In the original Red Dead Redemption, the outlaw John Marston is kidnapped by an agent of the Pinkerton Detective Agency and forced to hunt down the members of the gang he used to ride with across a Grand Theft Auto-style recreation of the wild west. The Pinkertons also feature prominently in Red Dead Redemption II; the sequel is set before the first game, focusing on the stories of the Dutch van der Linde gang and Arthur Morgan, an antihero and potential mentor to Marston.
The very real and still existent detective agency (now known as Pinkerton Consulting & Investigations, a subsidiary of Securitas AB) issued a cease-and-desist order shortly after the game's release. The suit stated that while the agency and its parent company were depicted with "clear affection" in the games, they thought that the "goodwill" associated with the brand warranted a slice of the huge profits Red Dead II had racked up in just the first few months after its release.
