For a few brief years in the late 2000s, Rockstar was at the top of the industry in terms of story-driven single player DLC. With GTA 4 and its Lost and Damned and Ballad of Gay Tony expansions, and Red Dead Redemption's Undead Nightmare, the developer was knocking it out of the park in creating add-on content that kept players coming back for years.
So what changed? Since GTA 5, Rockstar has focused its post-release content pretty much exclusively on online content, a practice that Red Dead Redemption 2 has fallen victim to in the past year. With a year since Red Dead Redemption 2's release, and the fun of online paling in comparison to the game's immersive single player mode, it's time for Rockstar to shift their priorities back to the DLC expansions that earned it so much praise in the past.
The Potential of New Austin
Completing the story of RDR2 opens up a whole host of new activities for the player to do without needing to jump into multiplayer. None among these are as promising, nor as disappointing, as the opportunity to explore New Austin, the province where much of the first Red Dead Redemption took place. While unlocking New Austin nearly doubles the size of the game's explorable map, players will quickly find that there's not much to explore.
While there are interesting sights to chance upon in Red Dead Redemption 2's version of New Austin - such as the community of Tumbleweed before it became a ghost town, and the familiar town of Armadillo, now stricken by a terrible plague of Cholera - there simply isn't much to do in New Austin. With no quests, side missions, and a sparse number of collectibles, it quickly becomes clear that New Austin's inclusion in the game is simply an attempt to expand the game's map to make room for more multiplayer content.
As it stands now, New Austin is a huge missed opportunity for additional single player content. A story-driven DLC centered in the state would be an obvious use of the sprawling locales that fall by the wayside in the main game. Giving John Marston more reasons to venture into the area, or even showing a flashback to the heyday of Dutch's Gang as they maraud about New Austin would be a great premise for a DLC centered in the region. That being said, there are possibilities for DLC that could be even more interesting than the chance to ride around New Austin once again.
Give Secondary RDR2 Characters the Spotlight
GTA 4 showed that Rockstar is capable of making whole new stories with new protagonists outside the plot of the main game with its Lost and Damned and Ballad of Gay Tony DLCs. An expansion in the same vein would be an incredible addition to Red Dead Redemption 2. Although, with Red Dead's huge cast of complex and interesting supporting characters, Rockstar has a major opportunity to pen a DLC that gives someone besides John or Arthur (or even Jack) the spotlight.
A campaign that follows Charles' adventures in between the implosion of Dutch's Gang and his reunion with John could be interesting. Similarly, the main plot of RDR 2 sees Sadie Adler's character transform from that a grieving widow into a grizzled bounty hunter, which leaves the door wide open for an opportunity to play as Sadie following her setting off on her own at the end of the game. Finally, little is known about Dutch's exploits between disbanding his gang and starting a new one in the mountains of West Elizabeth, and the chance to step into the shoes of perhaps the series' most complex character would be too good to pass up.
These are only a few of the characters a single player expansion for Red Dead Redemption 2 could focus on. Instead of only letting players play as their favorite supporting characters in multiplayer death matches or PC mods, Rockstar can give fans the ability to delve more into their personalities, their histories, and even their futures.
Undead Nightmare 2
Red Dead Redemption 2 is chock-full of eerie, macabre, and otherwise spooky side quests and easter eggs, but these only scratch the itch that fans have had since the Undead Nightmare DLC from the first Red Dead Redemption. The gory, scary, and relentlessly campy expansion saw John Marston wake up one day to discover the west overrun with zombies, with himself being the only one capable of stopping it. The expansion (which was a new game in its own right) was critically lauded for seamlessly blending the fun of Red Dead Redemption with survival horror elements.
It's no secret that fans love Undead Nightmare, and one would be hard-pressed to find a single person who wouldn't want to see a sequel (or prequel, in this case) make its appearance in the world of Red Dead 2. Gamer's have already seen John Marston face off against the undead menace, so maybe the expansion could center on Arthur rising from the grave, zombified and tuberculosis-free, and setting himself on finding the gang members who betrayed him and getting revenge on them. It would be cathartic, and a fresh change of pace to see an alternate reality where a zombie Arthur is the one to finally get his hands on Bill, Javier, Dutch, and Micah, and the story of revenge practically writes itself.
Unfortunately, Rockstar has made it clear it has no intention of adding anything Undead Nightmare-related to RDR 2, even in online mode. That being said, the demand for a follow up to the classic DLC cannot be denied. Undoubtedly, it would be in Rockstar's best interest to reconsider and give fans the post-apocalyptic western romp they so crave.
Red Dead Redemption 2Â is out now for PC, Stadia, PS4, and Xbox One.
Image Credit:Â mombo2811
