So, I see all the love the last 1/4 or 1/5 of the game that Red Dead Redemption gets... it was dull. DULL.
 
"Hey, you know thirty hours ago when we made you do all this mundane shit like herding cattle to get you to grips with the controls? Well, you're gonna spend the next 3ish hours doing that again!"
 
No thank you, Rockstar. It was boring the first time around, I do not want to do it again. So why does this part of the game get so much love? I find it abysmal game design, to be completely honest. Is it because some people get a feeling of connection to John's wife and kid? I felt no connection as I was just so pissed off at having to do these boring jobs again. Or maybe (and this is total guesswork) they like seeing John the family man, working to support the family he's about to be seperated from? I didn't get a sense of that either. All I got a sense of was repetitive tedium.
 
The very last half hour was kind of cool, though; protecting the farm as John before getting shot up, then getting revenge with Jack. But even that made ZERO sense. If the government just planned on killing Jack anyway, why send him back to his farm at all? Should have just shot him when he'd done his job. Probably would have been a more emotional moment, in fact; he'd worked tirelessly to be reunited with his family, only to never see them again. Still could have run with the whole revenge thing with Jack, too.
 
It just shocks me that people are using this as an example of good storytelling in videogames when it's anything but. I get the impression that all those people know is videogames and have never watched a truly great movie or read a novel since school.
 
The phrase "All the subtlety of a sledgehammer" comes to mind.
 
P.S. This totally isn't a troll: If you love it, great. Fuck my opinion. Just wanted to open up some discussion on it.