#rdr2 ramblings

[mostbrilliantidiot]

I'm going for the achievement and DAMN Abigail is dedicated to removing that squirrel huh

[sadcowboytimess]

So I was curious.

I normally keep some cheats engaged for Immortal Horses in RDR2 (because I am very fond of my horses).

Kept seeing various complaints about horses dying easily, so I turned off the cheats and stole a random horse today.

I did the stupidest shit. Got shot at. Ran into wagons. Picked a fight with all the guards at Cornwall Kerosene and Tar. Caused trouble in Rhodes (after Dutch said not to: yes you CAN rain chaos down on that town if you want. You just have to be creative and stubborn).

Etc

The unnamed, stolen, Kentucky saddler is very much alive.

Do I just have stupid luck with horses?

[desired-misery]

rdr2 and all the tragedy in it makes my heart hurt more with every passing year. Idk if if is just life things or if it's related to the pandemic influencing how I look at death (especially in the media), but I guess I'm growing weary of stories that see death as an honorable release from this world (or maybe I'm just a damned atheist who doesn't believe in anything after--- that this life is all we've got and the only thing that happens when we die is that we're suddenly no longer ourselves). RDR2 is a masterpiece and always will be, but the fact that Arthur's perceived sense of peace at the end is because he believes John, Abigail, and Jack make it out, that his family (after so much of it gets destroyed) gets to have a chance that he sacrificed himself for-- and we know that doesn't end well. And Rockstar knew that in handing us Arthur's death from the start because RDR was obviously already made. They doomed Arthur's sacrifice. John was a dead man as soon as his past caught up to him, which continued the violence not only with him but with Jack-- little Jack that Arthur obviously cared for.

idk I just think there could be something different but still emotionally powerful about rdr2 if Arthur lived. Or Hosea. Either of those two career outlaws chasing redemption after RDR2's story. Living to earn redemption would be a hell of a lot harder than dying. A lifelong struggle from within, a constant battle between "I am becoming a better man in spite of who I used to be" versus "my past and the people around me have equal right to hold me accountable for my horrible deeds". From a storytelling/game standpoint, the game had to end, obviously. But I think the game did a killer job on getting into all these muddy grey areas over what it means to be a good person/a good man/a good father/a good brother/ a good friend, and death froze Arthur where he was at.

[autism-connoisseur]

john marston is stronger than me fr because if my brother got tuberculosis and i heard someone calling him "black lung" i would have immediately put so many holes in the bastard you could play harmonica with his dead body

[taolaoo]

Sometimes I think about how John felt when he turned thirty-seven and became older than Arthur. Did he think about it, or did he not think about it at all? Just woke up one day and suddenly realized he was older than his older brother. Was there some kind of dissonance in his mind? Or did he not allow himself to think about it because just the mere thought of outliving Arthur would send his brain into a spiral, revealing all those ugly wounds?

Maybe he woke up and thought, "How ridiculous," because even in the worst scenarios, he couldn't imagine that a strong man like Arthur would die without seeing what John had accomplished.

But life is what it is, he thought.

He's thirty-seven, he's gotten older, but no matter how old he gets, the image of Arthur in his head will always be older. Because that's how he remembers him.

Just his big brother, the voice of reason that even in his final moments was able to guide him on the right path.

[brujahinaskirt]

WAIT A SEC. I want to cut some credit to player drunkenness in rdr2 and how it works as a vehicle to reveal something about the main character of this story.

Usually drunkenness in games is played off for cheap laughs, and there are plenty of slapsticky drunken antics in rdr2 (LENNAY). But happy-drunk Arthur gives SO MUCH INSIGHT into his real personality, too -- even when he's being a giggling, property-damaging, cancan-dancing terror. When he's drunk, he forgets a little of his mean bastard enforcer mask, the primary role he must play in the gang, and his loving nature becomes laughably obvious.

[spoilers under the cut]

From his sudden determination to teach Jack mathematics to his declared affection for Hosea; from his worrying about Susan getting a break to his insistence that newer gang members are "one of us now"; from his innocuous little compliments tossed around thoughtlessly ("Mary-Beth! Sweetest outlaw in the West! Javier! Best-dressed outlaw in the West!") to his more genuine praise for Abigail's inherent goodness, drunk Arthur is a fuzzy but honest look at a truer Arthur, one who is not thinking about the part he must play in a criminal outfit. Strip that awareness of his station away, even if just for a while, and we wind up with an Arthur who is surprisingly fun-loving, sometimes downright silly, and who lives to fuss over and dote on the people around him.

My favorite moment, perhaps, is a tipsy interaction with Sadie in Horseshoe Overlook during Sean's welcome home party. Arthur meanders over to her, this woman who is not a gang member or a close friend at the time, but simply a grieving widow he doesn't know very well. And he and asks, loudly: "MISSUS ADLER. DO YOU NEED ANYTHING MISSUS ADLER. DO YOU WANNA DANCE WITH ME MISSUS ADLER."

And she just sounds so tickled when she says no thanks to this goofy-drunk gunslinger. And I think maybe, just maybe, watching big bad gang lieutenant Arthur slamming a couple bottles of whiskey and so transparently doting on everyone gave her some of the first laughter at the world she had in what must feel like a very long time.

In Chapter 6, Arthur can again approach Sadie while drunk, and he encourage her to smile. Sadie hisses you're drunk; no woman likes being told this, and on the surface, this seems like a proper Antagonize line. But then Arthur -- who knows he is dying -- says, blearily, to this friend he met at her lowest point of grief and who seems to be in danger of plunging even lower in rage, "I just want you to be happy."

Drunkenness is not a liquid clarifier. Often times, alcohol garbles and distorts a person's personality. But with a character like Arthur, whose heart is so poorly matched with his 20-year lot in life, drunk-writing becomes a powerful tool. It's a quick, non-transformative way to believably peel off the snarl he wears around for a while (without him knowing it), letting players access an easy, silly, soft interior that sober Arthur is much more guarded about showing the gang.

[messrmoonyy]

How have I never noticed Albert Mason submits his picture of Arthur into the art gallery in Saint Denis 😭😭

[1000emotions]

this convo shows jack asking john about john’s father, and they talk about how he died when john was young and that jack wasn’t missing much by not getting to meet him. then, john tells jack that he’s not going anywhere.

john is trying to be the father that he didnt have as a kid, to give jack the reassurances that john wanted to get. john wanted to keep this promise so badly :(

[mountainshroom]

CW; a bit of blood in the last picture (its a wolf carrying a rabbit in its mouth, nothing too gorey!)

Thinking about how pretty charles’ hair is and animal symbolism in rdr2

[gothicgunslinger]

"javier has a knife kink etc."

yes, true – he probably is a kinky bastard,

but what about the javier that takes off your clothes with shaking hands? that kisses your scars, your freckles. that holds you, chest to chest, skin to skin – tells you, as he makes love to you, that you're the best thing to happen to him in a long time. "mi vida, you're mi vida, you know that?" and, "so, so beautiful. you're so beautiful, i love you." he kisses you, showers you in them, after you've both come – both spent your energy, yet he uses the last shred of his to assure you know. that you know, how deeply he loves you.

[mostbrilliantidiot]

I think one of the absolute best things Red Dead Redemption 2 did is the game did not hand you a solid answer to the question "Is Arthur Morgan a good man?"

Even on a high honor run through the game that is a deeply muddy topic.

The player is left to judge for themselves, and I do believe most of us come up with wildly different answers.

[meeks-just-wants-to-scroll]

I’ve had the incessant need to draw trans masc Javier since a week ago.

A bit self indulgent because I really like seeing trans masc characters with chests / no top surgery. Mainly comes from me not feeling dysphoria for my chest and being frustrated by the lack of trans masc characters with chests still.

Keeping the chest or getting surgery does not make either party more or less of their desired gender. That being said, I feel like showing trans men with chests sends a stronger message of “men can be more than flat chested” as opposed to every single trans man character in media having too surgery as if that’s the only way to be trans.

and also I just like seeing cowboys relaxing on a hot day with their jugs out.

[roamingtigress]

Imagine the van der Linde gang in an IKEA.

[omgwhatchloe]

you know the party in shady belle, that happens after you save jack? i have never gone near that party, and in all my playthroughs, i never will.

my heart hurts when i see how happy they are. i wonder if they even notice the huge void that screams someone is missing. sean. i cannot stay and watch them drink and party, i always immediately take arthur to bed. because i know there is no mourning, there never is, from anyone. there is no mention of sean, there isnt even a toast. a toast, in that moment, with the laughing and the alcohol and the chaos and everything that was so sean, wouldve been perfect. it wouldve been so bittersweet because didnt he deserve something? didnt he deserve more than a sketch of his soulless body, and an isolated, never visited pit in the ground, marked by some rocks and two pieces of wood. didnt he deserve a goodbye that we couldve at least seen, a few drinks in his name?

i always take arthur straight to bed, because the silence he left was louder than he ever was.

[classic-callahan]

one thing that fucks me up about red dead is that every part of me believes that even if arthur knew how his sacrifice would ultimately end — that john (and abigail) will still die too young, that jack will become consumed by a revenge mission just like his father — he would still do it

like yes, he was sick, and yes, he knew his path was ending anyway, but he could’ve chosen to try and fight for what he had left — john was even telling him to keep pushing! he could’ve seen charles one more time, could’ve visited mary, could’ve watched more sunsets and gone fishing by the quiet lake at the veteran’s house. could’ve breathed in fresh air a few more times, made a few more drawings, taken advantage of final comforts on that “vacation” he needed and passed in peace with someone at his side, but none of it would matter more to him than the few years he could give john & his family —

it wouldn’t matter that john’s life will still end at the hands of the government, because at least he had some years of peace and got the chance to really grow into his own man, a family man. it wouldn’t matter that jack’s path will veer away from what they all dreamed for him, because at least he had some time reading books and writing stories and just growing up, not moving around all the time, not having to be scolded about the dangers just at the edge of camp.

arthur would look at all the pain and see, well, there’s uncle at family dinner with the marstons. there’s charles exploring a new life in canada. there’s sadie taking on her own identity, making her own way in this life, talking like she can have a future again. there’s john waking early to work on the ranch while abigail makes up the coffee in their new home. there’s jack getting a new storybook for his birthday. there’s their dog, rufus, as energetic as copper used to be.

idk man i just so firmly believe that arthur “face me to the west so i can remember all the fine times we had” morgan, by the end of his path, would give so much to give these small moments of peace and joy to those that could still have them and it kills me

[lucasoliko]

Sillies...... will post the full thing later :3