RDR2 Horse permadeath seems like a massive design failure

[Dr. Caroll]

RDR2 horse permadeath is basically the animal companion permadeath mechanic from Far Cry: Primal except worse in every possible way because my pet sabretooth that I took for rides sometimes and fed meat and also gave lots of pets didn't run in front of trains on a regular basis.

 

[Van Bur3n]

Y'all need to hitch your horse to something if it's running off that much. Jeez Louise III.

Starting to feel bad for the horses who are dying to their terrible owners.

 

[George c]

I love this mechanic, I lost 2 horses and I could have reloaded but the emotions from the loss would have felt unwarranted if I just reloaded.

RIP Aquaria
RIP Buggy

 

[Ausroachman]

I love the mechanic , I'm 100+ hrs in and never lost my horse .

It prevents you from stupid horse shit like in odyssey where you can just ride your horse off a cliff .

If you constantly feed your horse or flee abit when ambushed I've never found him close to dying .

 

[RedDevil]

Just go to see the horse fairy and give it 500 rupees and your horse will be back

I think it's to the west of the map

Click to shrink...

This is exactly what came to my mind after reading OP.

 

[leng jai]

I didn't even know your horse could permanently die until I read people complaining about it on this forum. In my playthrough it "died" twice but both times I just used horse reviver.

 

[Lozjam]

I really despise that any time someone doesn't get or doesn't like a mechanic, it's a "design failure". You can not like a mechanic dude, but that doesn't mean it's a design failure. It does what it sets out to do

 

[SeeingeyeDug]

I parked my horse on the railroad tracks to run in for a mission thinking the mission would move stuff around, not realizing the mission immediately made the train come in and kill my first horse. The one from that first ranch on fire.

 

[Mario_Bones]

Y'all need to hitch your horse to something if it's running off that much. Jeez Louise III.

Starting to feel bad for the horses who are dying to their terrible owners.

Click to shrink...

Even that doesn't help because then you hop on a train and the horse unhitches itself and follows along and then runs off into a lake and dies

 

[Deleted member 42484]

It's just a video game bro. It's not a real horse.

 

[BoxManLocke]

Because your horse can die so easily and permanently, there is no reason at all to try to stick with one horse.

Click to shrink...

My first horse died after 80 hours. I've watched multiple streams of the game where players would keep their horses till the very end.

It's absolutely not easy for your horse to get killed, you were just unlucky.

 

[Multiverse Moo]

Look online for where to go on the east side of the map that spawns horses. Get a free Arabian and move on.

Click to shrink...

Already moved on, so dont need to do any stuff like that and no need for that attitude :P Also, I have a rose grey Arabian I'm currently bonding with.

I just lost the rare white one in a weird way when the whole town went after me. Shared my story (and the clip) because I managed to do the "revive" on my horse before Arthur got killed, but it was gone anyway.

 

[Kin5290]

It's not a design failure because the game was designed so that your horse can permanently die, you have to clean your weapons, etc.

I don't like how the game sacrifices the overall fun for the sake of realism. It makes playing the game a chore for me and I haven't picked it back up since starting Chapter 3. It's okay if others like this kind of game, but it isn't for me.

Click to shrink...

Speaking of, for all that the game insists on "realistically" lengthy animations for picking up items/looting bodies, or skinning animals, it bugs the hell out of me that when you clean your gun you just wipe down the exterior instead of breaking it down and cleaning the working parts of the gun.

 

[Van Bur3n]

Even that doesn't help because then you hop on a train and the horse unhitches itself and follows along and then runs off into a lake and dies

Click to shrink...

You didn't buy the floaties from the stable? See, this is carelessness at its finest.

 

[NSA]

I've only (almost) lost 1 horse and that's cause I stopped to fish on train tracks and thought the train would pass us by.. knocked us in the water and the horse sank where I couldn't reach her with the revive.. loaded a save with the quickness.

I don't see how this could be a big widespread problem. I'm not overly careful.

 

[Allforce]

I had 2 horses through the entire game (both lived, I just switched when I found a rare one) and when I lost that rare one after like 60 hours it was fucking devastating. That horse went through everything with Arthur and never once came close to death, I have no idea how you fuckers are slaughtering horses all over the place.

Give the damn thing an apple once in a while.

 

[Spartancarver]

You don't understand. There is no problem. There's millions of people that have fun with Rockstar games. You guys are a minority. So, why should they change it?

Click to shrink...

I'm having plenty of fun with RDR2. Doesn't mean I need to plug my ears and go into fanboy denial mode when anyone brings up the objective faults with the game.

Like the absolutely trash controls.