Highlights
- Red Dead Redemption 2 references real-world figures like Nikola Tesla in its side content, with Marko Dragic being a clear homage to the famous inventor.
- Marko Dragic's lab in the game strongly resembles Tesla's Wardenclyffe Tower, showcasing their similarities in their experiments with electricity.
- The detailed references to Tesla in the mission make it a memorable homage to one of the brightest minds of the time period in which the game is set.
Red Dead Redemption 2 prides itself on telling stories focused on fictional characters, but the title clearly pulls inspiration from real-world figures in a lot of its in-game portrayals. This is most obvious in the huge amount of side content that the game boasts, with many Stranger figures sharing a lot of on-the-nose similarities with some of the most famous faces from the time period in which the release is set.
One of the most memorable Stranger characters in Red Dead Redemption 2 is Marko Dragic, who is an eccentric inventor with lofty ambitions and an overbearing personality. The featured locations, motives, and inventions of Marko Dragic are nearly identical to the real-world Nikola Tesla's, with RDR 2 clearly making reference to the famous Serbian-American inventor.
Red Dead Redemption 2: Marko Dragic and Nikola Tesla
Players are first introduced to Marko Dragic in Red Dead Redemption 2's Stranger side-mission A Bright Bouncing Boy. In this first encounter, the player helps Dragic demonstrate a remote-controlled toy boat, with this kind of technology being revolutionary for RDR2's 1899 setting. With Dragic's intelligence being well-established, he invites the player back to his laboratory for the second encounter, where the references to Nikola Tesla become abundantly clear.
Dragic's lab is an imposing building buried in the wilderness of Red Dead Redemption 2, outfitted with an array of electrical conductors and lightning rods that speak to the character's similarities with Tesla. The lab is heavily based off of the real-life Wardenclyffe Tower where Tesla conducted many experiments, essentially confirming the reference between Dragic and the inventor. Inside, Arthur Morgan helps Dragic with a range of electrical tests, eventually bringing life to a robot that can then be found around the map of RDR2 following the quest's completion.
Marko Dragic's Stranger mission in RDR2 is one of the most character-driven, allowing fans to see the full scope of how similar Dragic is to Tesla. Of course, Nikola Tesla is most famous for his defining work in the field of electricity, being considered the father of modern electrical usage across the globe. This is directly paralleled by Dragic's existence as an inventor, professor, and electrical tinkerer.
The game likely made reference to Tesla due to the figure's importance in Red Dead Redemption 2's time period. Tesla would have been around 33 years old in 1899, in the midst of his groundbreaking work, and around the same age as Dragic during this period. While it is not explicitly stated, it is also likely that Dragic shares the same Serbian heritage as Tesla, with Dragic being a Slavic name that has deep roots within Serbia.
If this was not enough, Marko Dragic even shares the same likeness as Tesla, with both men featuring the same cropped black hair and facial hair, although Dragic has a more prominent beard compared to the mustached Tesla. Strangely, the Marko Dragic quest ends with the figure being found dead, despite Tesla living into the 1940s and passing at the age of 86.
Despite this, the outlandish experiments and mystery surrounding Dragic is a perfect homage to Tesla, with the mission being so memorable thanks to the detailed references to the real-world figure. With Tesla being one of the brightest minds around the time of Red Dead Redemption 2, it is no wonder that Rockstar Games chose to reference the inventor so heavily in the game's side content.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is available on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.