In December of last year, an update to the still fairly nascent Red Dead Redemption Online made it so that hunting became a lot less viable as a way to make money in the game. This incensed a number of players who felt like the game was forcing them to other aspects of the online that they didn’t enjoy as much, like the PVP. One thread on the game’s subreddit called it “a slap in the face.”
It turns out that, according to Rockstar, the reasoning for nerfing the monetary gain for hunting was an intentional fix to a bug. A new update on Rockstar’s support site finally clarified the situation.
“Prior to Title Update 1.06 a bug caused sales of skinned animal carcasses to be the same as a whole unskinned animal, despite the animal’s parts having been already harvested,” the support answer reads. “This meant players could skin the animal and sell the carcass and the parts separately to make more than intended. Sales of animals and animal products now pay out correctly; no sell prices of animal parts or whole animals have been changed, only the value of a skinned carcass has been corrected.”
It is unclear why it took Rockstar several months to answer this question, but they did eventually answer it. It seems like the original way it worked since launch was not the intended way, so it’s a nerf to players, but not one to Rockstar.
Red Dead Redemption II and Red Dead Online are on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
Source: Game Informer Red Dead Online Hunting Nerf Officially Explained By Rockstar