Red Dead Online may be a great way to spend an afternoon, pretending to be a cowboy who is making his fortune in a hostile new frontier, but it certainly isn’t easy to do so when the map happens to be populated with all manner of black-hatted griefers. Developer Rockstar Games is looking to curb this destructive attitude in the next big update.

Like most games of its ilk, Red Dead Online allows you to create a cowboy who represents your activities in the new frontier. Rugged, burly riders whose brawny hands can slap leather and draw iron that delivers some old fashioned justice. Testicles to that, because I’m hellbent on using my digital face as a weapon.

The beta for Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption 2 online stuff has started, bringing with it a scaled back Battle Royale mode in addition to a host of other online activities. As with the first game and GTA Online, the game will track what you do when connected to the online world, earning you money and notoriety. It’s probably best not to become too attached to that online progress.

A month after Red Dead Redemption 2 launched, developer Rockstar Games is finally ready to unleash its ambitious online component and mosey on down to a whole new sandbox of action, adventure and socialising in the old west. With a catch, of course. Red Dead Online will arrive today, but Rockstar is looking to stagger the release and reward its more hardcore fans first and foremost.

Say what you like about Red Dead Redemption 2 and the odd glitch, but that game felt amazingly polished when it came out in October, with zero large-scale patches having been introduced for the game…yet. A sequel that truly feels like the result of hundreds of people being overworked, Red Dead Redemption 2 a terrific example of quality meeting expectations. A quality that exists as an educational benchmark for CD Projekt RED and their upcoming Cyberpunk 2077 game.

After five years of waiting, players finally got to roam the wild west again in Red Dead Redemption 2. The game scored incredibly well critically, and sold incredibly well too, going on to have the best weekend opening of any product in the history of entertainment media. It was still outsold by Call of Duty.

Red Dead Redemption 2 has been a massive critical success, and it's becoming an even bigger sales one for Rockstar already after less than two weeks on store shelves.

From Rhodes to Valentine, Red Dead Redemption 2 is one heck of a gorgeous game. There’s rugged terrain to gallop over, foggy swamps to wade through and eerie forests to explore no matter where you are in the game. There’s also a slice of Mexico if you’re feeling brave enough.