Best side characters in GTA and Red Dead Redemption | Dan Houser and Lex Fridman

Favorite side characters: Dutch

00:02him. - So you also like the side characters. You like the flavor - Yeah, of course. - of the full cast. What are some of the favorites you've created? I'm sure the one you're currently working on- Nigel, that's a... You called him a side character. - Well, he's not a protagonist. He's like a god, not a character. So he's not... Him, I'm enjoying. I love Dutch. You know, it was partly because we wrote a few lines for him for the first game, and the actor did such a such an amazing job that when he spoke, it just came to me all of their backstory, which I'd been playing around with by that point anyway a little bit in my head. But I knew it was his bigger gangster from then. I sort of saw exactly who he

00:45was. And so that was... That felt like... He felt like a living character to me. - And we should say that Dutch is kind of like, maybe a little bit of a godlike figure- in both of the Red Dead Redemption games. He's the leader of the gang. And there's a father-son relationship with Dutch, with, uh, I mean, with Arthur, with John. There's a family feeling to the gang. They explore all of those dynamics, and then the feeling of betrayal and Arthur facing tuberculosis. You're going against the family, going against the father- because he is transforming his sense of the world, of morality, of all those kinds of things. So all the kind of very Shakespearean drama is right there. And Dutch is a prominent godlike figure through all of that. Also

Dutch's ego and Arthur's tragedy

01:32flawed himself. Also a man of good and evil in that, framework that they're operating under. - And he's just drowning in his ego at the end. You know, his ego gets the better of him. I think he's a... But there was something flawed but beautiful in his idealism when he was younger, and that's mostly off-camera. And then just so you know, always been as an individual, I've always been very susceptible to charming people. And he's charming. So I was kind of... I can see how people get captivated. by charming people. And the idea here was a very charming person, and the road's run out for him. - I personally am afraid of how much I love human beings, and how susceptible I am to charm and charisma.

02:21'Cause it can cloud your judgment about human nature. - Completely. And that's what's happened with him. And it ended up clouding his judgment about himself. He kind of fell for his own rubbish. - Yeah, but also it clouded Arthur's judgment. - Oh, completely. Arthur was completely, you know, platonically in love with him. He was worshiping him. He'd given up his power to him. And then I think for Arthur, the journey is retaking that power in the moment of dying. You know, and that's what the whole... that's why I thought that was really interesting. - Yeah, it's truly tragic for Arthur to be losing his identity, lifelong identity, and sense of belonging, and losing his life at the same time. In facing mortality, he is realizing that he's not all of it has been a lie.

The Gavin mystery

03:13- But he gets to do some... Well, it depends on what choices you make. But he gets to do some good. And so he gets his moment of redemption. - Just a little bit. But realizing... your whole life you've been living not a good life. You've been not a good man. - Isn't that what we're all afraid of? - I guess it's never too late to change your ways. - Hope not. I mean, that's... - So, the biggest, most important, primary question, central to the reason we're talking today, the number one question from the Internet, it is so ridiculous, but I must ask. Have you seen Gavin? Who is Gavin? So, for more context, there's a guy named Nigel in Red Dead Redemption 2 who's frantically searching for a mystery man named Gavin

04:00throughout the game. This has become one of the biggest mysteries amongst the interwebs, the RDR fan base. So, the theories include, theory one is it's a split personality disorder. Nigel himself is Gavin. So, the evidence for this theory is the letter that has some evidence that may be due to trauma, this split personality disorder was created. This Gavin was created inside Nigel's mind. Theory two is Gavin is dead, and Nigel's simply in denial. Theory three is that it's just a troll, and Rockstar intentionally created an unsolvable mystery to drive players crazy. I also heard theory four is Gavin is the Strange Man. So, there's this fascinating character, the Strange Man, this supernatural character that has a

04:50presence in RDR1 and a little bit in RDR2 also. But yeah. So which theory is closest to the truth? - Not three or four. In my mind, somewhere between one and two. I just loved the way he shouted, "Gavin." It just amused me. So at some level, it probably is trolling in that we didn't want it to be a totally clear mystery. You wanted it to have a little bit of adventure to it. but it was meant to be ... Without ever fully being explained that Gavin's not there anymore. Gavin's either gone home, Gavin's left him, Gavin's... And we were going to keep exploring that idea. That he was going to reappear in some way or other. - Did you have any idea how much imagination, excitement, and curiosity that little interaction would inspire in people?

Why Gavin became a meme

05:47- Yes and no. You could never know what people are going to find amusing in these big games, and a lot of it comes down to acting as well. The guy was just funny when he said "Gavin." It was just funny. You know? But there was a ped in Red Dead Redemption one that everyone was obsessed by, and I really wasn't expecting that. So we try to put a few characters in. I mean, Gavin was supposed to be amusing. I thought he was amusing. But you never know what people are going to get obsessed by. There are other characters I think are funny, and people don't even notice them, you know, or they see them in a completely different way. - Did you have a part in writing the letter? - Yeah. I can't remember if I wrote it or... Either I wrote it or Mike

06:23wrote it, or we both wrote it. I really can't remember, to be honest with you. But yeah, I certainly would have edited it, and Mike might have written it, or I might have written it. I really can't remember. - It's so fascinating because that little piece of writing— of course, you have thousands of pages- - Yeah. - ...but that little piece of writing gets analyzed. - Oh, but we certainly talked about it in depth, and if Mike was here, I'd ask him. He might remember. I can't really... And we do so many of those things. And I loved the use of letters in Red Dead to tell all these weird backstories. And some became very clear and some were still a little kind of opaque. But I think the general vibe was there was no

06:58Gavin. Either there was no Gavin or he'd long since left. So it's kind of a split personality, you know, and then we were going to over subsequent games provide more information. - So in some sense, you yourself don't quite know. You kind of have an idea, like which way do you lean more, theory one or two? Is he dead, and Nigel's in denial, or is there real communication going inside his head? - No, Gavin existed. So it wasn't that he was a split personality, and the only thing we hadn't really decided was in a future game No, Gavin existed. So it wasn't that he was a split personality, and the only thing we hadn't really decided was in a future game were we going to reveal that Gavin was dead, or was Gavin going to turn up having

07:35long since abandoned this maniac. That was what we were still playing around with. I think the idea was that he was never going to meet... He was never going to meet Gavin in this game. - I mean, it's just fascinating because you have to think about all of that. You have to write all of that. You have to have those discussions. You have to have those debates. - And it has to feel fresh. Like, what we've done before. Constantly looking as you do. You know, I think I've done, you know, somewhere between 15 and 20 of these games. Got to do stuff that's new. It can't repeat itself too much. - I mean, we also live in the age of the internet. Just, like, you realize there are millions of people worrying about where and who Gavin is.

08:17- Thank God. - It's like- - It's great, yeah. - It's fascinating that they're having... Is, think about people reading, like, James Joyce or something and thinking about the character, like, breaking apart Ulysses and thinking about, like, arguing about different interpretations of it. And to me, that in itself is also beautiful. - Yeah. We want the side mysteries to be solvable up to a point, but you still want these discussions. - Yeah, the mystery. - You know, and you want as long as it feels tonally appropriate for this whole big sort of shaggy dog story experience you're making. Which Gavin was just about, and he was so weird, and he just was intrinsically... there was just something funny about an English person screaming,

08:56"Gavin." I don't know why. - Yeah. Some of that humor, there's... there's certain in Red Dead Redemption there's humor, but there's a lot of it in Grand Theft Auto- ...and what... It's hard to put into words. why that's funny, why it becomes a meme, why it becomes viral, 'cause it's just funny. - Yeah, I know why I think it's funny, but you... what you can't... What I'm not good at doing at least is going, "This thing will become really popular online and this other thing won't." You can create this bunch of, you know, fifty different side things that people might get captivated by, and you just do not know what they're going to respond to. - How do you know when something's funny? Is it... you just feel it?

09:35- I know what I think is funny. It's, you know, it makes- - You just Google it or you just- - ...like just 'cause it's ridiculous as well. That was just... There's nothing funny about a dude shouting, "Gavin," a lot. He just said it in a funny way... I just thought it might be funny- It was great... and he just said it in such a funny way- ...and then it just became funny. Like, we often have those side characters and they're not that funny, and I think they're going to be hysterical, and then you put them in the game, and they're fine, but they're not amazing. That guy just brought that stuff to life. - Yeah. And his backstory too. I mean, Londoner and not... yeah, that... - Yeah, I think that was what... you know, just that it... there's something sometimes fun, you know, in...

The Strange Man's origin

10:08an English person saying the name Gavin is quite funny. I don't know why. - So, about the Strange Man, AKA, the Man in Black... Is there some element with Michael and the therapist in Grand Theft Auto V? Like, who is the Strange Man? - Well, the Strange Man was again... was, was, was someone we came up with quickly. It... we made Red Dead 1, and we... well, were making Red Dead 1, and we'd made this... we felt quite compelling story and quite interesting open world. But... and we'd already made a bunch of Grand Theft Autos, obviously, but unfortunately, we'd taken out the machine guns 'cause it was a cowboy game, apart from the big fixed position ones. And we'd taken out the cars, and we'd taken out the city and large numbers of pedestrians. So we

10:51essentially had a game about a dude riding a horse... ...around the desert. And it was quite... and it was quite boring. And so we then started filling it with content, and we filled it with these... and having to improvise. And we filled it with these things we call random events that would be these sort of motion-capture moments that you could interact with. And it... they were, they were... the designers did an amazing job with those. They were really fun. But there was not enough of them. And then we felt we needed more story 'cause the story was perhaps a little short. So we kind of quite late in development started putting in almost like these RPG-type content where you go and meet someone. And the way we thought of them was they were like short stories. So you go and meet

11:28someone, they'd set you a slow problem, like go and collect me 15 bunches of flowers. And when you came back, it would resolve your story. And so then, you know, one would go, "Go get them for my bride," and you come back and the bride's dead. You know, to... We tried to make them like these short stories with a sting in the tail. And he came out... as I was trying to come up with ideas for those, as just this weird character. And then we built him a bit into the story, where he would unlock as you worked your way through and be a commentary on what you were doing. So he was meant to be a kind of manifestation of your, you know, shadow, your karma, the devil, somewhere, you know, just saw the world. And then we built out his backstory over time

12:17and decided, you know... And so in Red Dead 2, you could interact with him again and... or not really interact with him. But he was there and he was meant to be, you know, something I suppose any creative is scared of, an artist who's kind of sold his soul to the devil. And that slowly revealed itself. - There is a connection between the main character and the... Is it like a Jungian shadow type of situation? - Well, it's sort of, because he knows what you're up to. The connection is... what's never really made clear is, does he know this about everybody? Like, is he following you, or is he able, because of the pact he's made with evil forces, able to do this for everybody? I don't think we necessarily ever clarify that. He's certainly able to do it for you.

Dr. Friedlander and therapy in GTA V

12:57- I mean, there's, sort of narrative-wise, there are techniques to reveal a kind of self-reflection analysis of the main character's thoughts. That's why I brought up the therapist with Michael. That was a really powerful, interesting thing to do in a video game. Like, I, I don't think I've seen... That's such a cool... I mean, there's a Sopranos element there, with the therapist. - A little bit, yeah. - I really love an opportunity for a character to just self-reflect through that technique. - But it also changed depending on what you'd done. - Yes. - So it was, it was sort of slightly... It wasn't as interactive as it could be, but it was slightly interactive, or slightly responsive to what you'd done.

13:38So it felt it was still valid video game content, 'cause it was living, up to a point. And I just thought the character, Dr. Friedlander, was just funny, 'cause he was awful. So it was like LA. You're in therapy. It's very LA. But it's also very LA, he wants to write a book and betray you. Which felt like a good, a good twist. It felt like a Grand Theft Auto therapist. But just like the idea of making the player in a game, and games are intrinsically kind of physical, and, you know, you... you walk, you punch things, you run around, you drive cars, you shoot people, whatever. There are these kind of physical fantasies. Trying to put them into a slightly more reflective or metaphysical state for a moment, I think can be really

14:17fun.