Quick Look: Red Dead Redemption

I get the sense that the developers at Rockstar might have managed to capture more of the feel of the frontier West in their new Red Dead Redemption than they set out to in this endeavor. In the first couple of hours in this new world crafted by the people who made Grand Theft Auto IV, I managed to get lost, die by dropping from cliffs, navigate convoluted menus just so that I could get the time and be thrown off my horse repeatedly while trying to herd some cattle for quite a short distance.

I also died one time because I mistook a couple of lawmen for evil doers and got into a firefight while wondering why my overall fame level was dropping while I was cleansing the city of criminals.

Red Dead Redemption can be confusing when it comes to how to progress in the world. Also, throwing in a horse race in the first hour does nothing to make the game more appealing to those who have experienced Mafia's tough race section, which seemed to be taken as a blueprint for a host of other open world games.

But the first time the player reaches an elevated bluff and sees the sun going down on the cactus fields that stretch as far as the eye can see, the title from Rockstar becomes less of a game and more of an actual Western experience.

The same can happen on the first firefight, when bad guys crumple to the ground only to rise again and run for cover leaving behind plumes of white smoke from their guns to mark their location. Red Dead Redemption seems too big and open at first, with the long ridding times in the open plains more intimidating than the streets of Liberty City. But after the first posse runs through town shooting up the place and dragging someone behind their horses, gamers will know that this place has soul and that there's no pressure to figure everything out on the first try.