Red Dead Online is dead. Well, technically, that's not what Rockstar Games said. However, the publisher did use some flowery words to basically confirm that it has diverted a vast majority of its resources to Grand Theft Auto Online and Grand Theft Auto 6.
Rockstar recently revealed its plans for Red Dead Online and GTA Online in an official blog post. Unfortunately, Rockstar couldn't hide the dire situation with Red Dead Online behind rosy words. In a nutshell, Rockstar confirmed that Red Dead Online is on life support so that the few players who are still playing can enjoy what's left of the game. On the other hand, GTA Online will still get substantial new updates going forward.
Here's a snippet of what Rockstar said in its latest update:
Over the past few years, we have been steadily moving more development resources towards the next entry in the Grand Theft Auto series — understanding more than ever the need to exceed players' expectations and for this next entry to be the best it can possibly be — and as a result, we are in the process of making some changes to how we support Red Dead Online.
If nothing else, this shouldn't come as a surprise. Rockstar had already reportedly canceled future remasters so that it can focus on GTA 6. Even if the company is open to revisiting canned plans in the future, it's clear that it wants to devote as many resources possible to make sure that the next GTA game is the best as it can be.
Red Dead fans will not like the latest news any bit, but it's not the worst thing in the world. We should appreciate Rockstar's candid statement in light of the current climate. Rockstar is not new to controversies surrounding toxic workplace conditions. The last thing it needs is outlets reaching out to know more about internal turmoil in case a disgruntled employee decides to quit in the middle of GTA 6's development.
If Rockstar is pooling all its available resources to work on GTA 6 while adding new updates to GTA Online and keeping tabs on Red Dead Online, we shouldn't expect anything more. Otherwise, GTA 6 might not be as good as we'd like it to be.
