Red Dead Redemption 2’s £568m opening weekend ‘biggest in entertainment history’
$725 million made in just three days comes close to GTA V's launch -- and the biggest ever launch weekend sales for any entertainment product in history
RED Dead Redemption 2 left the competition for dust as it posted the single biggest opening weekend in entertainment history.
Rockstar's Western epic, which reportedly cost around £78 million to make, made £568 million in its first three days on sale.
It didn't quite top Grand Theft Auto V's first three days which saw the entertainment world's first billion-dollar (£780m) launch, but it is the biggest launch of 2018, beating Avengers: Infinity War's £504 million ($640m) opening weekend.
Rockstar also revealed its digital sales on PlayStation set new records for digital pre-orders, day one sales and sales for a game's opening three days.
All of this comes despite the fact that the game isn't even out on PC yet, and the game's multiplayer component isn't going to be online until later this year.
It's helped by the fact that critics have been universal in their praise for the game as the best this decade and of this generation of consoles.
WHAT IS RED DEAD REDEMPTION 2?
Red Dead Redemption 2 is a prequel to Red Dead Redemption, a cowboy game from the makers of Grand Theft Auto.
You play as Arthur Morgan, a senior member of a gang of outlaws in 1899.
It's an open-world game set in a (slightly) compressed version of the Old West. Bits are very much modeled on Colorado's mountains and plains, others on the swamps around a large town modeled after an early New Orleans, and plenty more besides.
With mountains, forest, desert and more all having their own ecosystems, it features hundreds of different types of animal and gorgeous vistas.
It has hundreds of characters -- the cast numbers around 1,200 when you include motion capture and voice actors -- with pixel-perfect renditions of everything from the largemouth bass you've just caught to the can-can girls on stage whose show you've just taken in.
You'll meet small-town tough guys, robber barons, bloodthirsty agents, crooked clerks, slavers trying to make a living and slaves trying to survive.
You story starts shortly after a robbery gone wrong has forced your gang into hiding in those mountains -- and carries on as you try and settle old scores and rebuild your fortunes.
But it builds to much more than that.
As a study of the damage that can be done lust for revenge it stands with the best of them, and it's as brave and ambitious a portrait of a man's descent into madness as you'll find in any medium this year.
Gameplay is relatively simple -- you have a huge array of guns and other weapons to choose from as Arthur, and the majority of missions do involve shooting your way into or out of situations -- Arthur knows what his skills are, as do those who come asking for his help.
Whether you're on foot, on horseback, on a moving train or anywhere else, that core gameplay feels satsifying and compelling in and of itself.
And it keeps on working whether you're creeping through the mountains tracking a cougar, or defending your home and 'family' from an invading gang.
You can read our full review here.
MOST READ IN GAMING
It stormed to the top of the UK sales charts with double the physical sales of its predecessor
It's even caused searches for cowboy and wild west themed smut to skyrocket.
If you're yet to get a copy, check out the cheapest RDR2 Black Friday deals -- and if you don't even have a console to play it on yet, then head to Very to get Red Dead bundled with an Xbox One X for just £369.99 - or RDR 2 bundled with a PS4 Pro (using offer code N794E).
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