Red Dead Redemption - Development

Development

Red Dead Redemption was developed as a spiritual successor to Red Dead Revolver. A trailer of the project was sent to a select number of people at a Sony conference in 2005, promoting the release of the PlayStation 3 system. The trailer was a technology demonstration of the Rockstar Advanced Game Engine (RAGE) and was set in the Old West. It was referred to simply as Old West Project and a sequel to Red Dead Revolver. The trailer circulated throughout the Internet.

Production on Red Dead Redemption did not begin until early 2008 after work had finished on Manhunt 2 and Bully: Scholarship Edition. During development it was known internally as RDR2 and was aimed for release on the PlayStation 2 and Xbox. On February 3, 2009, Rockstar Games officially announced the game. In the April 2009 edition of Game Informer, Red Dead Redemption was listed as being for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and the PC. On June 10, 2009, a correction was made by a representative for Rockstar Games, who stated the game would not be coming to the PC. In a comment on their website the representative said "As of now, there are no current plans to bring Red Dead Redemption to the PC platform. If that should change, we will let you know."

Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser stated that Red Dead Redemption was "a nightmare" to create and that development of the game was a "massive headache" from a technical perspective. Rockstar themselves called Red Dead Redemption "more ambitious" than Grand Theft Auto IV, and claimed that Red Dead Redemption would surpass GTA IV to become "the ultimate open world game". Rockstar UK boss Neil Stephen told Market for Home Computing and Video Games (MCV) that "This title is incredibly beautiful and on an unprecedented scale," and that Rockstar has "very high expectations" for the game. Like previous games by Rockstar, including Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis, Grand Theft Auto IV and Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City, Red Dead Redemption was made using Rockstar's Rockstar Advanced Game Engine (RAGE) coupled with the Euphoria engine.

On November 25, 2009, Rockstar confirmed the game would be released in April of the following year. A new trailer entitled "My Name is John Marston" was released a week later on Tuesday, December 1. It confirmed the game's release date as April 27, 2010. On March 4, 2010, Rockstar pushed the game back to May citing the "optimal time frame" for release. Rockstar said that its decision to delay Red Dead Redemption to May was to allow its developers to "polish and fine-tune" the game before its eventual outing. Overall, Red Dead Redemption took over 800 people and nearly six years to complete, with a total cost estimated at approximately $80m-$100 million, making it one of the most expensive games ever developed.

Red Dead Redemption was rated M by the Entertainment Software Rating Board in Canada and the United States, 18 by the Pan European Game Information and British Board of Film Classification in Europe, MA15+ by the Australian Classification Board in Australia. Z by the Computer Entertainment Rating Organization in Japan, and R16 by the Office of Film and Literature Classification in New Zealand.