Well, almost everyone
A lot has changed in the months since I last checked in with Rust, Facepunch’s multiplayer survival sandbox on Steam Early Access, but much of the brutal experience remains the same.
The so-called reboot has become the default choice when launching the game on Steam, while the original version — which remains playable, I should add — is now marked as “legacy.”
There’s still plenty of humorous unfinished technical stuff, to be sure, but it’s coming along.
(Warning: tons of pictures ahead and some of them show butts!)
Different start-menu screen! It may seem like such a small thing to comment on, but it’s nice to see elements like these come together over time.
Last time I checked in, there was only a single server available. Tons of options now. Let’s go.
Huh. I clicked on the wake-up button but my character did not wake up. Frantically clicking all over the screen didn’t seem to help, either. No big deal. I’ll restart the game.
Thing is, the problem persisted in this new starting location.
And this one, too. That ass, tho.
Pressing Esc makes the screen go blurry, which is good to know but doesn’t exactly solve my problem. I caved and turned to Google for a solution: press F1 and type “respawn.” Hit enter.
We’re in business. Within two seconds of entering the game world, I heard deafening gunshots and feared for my life. That’s the Rust I remember. Feels good to be home.
Walked around for a bit and stumbled upon a rudimentary house.
Similar to my last playthrough, motion blur once again proved to be incredibly jarring and overdone. Pressing F2 will get you to the graphics menu, by the way.
You can play with the draw-distance slider in real time and watch as mountains start to vanish.
See?
I’m easily entertained. I can’t stress how important that is for an open-ended, emergent game like Rust where you’re largely supposed to make your own fun.
It was at this point I remembered that I never disabled motion blur, so I went to turn that off.
…and while doing so, some naked maniac murdered me.
Next spawn. This snow-covered environment is brand new to me. I’m noticing significantly more variation in terms of biomes with this latest build.
The user interface has been overhauled. I gathered some wood and made one of the few items I could with minimal supplies — a Salvaged Hammer.
Intricate design, considering I fashioned it out of wood obtained by bashing trees with a rock.
Went for a stroll and found whatever this thing is.
I don’t think that kind of design was possible in Rust since I last played.
I climbed to the top but fell trying to capture a good screenshot. There wasn’t anything up there.
Water now affects you in the ways you’d expect. As in, you can’t just live down there permanently.
Another spawn.
That structure far off in the distance caught my eye.
I had to do the old Elder Scrolls shimmy to scale this mountain.
Worked like a charm.
Score! I found a rock — the good kind — on the way up! Great for metal and sulfur ore.
Back to that mysterious structure.
Yeah, pretty cool. Unfortunately, the owner, who was wearing pants — a sure sign that he belonged to Rust‘s upper class — found me snooping. He politely asked what I was doing.
I said nothing, but slowly backed away and started walking. “Don’t engage and he’ll leave you alone,” I thought to myself. But he didn’t. He followed me! Minutes went by.
Still following me. In the game’s unfinished state, footsteps are extremely loud, so I knew he was trailing me. I knew. I tried to play it cool — to calmly walk, not run — but I was terrified.
Finally, I made it to these trees and turned around — the random player was gone. He didn’t brutally murder me! However, I did somehow lose my rock during the ordeal. Crap.
I thought I’d have to restart, but I discovered this guy sleeping peacefully. Do I feel good about robbing his only possession? No. But it’s a cruel world out there.
I put his rock to good use.
And continued harvesting resources late into the night.
Then I found a bag. Sure enough, there was a wolf skull in it. I don’t know what I was expecting.
Time to set up camp. It took me forever to figure out how to actually build, as the process has changed. Hint: put down your foundation and then hammer at it until stuff materializes.
Not too shabby, if I do say so myself. Gotta start small.
The building process is a llllittle janky right now.
Home sweet home. After setting the door in place, I went into my inventory to organize what remaining resources I had and, what the fuck? Some rando came in and killed me. Dude.
That’s Rust. You build something — it doesn’t even have to be good; in fact, it almost certainly won’t be — and someone will take it away. Just because they can.
With this new starting location, I did happen upon a warthog, finally. This was my first encounter with an animal and they’re a crucial part of making progress in the game.
Warthogs are known the world over for their coolness in the face of danger. Also, their mist-like blood. This majestic beast stood still while I repeatedly whacked him with a rock.
That is, until some rando unceremoniously bashed my head in. Ugh! Respawning…
Yeah, think I’m going to call it a night too.
