Video Games: Redemption is dead-on awesome

“Red Dead Redemption”

Rockstar Games

PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

Gunman… “Red Dead Redemption”

Rockstar Games

PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

Gunman John Marston is a dying breed of man.

Quick with his pistol and wearing his hatred of authority like a French cuff on the edge of his musty sleeve, Marston’s antihero persona is reflective of the rough-and-tumble United States of 1911.

Behind a long, sun-baked horizon an eternity of revolutionaries, whores, drug peddlers and plain-old killers surround him as he seeks a second chance with his sidearm.

He is — in case you couldn’t figure it out — the bounty hunter protagonist of this summer’s video game of note, “Red Dead Redemption.”

In Marston’s tale of moral ambiguity, Rockstar Games — renowned for its similarly free-form “Grand Theft Auto” series — has created not only one of the greatest gaming experiences to ever grace a console, but also demonstrated the art’s ability to be an emotionally mature experience.

Marston’s M-rated escapades run the gamut from his own tale of betrayal and violence to random encounters with “strangers” who require his considerable skills, all the while navigating an immersive Western environment teeming with banditos, outlaws and dangerous wild animals.

This impressive array of content could sell by itself in this era of unabashed video game violence, but with an option to do good or bad — to forge one’s own moral path — the experience becomes much more complex.

For instance, when the moment of death comes to one of Marston’s more formidable bounty targets, the player is faced with a choice: He may either end the man’s life or allow Marston’s honor to take over — resulting in the man’s death at the hands of Mexican revolutionaries.

These actions have reactions, and, although “Grand Theft Auto”-style killing sprees are possible, the true object of the game lies in the building of Marston as a complex man — whether you create a persona that’s good, bad or — more likely — somewhere in between.

The film critic Roger Ebert famously said that video games can “never be art,” but after seeing the emotionally wracked complexity of both the heroes and villains in the game’s story line, any fan of the Western genre can see that Marston is far more complex than your average poncho-wearing maniac. The game’s heroes and villains often do contradictory things and, above all, act as humanely as any movie character might.

The Wild West is not just one idea — it’s a series of conflicting issues, people, places and things as vast as the real America they reflect. Though the concept of a free-roaming western — killing and all — might sound like the last thing video games need to be considered art, the complex and entertaining experience of “Red Dead Redemption” proves that interactive entertainment is emerging as — pun intended — a new frontier.