anyone else hates hunting animals in this game?

[Singularity's Marauder]

i know plenty of people on this forum are gonna be like "ha ha soyboy, eat meat, release the grind", but i honestly don't really enjoy it. Not only because of the fact that we are introduced to this theme of how the Wild West is dying, and along it the ecosystem is collapsing and there are less and less wild animals, and when we kill one, we are pretty much probably destroying the last few survivors of their species. Thus leading to complete annihilation of everything for a hundred years until preservation of the environment finally becomes a subject worth considering.

BUT ALSO, gameplay-wise, it is just kinda boring. Animals don't often fight back, when they do it is exciting, but usually they don't. Sure, they run away, but they have a very small area in which they can run, so if you just keep following them, they will eventually just get stuck, turn around and then you will be able to shoot them in the head with dead eye. And dead eye in hunting, that kinda ruined it for me. Initially, I thought using dead eye would ruin the quality of the pelt and meat, but then I realized that as long as you pressed the dead eye shot on a specific highlighted body part, then the game wouldn't penalize you for using it. Which made it so that hunting became relatively easy. You just find a bunny-rabbit or an elk, shoot it and get some money. And this brings me to another aspect of hunting...

Money. When I was hunting in the early game, I was doing so for money. Money was ridiculously sparse and I couldn't afford stuff like clothing or even ammo. Though technically there is very little you can buy in Red Dead. But then the game does a 180 and dumps like a thousand dollars onto your account, and with each story mission you get more and more ridiculously wealthy, with money being a concept that is no longer physically present in your playthrough. So, hunting at that point becomes either hunting for food, which fine, this is probably cool. And hunting for stupid animal cosmetic items, which look like ♥♥♥♥. The original Arthur design is really good, and the clothing you can honestly put on him looks really bad. When playing at first I would dress Arthur in a funny red and black suit-like outfit with a wacky German hat, but then when I kept hearing people calling Arthur names for being a rural American, I realized the game wanted me to be a very specific kind of person. I mean, people called me in the game "the missing link", "cowpoke", "yankee", and here I was wearing a suit and a german hat, whilst having a giant dwarf beard like I was some sort of medieval Russian royalty or a specific kind of a practicing muslim. And I would imagine that this whiplash would also be present if I was wearing stupid animal stuff. People would call me "the missing link" or a "cowpoke", even though I would be more remniscent of some sort of crazy mountain dude. The original Arthur Morgan with maybe some light variations that are as close to the original style as possible is what you should be playing with, otherwise you are going to feel very stupid.

So, why hunt? For a camp that is going to end with the story? For dialogue options? For money in the camp that doesn't really matter as long as its above nothing... For cosmetic items that don't fit the story at all and just ruin your immersion and cutscenes? For pleasure? It's just following a line in the ground until you see a thing and then shooting it in the head with a specific weapon in dead eye or not dead eye.

The game is this exciting story about fighting gangs, police, agencies, mafia, and yet we are supposed to dedicate like at least half the play time on slowly stalking wild animals which have no real way of defending themselves. And it is boring.

The only exciting enemies are wolves, cause these are actually fast enough to be difficult to aim at with a controller, but bears, alligators, these are usually working alone, and all you have to do to kill them is shoot them in the face with a sniper rifle, for which ammo isn't even that expensive.

[vapechimp]

I am so glad you were not born some 150 years ago to witness how they were killing whales and seals for fat oil

[Mandalorian Deathknight]

Originally posted by vapechimp:

I am so glad you were not born some 150 years ago to witness how they were killing whales and seals for fat oil

or bison to clear the rail road tracks

[vapechimp]

Originally posted by Mandalorian Deathknight:

Originally posted by vapechimp:

I am so glad you were not born some 150 years ago to witness how they were killing whales and seals for fat oil

or bison to clear the rail road tracks

Just checked this up. From 300 million bisons reduced to 325 animals. Barely saved from full extinction a magnificent animal. Nowadays they are back to 20 000 wild bisons very slowly recovering

[Singularity's Marauder]

Originally posted by vapechimp:

Originally posted by Mandalorian Deathknight:

or bison to clear the rail road tracks

Just checked this up. From 300 million bisons reduced to 325 animals. Barely saved from full extinction a magnificent animal. Nowadays they are back to 20 000 wild bisons very slowly recovering

the issue is that if you rebuild a population from such small numbers, they become genetically weakened, because it activates plenty of their negative recessive genes.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

How do you think people lived? And no, going to a store and buying canned goods was not how people lived. That was actually a rare treat and when people did get their hands on canned goods they would store them on their home property in a way they would keep better (such as storm cellar) as a last resort should they have a bad winter and run out or low on other foods. If they had veggies with their meats like corn, carrots, greens, onions, green-beans; these were usually grown or purchased fresh.

Hunting for animals like Fish, Quail, Duck, Squirrel, Rabbit, Deer/Buck or Bison/Buffalo was fairly normal. Not only did you get meat from various animals you would make use of their pelts and furs as well to make your own clothing or other items such as satchels, wagon liners, etc. Fur pelts were needed for winter outer clothing and for many other uses.

Killing Whales for oils and fats is very old though. Man has been doing that for over 1200 years once he was able to make boats large enough to be ships. You can get unique oils from various other animals as well, such as Cats. As they produce a natural oil and that is what they naturally use to wash and brush their own fur coat.

[Hugh G Rection]

*laughs in using dynamite on bison*

[Ragnarr Loðbrók]

Cannibalism is an option.

[Singularity's Marauder]

Im surprised you guys are so invested into the lore implications when I clearly stated the the more important aspect is the gameplay. The reason why I dont find hunting satisfying is that it s just shooting a giant target with a sniper rifle in the head, and then selling for money you dont need and have too much of.

and the various cosmetic items for your camp and character are kinda stupid. And they just make me feel like a large ego poacher with a life so vapid, they turn racoons into carpets to show off to their friends, they dont have.

I mean the game has such an exciting story, and most of its side quests are also kinda exciting. Why go out in the north and spend 10 hours hunting for a moose just so you can kill it and then your game will randomly crash or some other stupid ♥♥♥♥.

Like I d rather have wildlands be populated with bounty hunters, bandits or ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ aliens. But the issue is that combat in this game is so easy that the game has to dump a cosmic amount of enemies to make it challenging. So scattered enemies in the wildlands wouldnt be exciting either cause you would just shoot them with dead eye and then it would just end.

In fact Rockstar did add some cool things in the wild that made the game kinda interesting. Mostly mountain climbing and weird easter eggs and encounters. Like the house of the ice skater or the man looking for his friend, or the mexican gang in the shacks. But hunting on its own... Eh... Really boring mechanic

[Luigibora]

Originally posted by Randomized Randomizer:

Im surprised you guys are so invested into the lore implications when I clearly stated the the more important aspect is the gameplay. The reason why I dont find hunting satisfying is that it s just shooting a giant target with a sniper rifle in the head, and then selling for money you dont need and have too much of.

and the various cosmetic items for your camp and character are kinda stupid. And they just make me feel like a large ego poacher with a life so vapid, they turn racoons into carpets to show off to their friends, they dont have.

I mean the game has such an exciting story, and most of its side quests are also kinda exciting. Why go out in the north and spend 10 hours hunting for a moose just so you can kill it and then your game will randomly crash or some other stupid ♥♥♥♥.

Like I d rather have wildlands be populated with bounty hunters, bandits or ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ aliens. But the issue is that combat in this game is so easy that the game has to dump a cosmic amount of enemies to make it challenging. So scattered enemies in the wildlands wouldnt be exciting either cause you would just shoot them with dead eye and then it would just end.

In fact Rockstar did add some cool things in the wild that made the game kinda interesting. Mostly mountain climbing and weird easter eggs and encounters. Like the house of the ice skater or the man looking for his friend, or the mexican gang in the shacks. But hunting on its own... Eh... Really boring mechanic

your not forced to kill evry animal you see, i understand hunting for specific animal material can be bit borring, but once you done that you can do the fun stuff.

And yea i agree Dead eye compleetly turns the game in easy mode, its so easy to ambuse if your stocked on chewing tabaco, but to be fair evry Rockstar game is leaned to easy side to aplease the cassual playerbase, also noticed they force you on to there own rules (difficulty) so you basicly always stuck on easy mode when playing one of there games.

[SteinDrSolido]

i hate hunting animals in games , i now its a game but i hate anyway , in cod or battlefield soldiers want kill me i have no problem kill them haha , but i hate dear / animal huntinggames .

[araq]

fr

[Singularity's Marauder]

Originally posted by SteinDrSolido:

i hate hunting animals in games , i now its a game but i hate anyway , in cod or battlefield soldiers want kill me i have no problem kill them haha , but i hate dear / animal huntinggames .

yeah, well... Killing animals is like gunning down civillians in the streets of Saint Denis. It just kinda comes off as edgy. On the other hand following the story has a meaning. And gunning down soldiers in online games, I dunno I never played cod, might be fun. Cause you get to fulfill your fantasy of murdering dumb internet nerds or something.

[Flaming Badger]

I'm the complete opposite. I've spent way more time hunting than anything else in this game. I'm basically treating it as a hunting simulator!

You keep talking about excitement. The hunting isn't generally supposed to be exciting, it's supposed to be satisfying. A little tense, yes. Maybe exciting on the odd occasion you let your guard down and get caught unawares. But mostly slow, methodical and satisfying.

If you don't like that style of gameplay that's fine. If you don't like the rewards that's also fine.
(Yes, I agree most of the trapper gear is goofy, but I like a few boots, gloves and hats/accessories. I totally understand that many people find the camp stuff very underwhelming, but I love having a bit more dialogue and feeling a part of something. Heck, I even do chores around camp! Money, whatever, that's more a reason not to feel guilty like I'm wasting my kills. They're going to someone who's going to use them)

If you're ruining your own fun with deadeye, that's on you though.

"and yet we are supposed to dedicate like at least half the play time"
My brother in Christ, you just said you're not interested in the rewards for hunting, why are you spending half your time hunting? That one's also on you.

I rather like that hunting is set against a background theme of ecological collapse. It adds a level of thoughtfulness and greyness to the activity. Can you justify what you're doing? What is your role in this as one man, compared against the spread of industry and civilisation?

The hunting mission with Charles and the bison poachers really hammers this home. I hunt, but I try to make full use of my kills. Carry what I can back to camp or to sell, or use it myself. The actual reward is the participation in the activity itself and the role you embody, not whatever the game hands you for it. Intrinsic as opposed to extrinsic, like all the best games. (I have a Mount and Blade anecdote about embodying roles, and a similar one about Arkham Asylum but I've waffled on enough as it is.)

Overall the detailed and thoughtful approach the game takes to hunting adds a richness in the same way that the vast amounts of minor (pointless?) activities and dialogues you can engage in, detailed environments and slow, deliberate animations also add richness. And like with those things, I think it's a richness you benefit from even if you choose not to engage directly with those systems.

[jswarpaint]

Originally posted by vapechimp:

Originally posted by Mandalorian Deathknight:

or bison to clear the rail road tracks

Just checked this up. From 300 million bisons reduced to 325 animals. Barely saved from full extinction a magnificent animal. Nowadays they are back to 20 000 wild bisons very slowly recovering

Maybe someday they can stampede and run over some people ???