New Red Dead Announcement Teased By Rockstar Games

Rockstar Games is teasing an announcement related to Red Dead with a red version of its iconic logo. The studio's Twitter, Facebook, and official website all now prominently feature the logo instead of its traditional black and yellow or white one. The Rockstar Newswire, where the studio delivers the latest announcements, also features the image.

The color red was a key component of Red Dead Redemption's visual aesthetic, most noticeably used in promotional artwork and its loading screens. This is what connects the tease to the acclaimed Western series. It is unclear, however, whether the tease is for a re-release of Red Dead Redemption or the long-awaited follow-up.

In April 2016, an image of what was said to be the map for Red Dead Redemption 2's game world appeared online. At the time, "a source close to the development of the new Red Dead game" was reported as confirming it as "a very recent art direction map." This leak gives some weight to the speculation that an entirely new game could be announced soon.

The original Red Dead Redemption was released for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in May 2010. It is not playable on PlayStation 4 but was added to list of titles supported by Xbox One backwards compatibility in July.

The other possible outcome from this tease is a re-release of Red Dead Redemption for PS4. On October 11, Red Dead Revolver--the first game in the series--was re-released on PS4, which could have been paving the way for Redemption.

When Red Dead Redemption was added to the list of backwards compatible titles on Xbox One, sales of the base version of game and the Game of the Year Edition on Xbox 360 skyrocketed. Amazon's sales ranking noted a 6329% rise in sales and it became the 17th most popular video game on the site, rising from No. 1093. With this in mind, Rockstar would certainly have good cause to ensure a PS4 version is available in some form.

There's also an outside chance that the tease could be for a PC version of Red Dead Redemption, which has been a popular request. However, in September 2015, Kris Roberts, lead multiplayer designer on Redemption, said Rockstar "never seriously considered" a PC version and that it was "pretty much always" going to be only a console title.

Since then, Rockstar has been more open to releasing its games on PC. Its most recent title, Grand Theft Auto 5, was made available on the platform and has cultivated a thriving community of players, modders, and content creators. Before this, Max Payne 3 was also released on PC.

Rockstar's parent company, Take-Two, has never officially teased or confirmed a new Red Dead title is in development. However, the company's chief executive, Strauss Zelnick, suggested one is inevitable by describing Red Dead as a "permanent" property, much like Grand Theft Auto.

In May, Take-Two said it will announce new games "soon," but added that none of these will be out until April 2017 at the very earliest.