Certified Cowboy Classic ‪™‬ and probably one of the few serious reviews you’ll find on my account. In my eyes, this is what a masterpiece looks like. The general plot is not even that outstanding on paper, it’s nothing that we haven’t seen before in some way or form — but the characters truly sell it. And it’s not just Arthur, John and Dutch, it’s the whole gang and cast that make this game feel alive. There’s no heroes and villains, these characters feel like real people, people with dreams and flaws like you’d encounter on your trip to Aldi a few streets away (with one exception, one of ‘em can go and rot in the 9th circle of hell).

But it’s not just the characters that shine in this game, the world does as well. It’s not centered around you as a player, like it’s the case with many other story-driven titles. It feels entirely independent, and the details are insane. Most are so well-crafted that they’re not even noticeable right away, but once you realize, they’ll make you smile. One of the many examples that I could give is that they gave NPCs their own daily routines. You can follow a sheep farmer around at dawn as he goes to work, or see him stumbling out of the saloon late at night. The times even differ depending on the day of the week. Just like horse ball’s shrinking in the cold, it’s a trivial detail — but it shows just how much Rockstar cared about creating this virtual world ( … if only they cared as much about their online experiences, but that’s a different story).

The game is also packed full of action, but it offers a lot of quite moments, too. Moments I appreciated a lot and which helped me immerse myself even more in the story. The cinematic scenes were straight out of a movie, lightning and camera work could easily compete with some blockbuster flicks.

I could go on and on talking about this, but I’ll just end it here with the fact that Arthur has become one of my favorite protagonists of all time in any kind of media, and the game is currently my all time favorite as well. And I doubt that will change any time soon, if at all, because the bar is set sky-high with this one.

Most inconsistent, and out-of-character bullshit I’ve ever seen. I’m not pointing fingers, but someone at Naughty Dog clearly wanted to push their own narrative like some off—brand Tarantino, no matter the cost of quality the game would suffer.

And no, I’m not just mad at that one particular scene, I’m mad at how it has been handled. It felt like a fabricated excuse in order to drive a plot that, once again, turned out to be quite the opposite of this “new, exciting” twist on a revenge tale. In the end, it was a mere contradiction in itself, and that’s it.

Story aside, the game itself is amazing — so many tiny details everywhere. Music from Gustavo Santaollala’s always a 12/10. The gameplay feels smooth and is a lot of fun, it’s the only reason why I’m going to go back to play this again at some point.

This game really could’ve been a gift, if only it didn’t have this ugly ass wrapping of a story.