It’s been only two years since Red Dead Redemption 2 released, and though there’s already talk of a third installment in the franchise potentially being in the works, Rockstar Games may want to consider waiting a little longer. A Red Dead Redemption 3 could seriously hurt the franchise if it’s not done right.
Red Dead Redemption 2 released in 2018 after an eight-year wait between the sequel and its predecessor. While the original game explored John Marston’s adventures as he tracked down and killed his former Van Der Linde gang associates, the second game follows the trials of Arthur Morgan, John, and the rest of the gang before the events of the first title.
Both games have been praised for their impressive graphics and exciting gameplay, making Red Dead Redemption the most successful franchise for Rockstar next to the Grand Theft Auto games. But considering how far they’ve gone with GTA, particularly how many games have been released since the success of the first few installments, there’s precedent for Rockstar to turn Red Dead Redemption into a trilogy, if not more. However, the following reasons may be enough for them to change their minds.
Making Red Dead Redemption A Trilogy Is A Bad Idea
The ways in which Rockstar has extended the life of the GTA franchise provides reason to believe they’ll do the same with RDR, but if they constantly repackage or remaster the same titles over and over again, they will likely become boring or predictable. Even if a new game is released, it runs the risk of being poor quality (in comparison to its predecessors, that is) if Rockstar doesn’t spend an adequate amount of time on it. The company took almost a decade between the first and second Red Dead Redemption games, so to create an entirely new title for next-gen consoles would likely take an equal amount of time, if not even more.
These days, Rockstar tends to take its time when releasing games. Other franchises – like Assassin’s Creed – have compromised on quality and bug fixes in the past in order to release their games in a timely manner, and to thus financially profit off of their popularity in the moment. The Red Dead Redemption series is so highly acclaimed because of the level of detail Rockstar puts into the open world environments, and if a new title was rushed, it could compromise their quality. Even more, if Rockstar were to release a Red Dead Redemption 3 that didn’t match its predecessors in terms of functionality or scale, it would be likely seen as a huge blow to the franchise’s reputation.
Perhaps the biggest reason that Rockstar should say no to a Red Dead Redemption 3 is that there’s not much more they can do with the story. The latest game acted as a prequel to the original, so it would feel repetitive to make a new game based on events that happened before the second. Similarly, all the main characters have been killed off in the franchise – Arthur, John, Dutch, and Bill. The Van der Linde gang doesn’t exist anymore, so the game's writers would have to create an all new gang and characters. However, if all the characters are different, then a third game wouldn’t feel like it truly fit in with the first two. Even more, it may be difficult for players to warm up to new outlaws when they’ll constantly be comparing them to previous ones, especially after all the distinct characters in Red Dead Redemption 2. Creating a Red Dead Redemption 3 would be a gamble, and if not done right it could seriously harm the franchise.