10 Things Red Dead Redemption 2 Must Learn From GTA V

7. Establish Many Meaningful Support Characters

Main-man John Marston was a philosophically-minded individual, constantly making comments on the world and society around him in a manner that made him one of the most loveable protagonists there's ever been. He was helped of course by such other great characters to bounce off. Even in the early game Bonnie MacFarlane is a tough no-nonsense gal just trying to get by on her ranch, whilst Nigel West Dickens is literally a snake-oil salesman; asking that you join him across the country to sell his fake tonics to bidding customers. Whilst you're never given a choice in any of this outside of choosing to do his missions out of order, it's characters like Dickens and MacFarlane's father that allowed Marston to open up about his opinions on things ranging from the state of the economy to how women are treated in the Old West. Some of the best missions in GTA V were a riff on the 'Stranger Missions' first popularised through Red Dead and GTA IV whereby you come across a random individual in need throughout the world. In GTA V you were limited to a certain set of characters to talk to depending on who you were playing as, but if Red Dead let us play as alternating heroes on both sides of the law, approaching somebody in a problematic situation could have differing outcomes based on our character's moral alignment.