Red Dead Online is a game that means a lot to me. When the IRL world first went into COVID lockdown, RDO was my place of refuge. I started livestreaming the game, and soon a small community sprung up around my digital adventures. I ended up spending almost 1,000 hours soaking up its Wild West atmosphere in 2020.
So it’s been frustrating, to say the least, that Rockstar doesn’t seem like they want to support this game. And I’m not alone in this frustration; the RDO community — or what’s left of it — is having a funeral in the game’s honor today.
I’m writing this on July 13, 2022, which marks the one-year anniversary since the game had a legitimate update.
And yeah, there are far more important things happening in the world than Rockstar’s decision to abandon this game, but this one really gets me fired up. I mean, Rockstar clearly has the funds and the talent to keep this thing thriving, and the world continues to be a compelling one. With an open world this good, and a bankroll the size of Rockstar’s, they have to want this game to fail to see it in the state it’s in.
And sure, it seemed reasonable at one point to think that Rockstar was just waiting for the time to be ripe to drop a big PS5 and Xbox Series X|S update, but the rumor is that a current-gen update got cancelled. This is a rumor, mind you, but it comes from a leaker who’s been right about these things in the past, and it does seem to line up with them stating that they’re throwing most of their development weight behind Grand Theft Auto VI now. So who knows?
Anyway, considering I just reinstalled Red Dead Redemption 2 the other day, I decided to check out this funeral for myself. I donned a formal-ish set of black duds, then headed to the cemetery to pay my respects. I stopped in Valentine, and it turns out I was the only one there. I decided to mosey on over to Blackwater to see if anyone had gathered in that neck of the woods, and it turns out I was alone there as well.
I guess Red Dead Online is so dead that people can’t even be bothered to attend its (unofficial) funeral (though the #RedDeadFuneral hashtag on Twitter seems to be getting a bit of use today). And really, this breaks my heart.
