Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption 2 is out now and it’s a gigantic game with a massive game world, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that it has a few bugs. Some of these are annoying and some are just terrifying, but possibly the most game-breaking is the Red Dead Redemption 2 camp characters missing bug. If you’re unlucky enough to encounter it you may miss out on some missions, including the one that teaches you how to fish. But what is this bug, how do you avoid it, and how do you fix it?
What is the Red Dead Redemption 2 Camp Characters Missing Bug?
Players have reported this particularly frustrating bug, which unfortunately is also easy to run into by accident. It doesn’t break the game permanently, but it can certainly lead to a few of the most interesting characters being gone for a good chunk of Chapter 2, not to mention the player missing out on some missions.
Basically, the bug means that the characters of Sadie Adler, Abigail Marston, and Jack Marston (John Marston’s son) will not appear in Chapter 2’s Horseshoe Overlook camp. Players are also reporting that Red Dead Redemption protagonist John Marston himself may not appear either. At the very least, John may be around during certain missions and to hand out his own key story missions, but during regular camp exploration, all four characters are totally absent.
Obviously these are some very significant characters to be missing from the game. The Marston family were at the heart of the beloved first Red Dead Redemption and so players were obviously looking forward to spending more time with them. Similarly, Sadie Adler is a major new character, and she was introduced very memorably in Chapter 1. Therefore, it’s frustrating not to spend more time with these people. So how do you sort this out?
How to Avoid the Camp Characters Missing Bug
Once you know the bug exists it’s easy to avoid, but if you don’t know that it’ll happen then you’ll almost certainly hit it by accident. We did, for sure. Basically, what causes the bug is doing the Uncle mission “Polite Society, Valentine Style.” It’s the first mission after you set up camp on Horseshoe Overlook, so you may have done it the second you arrived there at the beginning of Chapter 2. Hopefully, you took advantage of the big open world now available to you instead.
In short: don’t do the Uncle mission, at least not straight away. First, you need to look around the camp and talk to Sadie, Abigail, John, and Jack before you do anything else. Then, just for good measure, you have to sleep in the camp at least once. This will make sure all four characters continue to appear at the gang hideout.
It can be difficult to judge whether you are affected by this bug or not, as one of the big points about the new gang camp is that characters are coming and going all the time, such as earning money in other towns. They may simply be elsewhere, or there may be a mission with them elsewhere in the world. However, if you’ve done Uncle’s mission and all four of these characters are missing for you, there’s a good chance you’ve been hit by the Red Dead Redemption 2 Camp Characters Missing bug. So what do you do about it?
How to Fix the Camp Characters Missing Bug
Unfortunately, as of right now, there is no fix for the missing camp character bug. Rockstar may well be aware of the issue, it seems a rather obvious one, but until a patch for it drops we’re just stuck playing through the game without Sadie and the Marston family, which makes a big difference.
The tutorial for fishing, for example, is only available if Jack Marston is in the camp, so if you have the bug and he’s disappeared you won’t be able to learn how to fish (you’ll have to do it yourself). Not to mention, of course, that this is an entire mission you’ll be locked out of. Apparently the characters do start reappearing again somewhere around Chapter 3, so until a fix from Rockstar is made available we’ll just have to keep enjoying the open world until they come back.
