Fan excitement about a potential Red Dead Redemption 3 reached a fever pitch in May 2024 after a viral poster supposedly teased the game's existence.
Rockstar Games' epic series of open-world cowboy titles has cemented itself as one of the most beloved franchises in gaming, joining the likes of Rockstar's other megalithic Grand Theft Auto (GTA) games.
While gamers know (at least vaguely) when the next GTA game will be released with GTA 6 expected next year, there is no telling when fans will see another entry into the Red Dead franchise.
New Poster Teases Red Dead Redemption 3
A new poster circling online has gamers thinking they may know when Red Dead Redemption 3 will be released.
The 2024 poster features a large stylized "III" emblazoned on it, with a cowboy riding his horse through what looks to be a snowy landscape in the American West.
It also has a supposed release date, saying the cow-poking threequel is "Coming 2032."
The poster, which first appeared on the Spanish JamesHeisenberg Facebook page, described the game as "the next BIG project" from developer Rockstar Games after the upcoming GTA 6:
"Are You Ready...? 'Red Dead Redemption 3' would be the next BIG project to be in the works by Rockstar. A lot of cinema"
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While convincing, this poster is fan-made, and there has been no confirmation that Red Dead Redemption 3 is coming.
As of writing, the only officially revealed in-development Rockstar Games title is Grand Theft Auto 6, due sometime in 2025.
Will Red Dead Redemption 3 Ever Happen?
While news that this 2024 poster is fake may disappoint some, that is not to say Red Dead Redemption 3 will never happen.
It will probably be released even sooner than that 2032 date noted in the fan-made marketing piece.
There have been several teases indicating Rockstar Games is getting ready for a third Red Dead Redemption game.
According to several prominent leakers, the game is already in development in some form.
This comes after Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick told shareholders in 2021 that if a franchise at the publisher is "really, really great, it will keep going" (via Video Games Chronicle):
"If it’s really, really great it will keep going. I don’t know if you saw it, I just saw the new 'Bond' film, that was great. And you would like every franchise to be 'James Bond.'
There are precious few entertainment franchises of any sort that fall into that category, but they do exist. And I think 'GTA' is one of them, I think 'Red Dead' is one of them, 'NBA' is obviously one of them because the game [of basketball] will continue to exist."
While Zelnick's definition of "great" is unclear, one can assume given Red Dead's incredible critical response (with Red Dead 1 sitting at 95% and Red Dead 2 at 97% on Metacritic) and the franchise having sold over 86 million units worldwide as of February 2024 (via mxdum), the series falls into that "great" bucket.
As for when gamers could see Red Dead Redemption 3, it will likely be before 2032.
One of the things Red Dead Redemption 3 has going for it is that the team developing it would assumedly not be the same one working on Grand Theft Auto 6.
Typically, the Red Dead games have come out of Rockstar's San Diego studio, whereas GTA has been worked on at Rockstar North (based in the UK).
That means work on GTA 6 and Red Dead 3 could (and is likely to) be done simultaneously.
With this in mind, fans can expect a third Red Dead Redemption game sometime in the next few years. Red Dead 2 was released in 2018, five years after GTA 5 and eight years after the first Red Dead Redemption.
If Rockstar were to follow a similar development pipeline, the game's release would be between 2026 and 2030, with the latter half of that being more likely given Rockstar's recent propensity for taking its time.
[ Red Dead Redemption 3: Will a New Game Ever Release? ]
Red Dead Redemption 2 is available now on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.
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