With Red Dead Redemption having had several clear references to the John Ford classic, there's no denying that The Searchers ' influences on the Western film genre have worked their way into Rockstar's work, and it will be interesting to see if Red Dead Redemption 2 continues on what Ford and John Wayne delivered with their seminal 1956 film.

Calling Red Dead Redemption Grand Theft Equine is a dumb joke, even by my standards, but the GTA influence is as visible as the scars on John's face. The game is played in a large open world map that spans part of Mexico and part of the western American frontier, divided into three regions that are unlocked as the story progresses. John's actions can influence his fame and honor which have an impact on how townspeople react to him. Helping innocent people fight off bandits may improve his reputation but gunning down those same innocent townsfolk will have the opposite effect. Like GTA titles there is a wanted system, where if John decides to commit crimes he can attract the attention of the law and depending on how far he wants to take it this may escalate into military involvement. John can surrender to the law men, kill them all or simply high tail it out of there until the heat dies down. The problem with the last two options is the law might give up on John but that just means they've decided to send a bounty hunter after him so they don't have to deal with him themselves.

The Red Dead franchise succeeds because it's playing into the most American fantasies of what the Wild West was, while keeping it grounded. It was a time were America was still getting its footing as a Bennett new skin nation. Things were being discovered by a people who had largely still never seen most of what the land had to offer, thus appropriately titled, the Wild West. It seemed like a hellish dreamscape where those from the east coast talked of savages and wild beast, men who idealized the same sort of lawlessness discussed among certain circles. Yet, it was none of these things, for a people having just arrived to a nation, it was much tamer than one might imagine. Instead, it was a place not overly populated and begging for people to settle its lands (I hope we see Natives in this game). The west was a place of opportunity and discovery, somewhere one could make their mark in a relatively easy way (for the time).

Red Dead Redemption 2 will release for PS4 and Xbox One on October 26th, 2018. If you have yet to pick up a copy of the game, you can do that right now over on Amazon before it releases later this month.

As a subgenre of Westerns that mostly came to prominence in the 1960s and named for being produced and directed by Italian filmmakers, Sergio Leone's trilogy starring Clint Eastwood became the standard in bringing flair to the Western genre that was marked by a heightened sense of cinematic technique and style.

What Rockstar has built with Red Dead Redemption 2 isn't just a vast world of splendor and beauty within which they have place random mission markers and enemy bases to go clear. Instead, this is a place that they're legitimately wanting you to live in. Can it be tedious at times? Sure. But more often than not, I think it gives me a stronger sense of intimacy with both Arthur and this setting of the Wild West, and that's something I haven't felt in an open-world title in quite awhile.

By forcing you to slow down and complete duties that seem lackluster, you slowly start to feel more present in this world and grow closer to your own version of Arthur. If Red Dead Redemption 2 was just all about riding around the West and shooting up saloons with your revolver, you'd likely feel disconnected from your avatar. The game then just becomes a power trip and the character that you end up playing is just an amplified version of your own wants and desires. Doing simple chores though such as chopping wood, skinning animals and dragging them back to my horse, and donating to the gang's larger pool of money has made me feel more of a bond with Arthur than any other character I've played as in recent memory. My bond with the character thus far has been established in these small moments, not the large ones.

In the buildup to Red Dead Redemption 2 's release later this month, those looking for some inspiration to satisfy their craving for Western-themed experiences won't need to look further than our picks for the Western films you should watch before playing Rockstar's own Western epic, given the numerous cinematic references that the studio has drawn from in their previous titles.

Now, while I enjoy that Red Dead Redemption 2 has built in so many things that force you to slow down, I think it's important to note that this probably isn't something I would want to see from every video game in existence. Trust me, I enjoy how streamlined most other games are now as much as the next guy. But in Red Dead Redemption 2 , I think I've started to see early on in my playthrough the larger purpose that Rockstar has with all of these added elements to the game.