Leaks rarely lead to major court cases. Blacklisting is usually the worst thing that can happen to a website as it finds itself shut out by a publisher, but the idea of being slapped with a hefty bill? Unheard of, until yesterday when website Trusted Reviews and their parent company TI Media forked out £1 million to charity after they published confidential information regarding Red Dead Redemption 2 back in February from a leaked internal document from Rockstar Games.

What kind of a game is Red Dead Redemption 2? On the surface, it looks like your typical sandbox, albeit with some rootin’ tootin’ gun-slinging action thrown into the mix. Which it is! It’s also a horror game of sorts, if you’re prepared to dig deep enough. Rockstar loves them a mystery, and much like the first Red Dead Redemption game released in 2010, there’s plenty of it in the sequel.

There’s some good money to be made out in the wilds of Red Dead Redemption 2. Critters and varmints can be found roaming the land, their precious meat and skins ready to fetch a fine price on the market if you’re willing to track them down. Beyond even those creatures however, there are the legendary beats who inhabit forests and grasslands within the game.

If there’s one tradition that’s alive and well in Red Dead Redemption 2, it’s Rockstar’s love of cheat codes. A mainstay of any game from the developer, cheat codes are old school throwbacks to a time when players wanted to play a game and get drunk with power. Just like Grand Theft Auto 5 before it, Red Dead Redemption 2 does have cheats, but they comes with a few caveats.

Red Dead Redemption 2 is a story of endings and new beginnings, of the birth of legends and the consequences that come with creating a myth. It’s all wrapped up in an immaculate presentation, told over dozens of hours and adventures that leads to an inevitable conclusion: Red Dead Redemption 2 raises the bar for the sandbox genre and stands tall as the definitive western game of this or any other generation.

What you wear, how you approach people and your physical condition speaks volumes, as does Morgan when players highlight an NPC and use a more natural form of dialogue inputs to start a conversation in Red Dead Redemption 2. Which all plays beautifully together with the retuned AI system in Red Dead Redemption 2, says Rockstar.

Red Dead Redemption 2 seeks to capture that essence, giving players their own chance to establish themselves as one of the last outlaws alive before the West was truly won. It’s out this week at long last, but if you’re hungry for some of that trademark cowboy action, you can’t go wrong by saddling up and riding on into your nearest saloon to watch some of the best films that the western genre has ever produced.

Star power can help sell a game, but the other side of that coin flip also reveals the various hazards of working with a cast of established Hollywood actors. Overinflated egos, premium salary costs and creative differences are just a few of these drawbacks, something that Rockstar Games is well aware of these days.