Today Rockstar Games has revealed that a major update for the developer’s October-released Red Dead Redemption 2’s Red Dead Online has dropped featuring a whole arsenal of new content including story missions, poker, world changing mechanics, and the journey ahead for the online segment of the action adventure title.

Firstly, it’s worth noting that Rockstar has finally dropped the ‘beta’ portion of Red Dead Online since the mode’s debut back in November. Which is very exciting as it got pretty worrying when that would actually happen as fans were unsure how long it would stay in the playtest phase.

As part of the new update, players anticipating to participate in games of hold em’ after already seeing it available in the single player portion of the game can be rest assured as poker is now out for Red Dead Online. Divide up between the five counties, players can face in private games with friends in their posse or hit high-stakes against other players in public games. Rockstar emphasizes on playing poker in free-roam will lead to higher payouts compared to closed matches.

The story mission arc for Jessica LeClerk continues on for The Land of Opportunity with missions for both players honing either honorable or dishonorable social stats. As you grow closer to discovering who killed LeClerk’s husband, there two paths for the respected player: The honorable Gunslinger mission involving a fight against the Del Lobos gang to save Valentine or the more dishonorable assignment to assist Samson Finch in puling a heist on the Saint Denis Bank.

A handful of free-roam activities have also dropped as part of the new update including missions and dynamic events which could vary from assisting travelling NPCs to planned raids from antagonizing gangs. Posse Versus Challenges also make its debut as a bundle of different contests are available such as catching the most fish, shooting the most birds, or collecting the most herbs in a set time.

Amid the roster of adversary modes such as Plunder and Up In Smoke, Rockstar has added the newest addition labeled Overrun. Players are given the objective to conquer and as the name of the game, overrun enemies from their territories while managing to keep their own at the same time.

Brushing upon the previously reported defensive/aggressive play styles, this new update fully introduces the two mechanics bringing more ease to those who prefer different ways of enjoying the Five Counties in Red Dead Online. The more pacifist style allows players to take in the world around them without having to worry about the troubles that come from aggressive players like fishing or simply riding your mount. While the more hostile style allows players to fully go at it and cause as much trouble with those who seek the same chaos.

For the already introduced Hostility System, player visibility and hostile player countermeasures have been added on to assist those that run into more troublesome player. Such as when one player begins shooting at another nearby player, the one being attacked will not be penalized for defending himself and this will not affect those who are not involved in the incident.

As in tradition for every update, a list of balances/fixes have been added to better player experience when playing Red Dead Online:

• Auto-aim headshot tracking removed to up the difficulty on earning headshots on rivalling players.
  
• Increased swapping between weapons and make projectile weapons faster to launch.
  
• Update to the FPS control scheme making it more responsive when playing in the first-person view.
  
• PvP-centered challenges have been removed from Daily Challenges and new rewards have been added.
  
• New awards are available for newly added, gameplay-focused challenges.
  
• Global signal timer has been increased to create more flexibility for Free Roam Missions.
  
• Hostile players who do not respond to being attacked can now ‘press charge’ on the attacking player in the respawn scree.
  
• Horse pre-set selection is now available to pick which horse to choose when in free-roam.
  
• In-game economy has been adjusted for a bigger gold payout across all activities.

For what to come in the coming weeks for Red Dead Online, Rockstar games have revealed that a handful of different missions, showdown modes, and events will be coming as soon as next week and further into June.

The bigger picture that Rockstar has mapped for Red Dead Online is the new roles that the developer has planned for players to take on when playing. There are three roles said to be available: the criminal hunting Bounty Hunter, the entrepreneur-focused trader, or the adventurous Collector of rare items and foreign items.

It is said that each place will offer unique experience, clothing options, progression systems, and creating your own path in the growing world. This being the meat of the matter as players continue to look for purpose to return to Read Dead Online, specific roles will complement players based on their actions looks to work well for future updates.

Red Dead Redemption 2 is available for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

Source: Rockstar Newswire