The steady populating of Red Dead Online with content continues with this week’s Blood Money Update, a free expansion that adds new missions called Crimes and Opportunities to one of the best Wild West games.
The new missions include stories involving familiar gangsters and bounty hunters Anthony Foreman, James Langton and Sean Macguire. Find them on the map and they’ll initiate multi-stage Crime missions through which the player can earn Capitale. Amassing enough Capitale reveals Opportunities, which are missions of a larger scale.
Dirty deeds
Red Dead Online screenshot
Image Credit: Rockstar Games
In Saint Denis, dapper henchman Guido Martelli explains that Capitale is a sort of exclusive currency necessary for his nefarious criminal enterprise, or a MacGuffin to that effect. Martelli can be found in west Saint Denis, or directly through the menu.
The Blood Money update also expands the player-directed money-making schemes on Red Dead Online’s map. Crime Contracts furnish new ways of acquiring riches, while Capitale can also be found at vulnerable Homesteads and Camps.
Opportunity knocks
Red Dead Online screenshot
Image Credit: Rockstar Games
The large-scale Opportunities that come with the update can be approached in different ways, for instance with useful intelligence revealing itself through eavesdropping on conversations. The first of these opportunities is available now, with two more on the way.
In the available Opportunity, Martelli asks the player to damage a senator in Lemoyne by stealing three Jewels of the West. Securing the first of these pits the player against a heavily guarded train carrying the Covington Emerald.
Hired gun
Red Dead Online screenshot
Image Credit: Rockstar Games
As part of the update, items such as the ability to Fast Travel from Wilderness Camps that were previously released in an earlier exclusive pass have been added for sale at the Fence. The new Hired Gun Kit can also be purchased from the Fence after the player speaks with Guido Martelli. This package includes a bundle of consumables, as well as the Fierro Bandana and 10 Capitale.
The Quick Draw Club is a series of consecutive passes which can each be purchased for 25 Gold Bars. These can be earned back by completing the 25 ranks of the pass, while players will unlock cosmetics including Dutch’s Redcliff Outfit, the Whitchurch Cattleman Revolver Variant, the Rushword Shirt. The upcoming Halloween Pass 2 will be awarded for free to players who purchase all four instalments of the Quick Draw Club.
Story mode
Red Dead Online screenshot
Image Credit: Rockstar Games
Blood Money is a substantial update to one of the best historical games on Xbox Game Pass. Its content is framed within a familiar mission structure, usually triggered by a man in a cowboy hat informing the player ‘There’s a fella needs killin’’. Red Dead players craving new content to incentivize them to ride through Rockstar’s interpretation of the late 19th century American West will nonetheless welcome it.
The update also brings Nvidia DLSS support, which will give an improvement in frame rate and sharpness for players with eligible graphics cards.
