Red Dead Redemption 2’s Soundscape Made Me Sit At The Campfire And Just Listen

Rockstar’s cowboy sequel has some of the best audio in video games.

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Loading Red Dead Redemption 2 up, I find myself in a dusty town in The South. Before doing anything, I decide to close my eyes in order to hear my situation better, and the particularities of my surroundings pipe through.

There’s a banjo picking out a lilting tune. Dogs barking. Horses neighing a little distance off. Wagons roll over a crumbly road, bridles tinkling as they pass. All these details are described through sound, providing distance and depth, helping to bring all of it alive, to make it seem real. The banjo starts to speed up, rolling through the strings, gaining velocity.

I move Arthur Morgan through the town. There’s the crunch of gravel underfoot and the mulch of grass. Little birds whistling, crows cawing. I listen intensely, using a pair of decent headphones, and a world opens up, and the buzz of a mosquito tells me this region is hotter and more humid than the one from which I recently removed.

I find a stranger who’s been hollering. His name is Jeremiah Compson, an old man sleeping rough on a bench, and he tells me to help him find his old possessions in his repossessed house, and I take pity on him. I ride thunderously, hooves thumping the ground, to the place marked on my map, his derelict house…

Recently, I played Alien: Isolation on an iPad and I used a pair of wired headphones to immerse myself, but it was the game itself that heightened my audio perception. It’s very different to Rockstar’s cowboy simulator, being a first-person survival horror where you’re confined to the claustrophobic corridors of the space station Sevastopol. But like Red Dead, it brings its environments to life through outstanding sound design. Sevastopol is alive with the sounds specific to it, but Creative Assembly cranks up the tension with subtle changes to the soundscape – crackles, the occasional thrum of heartbeats, static, the soft beeping of gadgets that hint at the menace of what might be around the corner. Alien: Isolation was a game that helped me to hear what was possible in a video game.

Coming from that into the sunlit landscapes of Red Dead 2 it became clear how sound gives the visuals such an additional boost. For instance, unloading jugs of moonshine off a wagon, the jugs themselves look quite janky compared to the graphics for trees or wagons, but the specific clanking of porcelain – weighty yet fragile, with that hollow clink – persuaded me those were ‘real’ jugs I was hauling. This close attention to sounds isn’t always present – just consider another big-budget, triple-A open world. Horizon Zero Dawn was filled with stunning forests, majestic mountains, and intelligent machines, but I never felt rooted in its world in the same way as I do in Red Dead Redemption 2.

I enter the abandoned house of Jeremiah Compson. Picking up the photos and letters scattered about the place, I learn of this man’s life through his possessions, the circumstances that led to his destitution, as voiceovers pick up the story in this epistolary form. And I find Red Dead’s voice acting ranks up there not just with games, but with the likes of Pixar movies.

From the main players to the background cast, there’s an abundance of top drawer acting work, and it’s head-spinning to consider how much Rockstar must’ve spent on talent alone in the production of this game. In this particular side mission, I can pick out a lot of emotion, in the way that the voices blithely announce the facts: how Jeremiah loses his job, his place in the world, and how his family shuns him for no discernible reason.

Looking around, I’ve found Jeremiah’s old watch and his antique gun after a quick shootout as some bandits rushed me (no biggie), but his ledger I couldn’t locate. But wait, there’s a door in the floor leading to the cellar, something pertinent must be there… guess I’ll head down.

Playing Red Dead Redemption 2 I’ve come to fully appreciate the sounds that are on offer. Frequently, after a long day of ridin’, shootin’, and murderin’, I would wander around the camp, listening to people’s conversations, and eventually settle by the campfire. As the fire crackled I’d hear Lenny telling his astonishing stories about his family, or Uncle playing the banjo, or, with great relish, Javier crooning those sweetly mournful Spanish songs. It’s just a remarkably rich level of immersion, almost like being there, especially in first-person view.

I descend into Compson’s old house’s cellar and I find a scene from a horror movie. Chains, shackles. Barred windows. I find Compson’s ledger. It’s a list of names. The old man reads them out, in the voiceover, along with details such as their ages and their family relations. It’s a ledger of slaves. This is where he kept some of them. My pity for this old timer evaporates. The way he reads those names is horrifying. I ride back to him and throw his things in the fire and ol’ Jeremiah breaks down and cries.

All this from a side mission. It’s haunting and memorable and the voices played a significant part in the impact of it all. Red Dead Redemption 2 is a masterpiece and its sound mix and design are a major aspect of that. If resources can extend to it, let’s hope game devs hire the sound designers, mixers, and talent that can elevate a game to another level.

Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/red-dead-redemption-2-soundscape-campfire-listen/