Yesterday, Rockstar Games released a brand new Red Dead Redemption 2 trailer introducing main character Arthur Morgan and the Van der Linde gang, a gang that fans of the previous entries in the series surely know. While we didn't know about the character before yesterday, there was somebody some time ago who correctly revealed the main character's name.
As NeoGAF user Simo noted, an older Red Dead Redemption 2 leak did indeed talk of a main character named Arthur and the return of some of the Van der Linde gang members. If the story information leaked does indeed fall in line with what has been revealed officially, there's a good chance that the rest is also true.
You play a gang leader named Arthur. The biggest change made to the game is you have a posse. If I remember correctly, the story kind of starts when you find out someone in your outlaw gang is a pinkerton spy. The pinkertons end up having you on the run through most of the game. You acquire lots of members of your gang such as John Marston, Abigail, little Jack, and others. The core mechanic of the game is having to maintain and continuously move your outlaw camp. When you go on a mission you will choose who to take with you, similar to mass effect or dragon age. The game spans five zones. A directive they keep getting is to make the environments more interactive like skyrim. Whatever that means.
*POTENTIAL END GAME STUFF*
[spoiler] There is kind of a game plus like like the last one had. You end up at Beechers Hope and switch control to John Marston. There are then lots of quests etc dealing with building up your ranch. You literally will do x And Z to build a gazebo. I heard someone designed a mini game where you help a mare give birth that had people laughing. [/spoiler]
The last I heard, which was a few months ago, the game was kind of stuck in development hell of sorts. Then team kept remaking a vertical slice demo for the leaders of rockstar and they aren't impressed... They didn't find it different enough or innovative enough. Hopefully they got out of that rut.
I've also heard that since gta5 morale at rockstar SD had been bad. Long timers are quitting. Lots of turnover. Lots of frustration.
As this leak comes with an anonymous source, we still have to take everything with a grain of salt until more comes in on the matter.
Red Dead Redemption 2 launches next year on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in all regions. We will keep you updated on the game as soon as possible, so stay tuned for all the latest news.