So let me get this straight...(story spoilers)

[Iggy Wolf]

Rockstar had John's gun holsters and belt put in the same place as Arthur so that when you take over, his animations and skeletal rigging transfer seamlessly without clipping issues or having to create a whole new rig. EXCEPT that they actually DID change his model, because John has Arthur's face, skeleton, and animations in the Epilogue. What makes no sense is that his NPC model is ALREADY rigged to the player's animations and skeletal rig.

So what was the problem of just using the NPC John model in the Epilogue, if it was ALREADY rigged for player animations and skeleton?! The fact that version 1.0 actually seemed to have more of NPC John's face and rigging suggests that for SOME reason, they just decided in a random update to change that, despite it NOT being a problem for clothes and equipment.

The fact that mods right now are able to restore those things more or less (minus the clipping that does become obvious) means that his NPC model was rigged to work FLAWLESSLY with the existing clothes, weapons, equipment, and holsters. If anything, they gave themselves MORE work than if they did just "lazily" use John's NPC model in the Epilogue. The NPC model was already also rigged for weight and hairstyles. Unless it wasn't, but I doubt most players would have cared too much about making John fatter or skinnier or having his hair looking like Arthur's.

If anything, the whole point WAS to have John's original hairstyle. It's the only way it makes sense come RDR1. Instead, the final result is a bastardized, Frankenstein version of Arthur's body with John's face. It's funny, cause Rockstar always in the past had two different textures/rigs for player models and cutscene models. So them NOT making a separate version for John just seems either "more lazy" or "less lazy" but with a crappy result.