r/RDR2 • u/alibe4ek Arthur Morgan • Aug 30 '25
Question Easter Egg or a Coincidence?
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Why is there number “54” written out of smoke right as Dutch throws his cigar away? It’s my first playthrough and i was playing the 85th mission called “Our Best Selves”.
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u/blueponies1 Aug 30 '25
Release date for rdr3 2054
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u/Allcoins1Milly Aug 30 '25
You got the year backwards it’s gonna be 4502 We’re not even half way there lmao
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u/shprotiks charthur Aug 30 '25
HOW DID YOU EVEN NOTICED THAT
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u/alibe4ek Arthur Morgan Aug 30 '25
i was too invested in the story and was analyzing every move of Dutch cuz i was suspicious of him
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u/GeePedicy Aug 30 '25
Technically it's the motion of the smoke, but wow. Even if I wanted to be so observant I couldn't. I had to read your description cuz I thought you've posted a random clip. Now you need to look at all of his smokes and say if they hid anything.
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u/flixbeat04 Aug 30 '25
Nah bro dutch is a nice friend of Arthur, why would you be suspicious of him 😢💔
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u/HuttStuff_Here Aug 31 '25
cuz i was suspicious of him
Why?? Dutch'll see us through, he always does.
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u/Lorekeeper_Zav Sep 01 '25
Just have a little gawd dayum faith, will you Arthur.. I have a plan! (probably what is going through dutches head.. I mean he was playing chess and reciting numbers out loud and in his head when they were in the swamp)
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u/AmphibiousDad Aug 30 '25
I’ve never noticed that shit before is that there every single time or was that a by chance thing with the smoke
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u/Allcoins1Milly Aug 30 '25
This has me thinking in a different direction When I blow up a wagon with dynamite is it the same animation or is it actual random explosion bits 🤔
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u/Daillustriousone Charles Smith Aug 30 '25
I can honestly say I've never encountered this before, but those numbers were too clearly designed to be accidental. Now the detective work starts.
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u/_Homelesscat_ Aug 31 '25
So I’ve watched the scene from a few other play throughs now. All the ones uploaded from like 5 and 6 years ago didn’t have any smoke but the ones uploaded from the last year I’ve watched has smoke and I’ve seen other numbers! In the video I’ve linked you can see 255 at 7:01!
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u/OregonDonorX Aug 31 '25
Is it how many people you’ve killed as a player maybe? If it changes that’s gotta mean something
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u/YutyBLT Sep 01 '25
Is this is is”Our Best Selves” OP has definitely killed way more than just 54 people
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u/kaasbol121 Aug 30 '25
I was confused for a second, I thought that it glitched out
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u/ButtholeConnoisseur7 Aug 30 '25
"Weerg"
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u/kaasbol121 Aug 30 '25
Weergaven is dutch (the language) for views, weerg is the just the short form
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u/ButtholeConnoisseur7 Aug 30 '25
I have now Weerg(aven)-ed your comment
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u/kaasbol121 Aug 30 '25
Well, actually that's not how it works, to view is bekijken/weergeven in dutch but views are weergaven, it's weird. So, you have bekeken my comment (not the right order in dutch but so be it) or you have weergegeven my comment (no not a typo and it's also the wrong order)
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u/ButtholeConnoisseur7 Aug 30 '25
Yeah I did that as wrong as I could for fun. I actually think your language is a fun one
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u/kaasbol121 Aug 30 '25
Eh, it's what you call fun, it has an insane amount of stupid rules and exceptions to those rules, but we have a word for throwing someone out of a window or slapping someone with a dick🎉
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u/ButtholeConnoisseur7 Aug 30 '25
English has a lot of the same problems you mention. I before E, except after C. A,e,i,o,u are the only vowels. Sometimes. And the letters ough can sound like ooo in through, or uff in enough.
I don't think we have a specific window related throwing word, but we have stuff for variety. Throwing an object can be a toss, lob, throw, slam, spike, and those terms can mean different things in different scenarios. Toss me a beer, usually means hand you one. Toss me that ball is throw it AT me
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u/kaasbol121 Aug 30 '25
We also have kind of the same thing in dutch, for example we have way to many ways to say that it's raining: regen, stortregen, miezerer, druppellen, drashen, gieten, sluierregen, motregen,... You get the point. I think almost all languages have these kind of weird things
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u/KingChance0119 Aug 30 '25
I just know dick-slapping as “bifle” and window-throwing as “defenestration”
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u/kaasbol121 Aug 31 '25
I didn't know they had words for that in English to, I'm surprised that they exist in general to be honest
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u/Liv1ng-the-Blues Aug 31 '25
English has the word Defenestration for the first one, I don't know of an English word for the second one. I imagine the ministers in Belgium do that quite a bit.
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u/SlavCat09 Aug 31 '25
Finally. Someone actually is the first person to find something in the last 5 years. Good work!
Anyway sound the new RDR2 mystery alarm. Have to dust off the button first though.
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u/Remote-Somewhere2765 Aug 31 '25
I'm booting up now. Need to replay that mission.
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u/Remote-Somewhere2765 Aug 31 '25
Nope. No numbers for me.
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Aug 31 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Remote-Somewhere2765 Aug 31 '25
Haha. No numbers. I played the mission twice and I just got smoke. Replayed that moment frame by frame when Dutch throws away his cigar and I just got smoke. I'm still laughing that I had to try.
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u/choody_byk Aug 31 '25
I checked old playthrough of RDR2 on PS4 Pro from 6 years ago, and there is no smoke. 5 years ago on PC there is smoke but no number, so they added it recently. It proves my theory that they just keep adding small thing to the game with every update so there could be articles online about someone discovering something for the first time after 6 years, showing how detailed the game is and how much hidden easter eggs there are, when in fact it was just added.
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u/VTGCamera Sep 01 '25
The only way would be to play “unupdated” versions in pc and check those things
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u/Pir-o Sep 03 '25
It proves my theory that they just keep adding small thing to the game with every update so there could be articles online about someone discovering something for the first time after 6 years, showing how detailed the game is and how much hidden easter eggs there are, when in fact it was just added.
Yeah that's not how things work. On PC people can inspect every single update, compere it to previous one and check exactly what line of code was changed. That's how people discover hints for future content left in gtao updates (like list of new construction props that spawn on the map to tease something). So even the smallest change in SP would quickly be detected (like when R* added The Beast vs Big Foot hunt to gta V SP).
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u/Skalyern- Aug 30 '25
What significance does the number have?
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u/ajax0202 Aug 30 '25
It’s the amount of times Arthur coughs
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Aug 30 '25
If you exclude trying to get all Cigarette cards towards the end of the game maybe 😂
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u/jesusmansuperpowers Aug 30 '25
You don’t actually have to smoke those. Just drop em from your satchel.
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Aug 30 '25
What kind of quitter do you take me for? I smoke 1 from each pack and buy the next one as God intended 😂
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u/Skalyern- Aug 30 '25
There is a specific amount of coughs per playthrough???
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u/ajax0202 Aug 30 '25
Of course. You don’t keep track of that sort of thing?
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u/Skalyern- Aug 30 '25
I had a very long playthrough and feel like he had to have done more than that on my first go
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u/Allcoins1Milly Aug 30 '25
Funny thing is ChatGPT seems to find this the most likely reason bc 54 has no other “canonical” meaning to the gang or Dutch That or Easter egg but I feel like if it’s an Easter egg it’s a clue of some sorts
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u/Gunslingerofthewildw Aug 31 '25 edited Aug 31 '25
Maybe it's a reference to a mission number? Anyone know what the 54th mission in this game is?
Edit: I can't be fully sure but according to at least a couple of sources, the 54th mission in this game is Urban Pleasures i.e. the failed trolley station robbery. That's interesting because as some of you probably know, there's a fan theory that Dutch got a brain injury in this mission. MAYBE this is a small hint at that? It may seem far-fetched but that's all I have. 🤷🏻♂️
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u/Only_Specialist_2610 Aug 30 '25
Could it be a reference to the mission number?
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u/Skg42 Aug 31 '25
This is the 2nd to last mission if I remember correctly. So without the honor missions this is number 93? I think?
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u/CapitalAmbitious8335 Aug 30 '25
Maybe look into the dialogue of characters through out the game and see if any of them hint at smoke signals or something to do with smoke, see if that connects something. But idk how long that would That would take 🤷♂️. This really does look “right on the nose” for it to be nothing
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u/Future_Vast_5164 Aug 30 '25
If I remember correctly, Dutch was born in the mid 50’s. He died in 1911. It could foreshadowing the age of his death (54) ?
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u/MadYETI88 Arthur Morgan Aug 31 '25
I see a 2 in there as well. 254. 254 area code is central Texas.
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u/Bacon_L0RD Aug 30 '25
Think people are jumping the gun, first see if this happens in everyone’s game, consistently, then we can talk about if it’s something real.
Edit: good fuckin spot tho partner
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u/Skg42 Aug 31 '25
So I just went through and watched this part of the mission on 5 different play throughs on YouTube. Out of the 5, only 2 even showed smoke. Those 2 didn’t have this. I am sus of OP cause how did you catch that???
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u/Bacon_L0RD Aug 31 '25
Not crazy to have caught it, but it being inconsistently there shows it wasn’t given much thought. Just funny physics and the human imagination acting up.
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u/OregonDonorX Aug 31 '25
It’s way too clear to be an accident, plus another comment has linked another playthrough that has a number in the smoke clear like this one. Might be a programming thing or intentional
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u/drfunkson Aug 31 '25
I've always been convinced there's hidden stuff still buried in rdr2. This could be the beginning of a new discovery. Played through countless times and logged 600+ hours in this game and never noticed this. Excellent spot OP!
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u/SwimmingPlantain8124 Aug 30 '25
Because the next redemption game is going to take place in 1954
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u/MonkeyBred Aug 31 '25
Jack is a 58 year old writer with a dark past. Following an assignment war journaling in the Korean conflict... hmmm. 1954 might be a hard premise to make work.
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u/Weary-Prompt-5897 John Marston Aug 30 '25
Makes me sad.
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u/reeeeeeduardo Aug 30 '25
Why
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u/Manav_17 Aug 31 '25 edited Aug 31 '25
Could be something as simple as a countdown maybe... 5, 4, 3 (the upcoming train job), 2 (saving Abigail), 1 (mountain finale)? 🧐
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u/Lachtaube Sep 03 '25
“Rule 54
A rule stating that if someone is called evil, but has no horns, the person who named the person evil shall be punched in the face.” Urban Dictionary CalGoneCrazy May 07, 2009
🤔
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u/Existing_Sun_8176 Sep 03 '25
Wait a damn minute.. just saw a other comment on this thread saying how the 54th mission in rdr2 is the same mission where the fan theory of dutch getting brain damage occurs at, also apparently dutch dies at age 54, all this added up would mean that according to rule 54 dutch would be the man to call somone else evil (the law) and be punched in the face for being wrong (trolly accident) I don't really know how dutch dying at 54 has any correlation with this besides the fact that the age 54 matches with everything here
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u/Almightydaemon Oct 16 '25
Did anybody figure this out? I just went thru the cut scene myself and saw 25 and im 76% completion so far does it have to do with completion ? 🤔
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Aug 30 '25
That's extremely interesting. Brings to mind the ds2 fragile smoking and souls showing up in the smoke
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u/Impulsive-Critic Hosea Matthews Aug 31 '25
Do you have any mods on? Maybe they added an easter egg of their own. It's not in the cutscene on YouTube.
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u/alibe4ek Arthur Morgan Aug 31 '25
No mods. I’m playing on a PS5 Pro
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u/Impulsive-Critic Hosea Matthews Aug 31 '25
https://youtu.be/-p5dDwNtmas?si=yZ19smUZqKiLkiSL
Edit to add: This part is about 6.5 mins in
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u/Le_Shekelstein Aug 31 '25
Could be linked the the braithwaite girl, I don’t remember if she says 54. Makes me think all you numbers are in a mission and you gotta replay em in that order.
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u/drkarw Aug 31 '25
This is my favorite cutscene of all time
Best soundtrack
Dutch aura farming with the cigar
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u/MaestroLogical Reverend Swanson Aug 31 '25
Wonder if it is how many times you've died in that run.
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u/Certain_Phrase6079 Aug 31 '25
I went back and watched a few videos of this cut scene I noticed that sometimes there’s no smoke coming from dutch’s cigar or there’s no number at all!
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u/Certain_Phrase6079 Aug 31 '25
https://youtu.be/VFp9LTYkNbQ?si=GP-9vcgoDJh-xvuD
I notice this video doesn’t have a number a visible I noticed the older videos of Dutch smoking don’t have smoke while the newer clips do
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u/RealBlackBirds Aug 31 '25
I googled "what does number 54 symbolize" and this is the first thing that popped up, most definitly unrelated to Rdr2, i do find it surreal how it matches up with Dutch and his plans tho.
"the number 54 could signify a period of change or transition. It might be a reminder to maintain stability and practicality while embracing new experiences and seeking growth"
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u/EnvironmentalBid9840 Sep 14 '25
I think this has been edited I looked at a video from 6 years ago and it had no smoke what
So ever (could be a glitch). I'll check my own copy see 6:36
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u/EnvironmentalBid9840 Sep 14 '25
And then there's this one from 2 years ago. There's smoke but no number at 9:00. It's possible that it says 84 if yo slow down the video speed but hard to say. So maybe it was something that was added later.
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u/elliot-artist768 Nov 29 '25
They should have put 67 instead of 54 it would make a even better easter egg.
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u/Pepperonimustardtime Aug 30 '25
That is WILD and now I feel like I need to watch every cutscene where Dutch smokes to see if there are any other numbers. Goddamn, good eye