Red Dead Redemption II is coming out soon. It’s the latest game from Rockstar, not counting re-releases to current-gen platforms, since Grand Theft Auto V in 2013. And it has been 8 years since Red Dead Redemption. There is a lot of hype for the game, not only from fans and gamers, but also the business side of things. Analysts are predicting Red Dead Redemption II will sell at least 15 million copies, beating Call Of Duty in terms of sales.
It’s a big IP, which is a far cry to when Rockstar rescued it from utter development hell.
Before Red Dead Redemption, there was the troubled development of Red Dead Revolver. And before that, there was Angel Studios.
Angel Studios
Angel Studios have been around for a long time. Established in 1984 by Colombian artist Diego Angel, it started out as a graphics house. It produced CG effects for movies such as The Lawnmower Man. When the 90’s hit, the company, based in the San Diego area, pivoted into the new exciting world of video games. Angel Studios hit the ball running hard- its first title is a baseball game Major League Baseball Featuring Ken Griffey Jr. But after that they were working with both Nintendo and Microsoft.
With Nintendo, they were responsible for porting Resident Evil 2 to Nintendo 64. With Microsoft, they created Midtown Madness, a racing game that is the progenitor to the open world racing games today. The working experience with Capcom and their work on Midtown Madness were pivotal elements that lead to Red Dead Revolver and the involvement of Rockstar.
Now A Rockstar
Rockstar was still a fledgling new brand under Take Two in the late ’90s. After Grand Theft Auto was a success, Take Two acquired the publisher, the franchise under it and the team to be housed under the Rockstar label. By the era of the 128-bit generation of consoles (OG Xbox, PS2, Nintendo Gamecube), Rockstar has made a partnership with Angel Studios to work on multiple titles.
The result was two open world racers available on launch of the PS2, Midnight Club and Smuggler’s Run. Midnight Club brings the Midtown Madness gameplay and paired it with the illegal street racing and tuner culture vibe. Whereas Smuggler’s Run is an off-road objective-based racing game where it’s about.. smuggling.. items.
Angel Studios was still however an independent development team working with many other parties in the early 00’s. Other projects include working with Atari where they made Test Drive Off Road Wide Open, applying the open world/sandbox racing template to off-road racing with licensed vehicles. The other is another partnership with Capcom.
From The Heavens, To Red Dead Development Hell
With experience working on projects such as Resi 2, Capcom and Angel Studios developed a new game called Red Dead Revolver. A Western-themed shooter in an era where the generation did not have many representation in video games. The game was unveiled in 2002 featuring a very arcadey feel to it. Not surprising, since it has been said that the idea was Red Dead Revolver is a spirutal successor to Gun.Smoke, an old arcade game by Capcom.
According to People Make Games, the partnership Of Angel Stuios and Capcom started out by making a game based on SWAT teams. The project later pivoted into a Western style shooter. But codename SWAT remained, which then stands for Spaghetti Western Action Title.
While it was a Capcom game, Red Dead Revolver plays like an arcade game and has wacky, supernatural elements. Dominic Craig, designer of Red Dead Revolver spoked recently to People Make Games saying that at the time, “the game wasn’t actually very fun.”
“The shooting was weird,” he added. It was compared to Panzer Dragoon and the many average action games from Japan that do not age well today like Tenchu.
You can see that clearly in this gameplay footage here from TGS 2002, where the movements seems to be on-rails, as suggested by Craig with the Panzer Dragoon comparisons.
However, it was radio silence after that. Red Dead Revolver did not appear again at E3 2003.
By August 2003, the game was officially cancelled.
It seems the big problem was that Capcom and Angel had different visions of how the game should be.
“Capcom had one idea of what they wanted to do and Angel had another, as a result, the game floundered”, said Rockstar’s PR manager at the time, Hamish Brown, to BBC in 2004.
なつかしいですね RT @EMannLand: Akira Yasuda @akiman7 #RedDead Revolver pic.twitter.com/iKHfMPKhHr
— あきまんwatchSOLDIER76 (@akiman7) October 19, 2016
It does not help that Capcom’s prolific illustrator Akiman, famous for his many works including designs of Street Fighter II characters, was not at his best whilst working on the project.
Speaking to Archipel, he said: “To be honest, I really didn’t want to. But since I was given the freedom to work on Turn A Gundam, I felt I needed to give back, so I went to work in the United States.” Red Dead Revolver was his last project as a Capcom employee.
You can still see the remnants of Akiman’s character designs. Some of them that are left in the finished product. Some of them are designed based of the other developers of Rockstar San Diego which had, shall we say, unflattering designs.
“You can’t quite tell if it’s homage or being a little bit mean,” said Craig on the character designs.
Rockstar Acquisition
In 2002, Rockstar acquired Angel Studios, now rebranded to Rockstar San Diego. This is all thanks to their great working relationship from making Midnight Club and Smuggler’s Run.
Once the acquisition is done, the heads at Rockstar then checked out the other projects the studio was working on. Red Dead Revolver caught the eyes of Rockstar co-founder and President Sam Houser. “The one that always caught our eye was this cowboy game that looked very good,” said Houser, speaking to IGN.
“For the time it looked visually spectacular, but also speaking to the management guys there it was a complete mess. It didn’t really exist as a game.”
Capcom has since cancelled the project and want nothing involved with aside from publishing rights in Japan. So Rockstar decided to give the green light to continue the game’s development and make it work this time.
Red Dead Revolver eventually ships to stores in 2004.
Spaghetti Western Action Title
Red Dead Revolver had some significant changes when it is finally released, giving it a Rockstar touch. For one, it now takes more cues to Spaghetti Western films. And what better way of showcasing that than its very strong intro.
It is a title card sequence, showing all the main characters in motion and then a freeze frame. The composition just sells its tone. But the gel that glues it all together so well has to be the soundtrack. The opening song is licensed piece of music from 1971’s Lo Chiamavano King. The song appeared again in the 2012 Western flick, Django Unchained which added lyrics.
In fact, the whole game’s soundtrack is based of licensed songs from Spaghetti Western films, which added a lot to the game’s atmosphere.
“Much Obliged”
And this influence permeates through the game. The whole tone of the game is an homage to the Spaghetti Western films.
Red Dead Revolver is a story of betrayal and how one man is on a quest for personal vengeance. Your protagonist Red Harlow is a man of few words. In his youth, Red survived an attack that killed his father and Native American mother. He then grew up as a lone wanderer-turned bounty hunter and slowly uncover the truth of that dark event in his life.
If that sounds all too familiar, then it is. Red is basically based on the many characters Clint Eastwood played. Red himself is a man of few words. But not devoid of personality. His small lines, like thanking someone with “much obliged” is enough to make him cool but not bland.
A Decent Cover-Based Shooter
Rockstar was not the house that make pretty games back in the PS2 days and even in 2004 the graphics were a bit muddy. It helps that whole Wild West theme and grainy film effects mixed well with that quality of visuals. The UI has been refined since the Capcom build, being made simpler. Floating weapon pickups were still a thing back then, and it looks hilariously out of place today.
Red Dead Revolver also changed to become a cover-based third-person shooter. It’s not the most mechanically sound, the pioneer of third-person cover shooters at the time Kill Switch did it much better, but gunplay was serviceable. Red has access to revolvers and rifles that he can pickup on the ground as enemies drop it or buy and upgrade at the local store.
It is in this game where the Dead Eye was first introduced. Red has a special ability to slow down time and lock-on bullets to enemies, which he will unleash rapidly as the slow-down stops. It has limited use but the special meter gradually fills up over time.
This ability plays into the duel system. Yes, there is sections of the game where it’s high noon and it’s a one-on-one duel of reflex. Pull the gun quick, aim your six shots correctly and puff that smoking revolver of yours as someone brutally die in front of you.
But it’s not just Dead Eye. Every playable character has a special ability. Throughout the main campaign you get to play as different characters, each with their own elaborate title card intro and a special ability. English gunslinger Jack Swift dual-wields revolvers by default and his ability is a Dead Eye that works in real time- a swarm of lock-ons followed by a rapid fire of twelve bullets. Annie Stoakes has her rifle shots become explosive and punchier akin to a rocket launcher.
This lends well to its split-screen multiplayer option, called Showdown Mode, where you can play as various characters in the game for some deathmatch goodness. New characters can be unlocked by performing well in the single-player which you are graded by the end of each level. A remnant of its arcadey Spaghetti Western Action Title roots possibly.
The game is broken down into various levels, and you will then get access to the small hub town of Brimstone. It is here where you can roam about the small town, buying permanent upgrades and weapons before proceeding to the next mission issued by the sheriff.
Despite the whole story and gameplay taken an overhaul, there are still remnants of the original Capcom vision of supernatural Western. The Jack Swift level feels like a fever dream. One of the bounties have you kill a crazy undertaker at a bleak graveyard. And he carries a coffin. That stores a gattling gun.
There a few of these surreal characters and moments. But overall, Red Dead Revolver is a nice homage to its inspiration.
Legacy
Red walked way from the screen with his last words: “It was never about the money”.
To sink in this much effort to rescue a troubled development is not something you see frequently. Doom 2016 recovered from development hell, but that’s an already established name that needed to be saved. But a fresh IP like Red Dead Revolver? Rockstar saw the potential, fixed what they can and ready their aim for a clean break.
They also did this to L.A. Noire, a 1940’s detective game which also suffered development issues before Rockstar came knocking. The game was released in 2011 after a long development starting in 2004, but was too late to save Team Bondi which later shut down.
Red Dead Revolver spawned the Red Dead series. In 2005, an early footage of a cowboy on a horse appeared, using pre-release PS3 hardware. And by 2010, Red Dead Redemption was released. It was the clean break from the predecessor. Instead of going for more over-the-top Spaghetti Western, Redemption is a more grounded, more nuanced take on the Wild West setting. It also borrows more influence from GTA by going open world.
Red Dead Redemption also had issues during development, unfortunately. Which may explain why we won’t be getting any Midnight Club. Unfortunately, even Red Dead Redemption II is plagued with overworked staff and crunch time, which has made the games industry buzzing about the game in the wrong ways. These guys are a bit too passionate for their craft. Thankfully positive changes are coming to the workplaces.
Redemption has no clear connection to Revolver, but there was DLC for the multiplayer mode Red Dead Online where you can play as characters from Red Dead Revolver, updated to HD and featuring new lines of dialogue.
Red Dead Redemption sales near 15 million copies in 2015. 5 million were sold in three months and 8 million by the year end of its release. Red Dead Redemption II is expected to topple that.
It was never about the money, yet here we are.