Journal Luke727's Journal: RDR 1

So I have finally completed the Mexico missions and have opened up West Elizabeth; the last couple of Mexican missions kind of drained me, though, so I'll pick it up tomorrow. After playing this game for quite a while now, a few things have really started to bug me. First of all, the riding shotgun missions. While riding to your destination you cannot look around and enjoy the scenery; the camera angles are fixed and keep changing around. I guess this must be to prevent you from doing something that would fuck up the mission (i.e. shooting random people, etc). The distances on some of these rides are ridiculously long, but thankfully they give you the option to skip straight to the destination. However, this brings me to my next issue: loading times. Granted while free-roaming there is no loading time at all, but after a while the long rides between towns gets old and you just want to get there already. I haven't timed it or anything, but it seems rather long and it totally kills the immersion of the game. My last major complaint is that some of the cut-scenes are just too long; I appreciate that they are trying to tell a story, but FOR FUCK'S SAKE IT IS A FUCKING VIDEO GAME. If I wanted to be told a story I would watch a movie. I do have a few minor complaints as well. The minor stranger missions are fun at first, but after the 100th time you've stopped a robbery or captured some escaped criminals it gets really old; I'm at the point where I let the bad guys get away just for my own satisfaction. One small thing that really annoys the shit out of me is that when you loot something (body, animal, herb, whatever) you almost never face the same way when you come back up. I.e. if you are facing east when you go to skin an animal you won't be facing the same way when you are done. Minor, I know, but it is a serious nuisance. I think the thing that annoys me the most, though, is when OUT OF NOWHERE AND FOR NO REASON WHATSOEVER some fuckwad starts shooting at you. This happened to me right at the end of my gaming session. I ran away from him and came upon a guy looking to duel; I accepted the challenge and just before we were about to draw the random asshole found me and killed me. The last thing is movement during combat. When you have a weapon out you move faster than usual; this makes it difficult to navigate narrow corridors in areas where big gunfights break out. Also, the cover system is just as awkward here was it was in GTA IV.