With 60 hours of gameplay created from a 2,000-page-long story, 2,200 days of motion capture, 500,000 lines of dialogue, and 300,000 animations, it’s no surprise that you’ll find something new in Red Dead Redemption 2 every time you play it. There’s hidden dialogue to listen to at camp, interactions that only occur if you’re idling, and snippets of story material you might not be aware of if you’re not paying attention.
Luckily, this list is here to help you with all of that. By the time you finish reading this list, you’ll either want to start the whole game over again, know more about the game than ever before, or preferably, both!
Spoilers for Red Dead Redemption 2 ahead!
10 Arthur Sings
With so many main story missions and endless side missions (not to mention stranger missions and quests you come across just riding around the map), it’s hard to find a moment to just sit and let Arthur (and his horse) be. But if you find a moment, it can actually be quite rewarding. In addition to watching some small idling animations both Arthur and his horse will perform, if you wait long enough, Arthur might just start humming or singing to himself. How’s that for some realism?
9 Possums Playing Dead
Hunting can be a huge part of the Red Dead Redemption experience. Some story missions require it, there are legendary animal pelts to acquire, and if you’re feeling so inclined, your camp often needs some meat for Pearson to put in his stew. Not only that, but there are over 500 different animals to hunt, skin, and add to your compendium—some of which are possums.
Rockstar certainly know how to develop a realistic game because believe it or not, possums will actually play dead if you get close to them, just like their real-life counterparts.
8 Pickpockets
You’re probably already well-aware that you can rob pretty much anyone you come in Red Dead. But unfortunately for you and Arthur, you aren’t the only ne’er-do-wells out there. Sometimes, you might find that after bumping into a stranger while walking through the streets of Saint Denis that you have a little less cash on you than you did before. This is because, true to realistic situations of the time, NPCs can and will pickpocket you. So be careful the next time you get off your horse and decide to traverse the streets on foot.
7 Horse Bonding
Horse bonding itself is no great secret. You have to build up your relationship with your horse if you want to be able to travel farther in less time without totally wearing your horse out. You can build up your bond with your horse by tying it up to posts, patting it, feeding it, and of course, brushing it. But you may not know that if you have a level four bond with your horse, Arthur will actually cry when your horse dies on a mission and you don’t have the time or resources to revive it. Not bad for a cold-hearted outlaw, now is it?
6 Arthur and Abigail
It’s no secret that Arthur is unimpressed with John’s efforts to run away from life as a husband and father. Even if he and Abigail weren’t officially married during the main story, he still could have stepped up. In his journal, Arthur makes an allusion to how he should have married Abigail before she fell in love with John. And if you think about how he interacts with Abigail and takes care of Jack when John isn’t around, it really doesn’t come as much of a surprise that the two of them have history. Dutch did say she’d been with the whole gang, after all.
5 Cutscene Dialogue
The honor rating system is a very important aspect of Red Dead Redemption 2. It’s no secret it can alter the way certain events roll out and ultimately, whether Micah or tuberculosis will kill Arthur. But did you know the dialogue in certain important cutscenes will change depending on how high or low your honor is?
It’s certainly viable with as many hours and pages of story that went into the game, but it’s still impressive. The developers went out of their way to take into account how the player wanted to play the game and worked to accommodate that.
4 Pinkertons in the Credits
There are a large majority of Red Dead Redemption 2 fans who may not have played the first game in the series from 2009. But you don’t need to be an original RDR fan to love and appreciate John Marston and his storyline. After completing the epilogue (parts one and two) with John as the new protagonist, you’ll have the pleasure of sitting through forty minutes of credits. It isn’t as boring as it sounds, since the majority of that time is dedicated to cutscenes. Those unfamiliar with the story may not realize the Pinkerton detectives shown looking for someone and eventually finding John’s ranch are the same ones that will employ and then kill him in Red Dead Redemption.
3 Supernatural Creatures
For all of its realism and accuracy to the time period it takes place in, Red Dead Redemption 2 also likes to have a little fun with the players. If you know where to look, your playthrough of the game can involve visits with a couple of supernatural entities, such as a vampire, ghosts, and a UFO.
Things like this bring en extra level of fun to the gameplay, but what makes these additions even better is that they’re just that—additions. They’re not required to finish the game, so you don’t have to worry about finding these creatures if you don’t want to.
2 The Survivors
Though many original RDR fans couldn’t wait for RDR2 to come out just so they could free roam with their beloved John Marston, once they’d gotten to know Arthur Morgan, it was hard to lose him. By the time some gamers got to the epilogue, they just wished they could go back and spend more time with Arthur and the rest of the Van der Linde gang. If this sounds like you, it could be worth knowing you can find old members of the gang like Mary-Beth, Tilly, Pearson, and even Rains Fall around the map during and after the epilogue.
1 The Non-Survivors
Of course, if there are some members of the gang you’d like to visit with and can’t, but there’s still a way to pay your respects. You can visit Sean, Kieran, Hosea, and Lenny’s graves as Arthur, since they all die before he does.
But if you want to visit Susan Grimshaw or Arthur’s graves, you’ll have to wait until you’re playing as John either during or after the epilogue. The graves are easy to find once you know where to look, and they’re all surrounded by nature, where you can sit in a moment of quiet with the breeze and reflect on all the fun times the gang once had.
NEXT: 10 Questions We Still Have About Arthur Morgan After RDR2