it's not that hard if you do a few things.

1) kill the other bears around so there's only 1
2) you only need to kill the bear with the knife, so you can shoot it a few times and then knife it
3) bears are fast but only for straight-aways so when you see one, jump off your horse and just run around to it's backside and you can get close to knife at it w/o mauling you

Started this last night. I'm already overwhelmed.

I got it with the bird/deer combo too. Not sure why it wasn't registering with all the other combos, but it finally worked so I'm happy.

This was probably the easiest one of the lot. I think I just walked out of town, shot a horse and a bird. Next. I didn't have any issues at all.

This game is unbelievable. The SECOND I go search for a specific animal to hunt, they completely disappear from the game. I've been riding around 15-20 minutes looking for a fucking wild horse to kill for the 100% completion and I can't find one, even though they are easily the most common animal I see (when I'm not searching for it, of course).

I finally got it, but died numerous times even taking this advice in. First, the bear would never spawn unless I was on foot, so that was frustrating. Second, 3 or 4 bears would spawn while I was chasing the wounded bear I had shot. Third, the bear always seemed to get me when I tried to roll away and then swipe at it.

However I ended up completing the challenge after I shot one in the face once with the Henry repeater, and then by blind luck managed to swipe at its face miliseconds before it was about to tackle me head on.

There was one mission in the story that requires you to kill a bear. I just saved it there or used the checkpoint and just kept trying until I got it. I experimented with bullets.

Take 1: One bullet. Two bullets. Three bullets... shit, he's dead. Jump off cliff, kill self.
Take 2: One bullet. Two bullets. Select knife. Ok, let's get close... FUCK! I'm dead.
Take 3: One bullet. Two bullets. WTF? He's dead? Jump off cliff, kill self.
Take 4: One bullet. Two bullets. And you get the idea

Same here. I can see this game taking priority over my social life for the next month or so.

Bait.

So my brother and I started up the co-op missions last night and had a blast. It quickly became apparent we need more people. If anyone is up for joining up, let me know. Also, don't ignore my invites (TheNightFlier! )

Brother or bro?

Send me an invite if I'm online when you're doing the missions. I've gone through them all before.

Both?

You sent me an invite? I never got it.

I was playing the Casual playlists till at least 1. I haven't even played the co-op missions for it, I'd be down.

Twice!

Weird, but like I said, I'm down for the co-ops since I haven't played them yet.

The casual playlist is just too much damn fun.

in a good way or bad?

if i was never really into the GTA games, will i like this one?

I despise GTA, I love RDR.

To be fair, I despise the setting and tone of GTA, not the necessarily gameplay. Even if I hated the gameplay, I think the story and experience of RDR would supersede that.

I had a hard time getting into GTA IV and I love RDR

good for pick up and play in short bursts?

How short? The story has a bunch of missions. Those missions are not very long, usually. I suppose you could do that, but I really think you'll have a hard time putting it down unless you have to.

On the surface, RDR feels exactly like GTAIV. But after you get into it, the more you realize they've more or less kept all the good stuff and thrown all the bad stuff.

Only thing I really missed was the car radio.

sounds good. thanks for the tips.

The issue is that many missions have fairly long exposition (cutscenes and dialogue exchanges) before you get down to business. Remember how you had to drive to the destination in GTA? You can skip it unless you have to ride a horse, but you'll miss the story that way.

You can pick up and play the multiplayer in short bursts. There are plenty of things to screw around with in small bits and bites. Just depends on how you want to explore.

If you want your progress, like your XP kept though, be sure to finish something to get the game to save (you can't save manually in multiplayer). This could include finishing a gang hideout, leveling up, or completing a free roam challenge such as sharpshooter, hunter, etc. You'll see the "saving" message when it happens.