prequel episodes Remedy shot.

same for red dead.

finally got round to focusing more on playing through missions than exploring the world and clearing out gang hideouts. just finished red dead ten minutes ago.

wow.

(everyone check in when you've finished, i'd like to discuss this without spoiling things)

Beat it last night. Reactions (not necessarily in this order): cried, jaw dropped, caught my breath, cheered. What an amazing, fulfilling experience.

Rockstar has wrought something with so much beauty, wonder, and ardor that it transcends video games, even cinema, into art.

I just hung out in the Tanner's Reach cabin with the door open, and when a cougar would dare come near, slicey-dicey.

(Also an effective strategy when in Bearclaw Camp.)

I'll talk spoilers with you dudes, just because I'm curious to see if you're a cold ass motherfucker, like me.

SPOILERS BELOW FOOLS!

So... Years later, when you're Jack and get to hunt down Ross, who else killed everyone involved? I wasted the agency guy because he talked about how great Ross was. Then knifed his wife and blew his brother's head off with my sawed off.

I really loved how they force you to spend so much time just doing mundane shit with your family. It was really effective at making you feel like shit when you realized what was going to happen to John.

In terms of what they were able to pull off, I can't recall any other game that was so successful at just crushing your heart. Especially since you got to see the relationship with Jack change so much.

Such a great game. It's a shame you can only experience that once.

spoilers:

ideally, it'll start a new trend in gaming where characters become developed, rounded out, and more than just pawns skittering around waving guns. i did not kill his wife, simply because she was so down on the agency and her husband's lifestyle.

one thing i was really, truly hoping for from the time he was introduced was backstory on landon ricketts. i'm sure im not the only one whose mind it crossed that he may've been john's father - he was an orphan, after all. i saw it going down in that landon left his family to be a gunslinger, and john was left to himself. he was so warm to john, teaching him in the same way you taught your son later. was sad that all he ultimately got was a blurb in the paper announcing his death.

what a great game. so well realized and crafted. the ending killed me. we lucked out in may between RDR and Alan Wake.

BE SPOILIN' LIKE BAD CABBAGE:

Through what little time he had with his father, Jack Marston learned focus and restraint. And thus, he left no trail of dead in his wake--he kept his eye on his target, and executed his prey with extreme prejudice.

As for Landon Ricketts, I hadn't thought of the estranged father angle. Good theory. Although, Ricketts did go to great lengths to draw a sharp contrast between his famed gunslinging past and the peasant-killing outlaw ways of John Marston. Still, he was rather paternal. Perhaps future DLC will shed some light on the subject.

See, I played this differently than any Rockstar game I'd played before. In the end, I'd totaled one $20 bounty for accidental horse theft. That was it for crime - I wanted to see how the game would hold up played cleanly. Landon did have some ethical statements to make to me, but I don't feel like he ever treated me like an outlaw; an effect of my squeeky clean playthrough? Maybe. Very cool, if so.

Out of curiosity, herding cattle with uncle, did anyone choose to go after the outlaws instead of staying with the herd? I'm curious what the result would be.

Also, what's with the medal system in the completed missions list? i've got gold (or bronze?) and silver. No idea which is most desirable.

I have a choice between getting this and oblivion. I really like the open world play in oblivion with the non-linear story and choice driven gameplay. And I like looting. Which should I get?

Out of curiosity, herding cattle with uncle, did anyone choose to go after the outlaws instead of staying with the herd? I'm curious what the result would be.

I wasted the outlaws. When you do, the train comes to a stop and the conductor thanks you.

I have a choice between getting this and oblivion. I really like the open world play in oblivion with the non-linear story and choice driven gameplay. And I like looting. Which should I get?

That is a strange choice to have to make. Oblivion is like a $10 game these days. For me, I would do RDR. I really disliked Oblivion, because it was way too open, IMO. They really didn't drive you into any narrative at all and games like that don't keep my interest anymore.

Up to that point, the only bounty I ever got was the mission-required one for Seth. Still, Landon seemed to make it a point to harp on Marston's outlaw past (pre-game) and the fact that he shot those three "peasants" (bandits) when he first got to Chuparosa. Got on my damned nerves.

ok, im glad i let them go then. screw the conductor, he ran over one of my cows!

^^ though honestly, if there were one thing i'd change about the single player experience, it would be adding more missions like this one where the outcome isn't so straightforward. throughout the game most of the reward/penalty falls on honor and bounty; i really dug a mission that threw a curveball and a quick decision at me unexpectedly. more of that for red dead resurrection please.

Aww, shit. Before the finale [SPOILER], I was totally expecting the sequel to be called RED DEAD REVENGE and to focus on Jack's hunt for the G-Men. But so much for that, eh? I like "RESURRECTION," though, as long as it isn't literal and doesn't involve any damned zombies.[/SPOILER]

I'm with you on the "straightforward" bit--one of the few things I liked better about the GTA series is that it's fairly hard to fail a mission. Generally, failure is only achieved in cases when you are killed or that which you are a steward of is destroyed. Otherwise, you are free to complete as you see fit.

all of the missions were so simple and straightforward - kill all of x, find this at the bottom of the cave, etc... the cattle/train/outlaw bit was great, because it threw a surprise at you mid-mission.

more of that please.

so, about that dastardly achievement for tying a girl to the train tracks...

i wish i had a video capture card for my xbox.

oh, fuck!

that is dastadly!

i have tried it over and over. at least ten times, i'd say. and each time i do, te person either disappears, the train stops at a nearby station and never continues, or it hits the person, but thn they disappear and nothing gore-ish happens. i'm wondering if i hve a different, tame version of the game in australia that won't allow me to hog tie people to train tracks. if so, i am extremely disappointed.

you still playing it, Berto?

i had a break for a bit, but i'm getting back into it again. i've finished the story line, so now i'm just doing heaps of the journal stuff and all that. hasn't got old yet.

naw, im done with red dead for now. just played through uncharted one and two, which are ps3 exclusive, and reaaaallly fun. you'd like em matt.

i've decided to *cringe* have another go at mass effect. found a new copy of the platinum edition with the bonus dlc and extra content disc on amazon for 12.99 shipped. i really couldn't get into it the first two times i started playing, but i'm at a place where i keep hearing how great the story is, and how much better the second game in the series is than the first. hopefully it'll work out this time.

also, gonna pick up a copy of deadly premonition sooooon. it's so bad it's brilliant. plus it has so many twin peaks references... makes my happy bone happy.

oh yeah, i loved both the uncharted games. the second one was fucking great. some of the storyline scenes were so damn funny and lame. what a character!

Mass Effect is brilliant. My suggestion would be to just play it, and nothing else until you complete it. Also, don't think too hard about the decisions you make while playing. Go with your gut. Then when you import your save into ME2, you'll have a really interesting story to continue.

Once, you've played, it's great to go on YouTube and see how your big decisions could have played out differently.

As much as I love ME, ME2 is leaps and bounds better. You can realistically dive right into ME2 as they do a good job getting you up to speed on what happened, but you'll have a much better attachment to the characters if you've played ME.