Emmett Watkins Jr. – Widow in the Wilderness (Red Dead Redemption II)

Red Dead Redemption II has a reputation that precedes it. If you’ve been an online enjoyer of the medium since it released, then you already know that the thing that makes it one of the greatest games of all time to some, including myself, it what turns many players off from it: its slow pacing. The game took me 100 to roll credits, and it’s not due only to the plethora of side content I played between main missions, but those missions themselves are plentiful and spread out over a massive sprawling narrative. However, despite the intimidating scope of the game world and it’s story, Red Dead II is at it’s strongest when it focuses down on smaller interactions between charaters, and perhaps the strongest example of this is The Widow of Willard’s Rest.

The Widow of Willard’s Rest is one of the many stranger missions in the game, which are basically side missions by another name, though unique in that they aren’t one-and-done and often continue the story of the characters involved as you play the game. In this one, you come across Charlotte as she weeps over the grave of her husband. She moved out to the wilderness with him as he loved the outdoors, but now that he’s gone, she feels helpless to be out there alone. Arthur, your player character, offers her an impromptu hunting lesson where she learns how to kill a rabbit, skin it properly, and even protect herself from wolves. Now in possession of some kind of way forward, Charlotte says goodbye to Arthur, thanks hinm for his tips, and invites him back in the future.

Upon returning to her neck of the woods, you find her by a campfire she set herself, cooking, but still can’t seem to shoot quite straight. After getting her to practice on some nearby bottles on a fence, she becomes a budding crackshot. She then invites Arthur to have some of the rabbit he helped gather for her in a stew she’s brewed up. However, due to reasons that would spoil the main story, Arthur falls ill during the meal and wakes up hours later in Charlotte’s bed in an empty cabin. Next to him is a note from her, thanking him for all he’s done, and $100 in a nearby box that you can choose to take or not. Days later, you can return once more for a seconds long conversation in which she’s glad to see you up and walking again, thanks you again, and send you on your way after kisisng you on the cheek.

I love this series of missions because of just how simple it is. This is a AAA 3rd person shooter, but it defise the expectations of one by having it’s most memorable moments having to do nothing with action and everything to do with humanity. This side quest manages to convey so much because it’s interactions revolve around being in service of others instead of yourself. You are not just shooting, running, and riding into and from danger, but doing so to show another how to survive in this world. It’s a small act of selflessness in a genre that rarely portrays such acts, let alone lets you participate in them.

And it even ties into the core narrative of the game, which I will now spoil so stop reading now if you have never beaten Red Dead Redemption II. In the final chapters of the game, Arthur is reflecting on his life as he becomes aware of how immediate his death is as a result of his tuberculosis. He comes to regret his life of crime even more intensely than he was hinted to early on, and this act of kindness from a stranger to a stranger is one of the many ways he tries to balance out his karma. However, his action is portrayed less as a task done to frantically put moral points on the board before the incoming final buzzer, but more as a genuine act from someone who genuinely cared, even if they might not have months earlier.

This quest hits me so hard because it is one of many examples in media of someone doing good just for the sake of it. Sure, you get $100 near the end of the questline, but you can choose to abandon that reward, which makes the act feel even more pure. There’s not even any romantic subtext to this entire exchange, which just adds to the authentic feeling of the interactions. So often does doing good deeds in games come with an implicitly reward for, if not the protagonist, then at least the player. This quest like, instead, is ultimately a net negative. You wasted bullets showing her how to shoot, wasted resources to help her hunt, wasted time on the diversion in the first place, but those are only wasted resources in you didn’t care about the act itself.

The Widow of Willard’s Rest highlights the core of why I love Red Dead II, and why so many others may never get it ultimately. The game is slowly paced, yes, but the time you put into it does not build towards some magnificent mechanical reward, or really even much of a massive narrative one. Each moment of Red Dead II is in and of itself it’s own reward. You don’t go hunting in the middle of nowhere for animal pelts just for the money you get from selling them, but also for the texture and peace of a night outdoors. You don’t start up a round of poker just to empty the pockets of a half dozen random men, but to soak in the piano and fiddle soundtracking the dozens and dozens of intertwining lives you get to experience a glimpse of while in that saloon. You don’t see the main narrative of Red Dead II to it’s bitter end to finally get away with the spoils of a long life of outlaw living, but to simply walk in the shoes of men who were never meant to thrive in the new world that is being erected in front of them. Life is fleeting, and as much of Red Dead II shows, it can be over faster than you can ever see coming. So, it is only fair that the game shows us the rewards of living that life, and being present in it while doing so. A more cynical cowboy, even that very same cowboy earlier in his journey, may have been to hardened of heart to stop and help that crying woman. Red Dead Redemption II will continue to be one of the greatest games of all time because it lets you make the choice to be the one who does, not because there’s something in it for you, but because it is the right thing to do.

With video games being a very subjective form of art, what do you, the reader think are standout side quests?