Red Dead Redemption 2 - How to Play Five Finger Fillet and Win

Learn how to play Five Finger Fillet and win in Red Dead Redemption 2. Sometimes, even when you’re resting, you want to add a little spice to your side activities. Why bother with strategy when instincts will do? That’s where Five Finger Fillet comes into play. Returning from the original Red Dead Redemption with some improvements, Five Finger Fillet is all about keeping your wits about you as you perform laps with your knife. In Red Dead 2, Five Finger Fillet has several new twists, and you’ll want to know about them before your first challenge.

For those new to the franchise, Five Finger Fillet is a game where you need to quickly stab a knife back and forth between the fingers of your outstretched palm. You want to avoid stabbing yourself while also getting back and forth as quickly as possible. Completing this trip once is called a lap. After each lap, you stab the knife into the center of the table, inviting your opponent to start his round.

When playing in Red Dead Redemption 2, a lap is achieved via quick button presses. Each sequence will display at the start of a lap, and you have to hit the buttons in order without fail. Any hesitation or mistimed button presses will result in a quick stab and a losing round.

Before starting in the game, you must pony up a wager. After winning one round, new opponents will arrive at the table, often raising the stakes and the difficulty. In these situations, you can press Cross/A to accept the challenge or hold Circle/B to leave while you’re ahead.

Red Dead Redemption 2 Five Finger Fillet – How to Play Guts and Win

Unlike the first game, Red Dead Redemption 2 has three different variants of Five Finger Fillet. No matter what you choose, you’ll need to perform the objective better than your opponent to win a round. Each game is split into multiple rounds, with the person who claims the best of two taking the winnings for themselves.

Classic takes Five Finger Fillet back to its roots. You need to complete a certain number of laps more swiftly than your foe. You get five chances to improve your score, but you’ll fail one attempt if you stab yourself. Any failed attempts will also result in you starting from the beginning with a reset timer.
In Guts, the number of laps you complete around your hand is up to you. You have twenty seconds to get as many full laps as possible, but any mistakes will eat into your remaining time and give your opponent an advantage.
Burnout takes Guts to a whole other level. You have an extended timer here, up the 30 seconds instead of 20. However, you need to complete as many laps as you can without making any mistakes. There aren’t any retries here either. Make one mistake and it’s game over.

Red Dead Redemption 2 – Five Finger Fillet Tips and Tricks

Before you start any round of Five Finger Fillet, you have the opportunity to practice your skills. You can do up to three practice rounds on the table to remind yourself of this fast-paced gameplay. Just hold down Square/X when you sit down. Practice records your best times alongside the main game, giving you an extra incentive to give it your all.

If you hold R2/LT while your opponent is playing Five Finger Fillet, you can scope out the patterns they’re performing. This will give you a slight advantage, as you’ll know what’s coming when it’s your turn to start speeding through laps. Just be sure to memorize the button combination before he’s good and finished.

If you’re feeling like a showoff, you can end a round of Five Finger Fillet with a flourish. Tap L1/LB at the right time as you finish a full lap in order to perform a knife trick. If it’s near the end of your turn, you can hit the button to perform a trick as you spike it into the table and pass play to your partner. This knife spiking trick will only appear if you performed particularly well during the last round.