Development of Red Dead Redemption 2

A team of approximately 1,600 people developed Red Dead Redemption 2 over several years. Rockstar Games published the action-adventure game in October 2018 for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, and in November 2019 for Windows and Stadia. Rockstar co-opted all of its studios into one large team to facilitate development. The story is set in 1899 in a fictionalized representation of the Western, Midwestern, and Southern United States and follows outlaw Arthur Morgan, a member of the Van der Linde gang. Arthur must deal with the decline of the Wild West while attempting to survive against government forces, rival gangs, and other adversaries. The story also follows fellow gang member John Marston, the protagonist of Red Dead Redemption (2010).

Rockstar used motion capture to record the performances of the cast, as well as face cameras to capture their facial reactions for later animation. The secretive nature of Rockstar's development processes meant that the actors and director were unsure of the future of the characters during production; the writers continued to work on the script while the actors shot their scenes in segments. Rockstar wanted a diverse cast of characters within the Van der Linde gang and put particular focus on the individual stories behind each character. While one of the main themes of the original game was to protect family at all costs, Red Dead Redemption 2 tells the story of the breakdown of a family in the form of the Van der Linde gang.