Important Info: http://www.rustmap.net (it's the map, duh)
Rust is in Early Access Alpha, like seemingly every game that comes out on Steam these days, but I didn't start playing it until recently. Up until a month ago, my computer couldn't actually run it, but I didn't get Rust right away even when I got a new computer because I'm not an Alpha guy. I appreciate the idea of it in the sense it can help fine-tune a game, at least according to what the gamers want, but I don't really have that much of an interest in playing an unfinished game.
But Rust -- and DayZ, though I haven't gotten that -- was a special case for me. I love and hate the idea of it. Since I've never played a game like this before, meaning a survival game with a lot of emphasis on PvP, Rust is intriguing to me. Take Minecraft and DayZ and throw them together, get rid of zombies and ta-da, you got a game that sounds awesome.
Yet also kind of, potentially terrible. This could be a game that's destined to either "Best Game Ever" or "Rage Quit On The Daily" status. What do I mean by this? Glad I asked.
The building is simple. You gather resources and build a house. Games like Minecraft have been doing this for years, and I spent a fair amount of time playing Terraria. I like this gameplay innovation and enjoy that more games do it. These resources also add to the survival aspects because you have to kill animals and cook your food, while keeping yourself warm and safe from the elements. You can craft various weapons to protect yourself. It's still in basic stages but it's fun, though I don't know for how long because there isn't a whole lot you can do right now.
Oh yeah, there's also perma-death so if you die, you lose everything you have on you.
The selling point for Rust was the PvP, at least for me. The idea of meeting randoms in a post-apocalyptic world, not knowing if they will be friendly or hostile, is a turn-on. Seeing how a social infrastructure would form is fascinating. Will you meet someone who will be part of building a village in order to survive? Will a giant group of people just walk around slaughtering everyone?
I was going to piece together a highlight video of me playing Rust, but this hasn't happened yet (keeping it open for the future though) for a couple reasons.
- Elder Scrolls Online is now out so I have to put time into that, while still trudging through Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls.
- There aren't enough highlights to even warrant a video at this point.
Day 1 - Play For Maybe 5 And A Half Hours... Enjoyed Maybe 30 Minutes
My brother and I buy Rust because it's about teaming up more than going alone, at least in theory. Pumped to play, even if it is Alpha, we fire it up. We spawn in an area we obviously aren't familiar with as a bald man with a rock, and we wonder how to invite each other so we can play together.
Only you can't. So we walk, walk, walk and walk. We occasionally die from either animals, because we think that our rock can kill some of these, or humans that are better equipped than us. Hell, sometimes other noobs with rocks attack us too.
When we die we respawn in an area we still don't know. We wonder if there's a map... nope. No compass, nothing. We are out in this brand new area, completely unaware of the environment. Lost, confused, but not yet angry, we both travel, trying desperately to find one another. We notice that there's a road, so we walk the road because we figure that's out best chance.
Bad idea. That's a perfect area for people to kill us.
So we walk around some more. Even though there are buildings populating the area, they're mostly all just wood with metal doors. Sure, they're different sizes, but everything looks the same in this game. I understand going for realism, but it's very hard to navigate in this game, especially for someone like me who is apparently terrible at navigation. Since it's a game and not real-life, it would be nice to have a compass or something. Though later I learn that you can follow the sun and moon, but I can't be bothered to do that because I suck.
If people aren't killing us, they're asking us if we're friendly. Sometimes people kill you regardless of what you say.
Eventually I find someone nice who gives me some stuff, like a gun. This is almost two hours in, and while I'm aware that meeting friendly people is basically dependent on when you're playing, it's nice to see someone who isn't trying to kill me.
I still haven't found my friend, and this guy says I can stay there but I tell him that I'm looking for my friend, I say "Thanks for the stuff" and I go on my way. Luckily I eventually find my brother and the game is fun for probably half an hour. We manage to craft a single sleeping bag that I use because my brother knows that I always get lost, and we go out to get more cloth (which is needed to make sleeping bags). For those who don't know, the sleeping bag is a god-send. It is what you use to set up camp, meaning when you have a sleeping bag, you can now respawn at that sleeping bag.
We also build a small shack with a wooden door and a box to put our stuff in. We have no materials to make a metal door.
The best encounter of the night is when we're walking by some houses (who are our neighbours), and it gets tense. There is someone on top of the roof, and we hear them talking. The basic conversation goes like this:
Them: There are people there.
Us: We're friendly. [We keep running, but they keep talking about us]
Them: Is that a gun? [I still have a gun at this point]
My Brother: Yes, this is a gun. [He admits later to me that he figured that would either make them back off or make them come get us... it was badass how he said it to them though]
It's a small moment, but it's where Rust shines.
Eventually my brother dies and we're separated once again. We continue looking for one another, repeating the process from before, and at one point he's in an area that has absolutely nothing there. Eventually we quit for the night and we don't even think we like the game.
 |
| "Make friends." That's... arguable. |
Day 2 - First Ever Raid, But We Enjoy The Game
I get a few texts while I'm at work from my brother who says that there is a map online, and that some servers allow you to teleport to people. There are also starter kits in some servers. We apparently hadn't chosen one of them, but we choose not to start over again because we do already have one sleeping bag laid down. Surely it can't be too hard to find each other and make another?
We turn on the game and we've gotten raided. It was our fault -- we created a wooden door which is pretty easy to knock down. Everything we managed to get is gone, and it's frustrating, but we knew something like this could happen.
But this is where a big complain of mine comes into play. The idea of raiding houses is fine and probably necessary, because this kind of thing would happen in the real world. But I wish there were some sort of system set-up that you could be notified, at least if you're sleeping in your house, when someone is raiding you. Think about it: in the real world if you're sleeping in a house and people are banging down your door, you'll probably hear it. I'm not a game developer, and I'm not sure how you'd implement anything to help, but I wish it existed. Though it's not realistic, it'd be nice to be told who raided your house.
We start over again, and eventually find one another. I think this is the point that we put down another sleeping bag, and I could be wrong here, but I think I enjoyed playing the game the rest of the night. Sure you had people who kill on sight (KOSer), but I believe I started meeting people. I'm not that social in real-life, but I seem to like mingling in this game. We have some neighbours and sometimes the area they're in is a death trap, but mostly it's pretty cool.
We get resources, build up the house, and I believe this is where we put in metal doors.
One encounter I remember is when I walk up to a house and there's a guy standing there. This is the basic conversation.
Me: Yo. What's up?
[Someone else walks out of the building, I think I'm going to die]
Guy 2: Woo we have a party!
Me: Yeah!
[Another guy arrives, with clothes on. I think I'm going to die]
Guy 3 (With Clothes): Hey, what's up?
Me: My gay life mate is back at the house so I'm out here looking for a good time.
Guy 3: Oh daaaaaamn. Want to come back to my place? I have lots of animal fat to show you.
Me: Oh that's tempting. I have a giant rock.
Time passes, having gay talk.
Me: Well I have to go now guys, I'll be back later for the orgy.
I laugh and tell this story to a friend when I see him. Rust makes you want to act gay if you're a guy because you're a half-naked (though you can choose not to censor your giant wang as far as I know) bald man. I don't know. Just seems right.
Day 3 - The Most Fun I've Had In Rust
It's not a day unlike the others. We mine resources, my brother gets really into building a house, and I'm apparently a social butterfly because fuck survival, I want to party. #YOLO
I have a lot of fun on Day 3. I make a friend, who I won't call out here because I learn some things about him later on. We keep running into each other, and he could easily kill me but doesn't. The first time I meet him he asks me what's up and I say I'm trying to figure out who raided my house. He laughs, and I tell him I'm a detective on a case. He could have very well have been the one who raided me.
While we're talking someone shoots at him. But not me. Later on I wonder if the guy shooting was protecting me. We try to find the guy, I say I'll try to draw him out because I don't have anything anyway, but me and my friend end up getting separated when he says he's going to go around the mountain.
So now Detective Tyler has two goals:
- Find out who raided my house.
- Find out who shot my friend.
- Find out who raided my house.
- Find out who shot my friend. [cold case]
My brother has an idea of who it was that raided us. Whether it's true or not, he hatched a plan to infiltrate them. It was going to be the biggest betrayal of all time. We would have done it too.
What I noticed on Day 3 is that the chat is helpful. People often expose KOSers and people who are raiding. It's very helpful. I see my friend calling out a guy called cjmason, who I'm assuming is a KOSer. Since I'm supportive of my friend, I tell him that I will also help kill cjmason. My brother agrees to as well. Now we're out for blood.
- Find out who raided my house.
- Find out who shot my friend [cold case] -- Though now I think it's cjmason.
- Find and terminate cjmason.
Then we make up our minds that if we see the guy we should help him. So I do actually find him again and we give him a place to stay. We give him a metal door and a sleeping bag. We're amassing an army.
The last memorable encounter I've had with someone is when I went to see one of my neighbours. He tells me he got raided before, and I feel bad because I was totally there before, man. He tells me who did it.
It was my friend.
I tell him that that guy was friendly to me, but he is clearly not a fan of my friend. The plot thickens. I add "Ask my friend about his secretive past" to my To-Do list but I haven't done it yet.
So the rest of the night is basically just normal stuff. Getting wood, bashing rocks with a rock, killing animals, getting lost at night, building a house. As the night goes on it becomes less fun, with different people online, but I end the night having enjoyed Day 3 immensely.
Day 4 - I Don't Really Like Rust Anymore (Again)
Someone tried to raid us but because of the build of our house and metal doors, they didn't succeed. We had a pretty good tactic that seemed to work. Awesome.
Most of the time I spend playing Day 4 sucks. People are annoying in chat, everyone is a KOSer, I call someone a dick and he tells me he hates me... it's hard to get anything going. The people I enjoyed talking to aren't on when I get on.
I quickly stop wanting to play but I keep going anyway, running out into the wilderness to see what I can find.
It was always entirely possible that the people would ruin the experience for me. I think my main problem is that there aren't any real consequences. Since it's a game, you can't fully nail that feeling of "surviving in a post-apocalyptic world," so people kill without remorse or consequences.
It's hard to know how people would react if they were thrust into this position, but I'm going to wager that people don't go on murderous rampages because a) most people haven't reached that level of dickdom and b) because it's beneficial not to be a dick all the time. There are consequences in the real-world.
In my experience if you see a guy with a gun, most of the time you're going to die. They kill people who only have rocks seemingly just because. It's not that I'm angry, it's that I get a little frustrated because it's hard to enjoy this game I paid for. Ultimately it's just a game though, and I realize this, which is why trolling and griefing don't really work on me. It does get really old constantly getting killed though.
It's not that I don't want people to kill other people. That's part of why the game is tense, but everyone on Day 4 seemed to think it was the only way to play.
Rust could be so much. In my mind I imagine people resurrecting a walled village where people take turns protecting the fort, while other people go out for resources. I don't know if Rust will ever get to this level or not, but I'm still fascinated by the potential.
There isn't anything remotely good to report about Day 4 until the end. My brother meets a neighbour who is apparently a "squatter" (haha, awesome). I eventually come back and also meet the guy. He gives us a gun! He's super friendly and we show him where we live. He compliments the work that my brother has done on building the house because my brother put his heart and soul into that.
We add him to our Steam friends list, we chat a bit. He tells us he has to go shower and then he'll be back, but we had to go shortly after.
The End Of Rust (For Now)?
This is the end of Rust for me right now. I don't know if I'll go back while it's still in Alpha or not. Like I said earlier, I got Elder Scrolls Online and Diablo 3 to play through. Other games will pop up as well.
There are other small encounters with people that I didn't mention, but I think I mentioned the best ones.
I'll definitely check out Rust once it hits its official launch because I want to see how the world grows and develops, and I'll admit that the relationships that I started to cultivate are urging me to go back, but when I look at it objectively... I enjoyed maybe half my time with Rust.
I'm not giving it a score because this isn't that kind of article, but if you're like me and watched funny videos with The Chief and expected it to be like that... you'll be disappointed. Outside of the KOSers and hackers -- which I forgot to mention until right now -- there is a lot of doing the same old, same old. Right now I don't think there's enough content, outside of the social interactions, to warrant playing a long time.
Rust has a lot of potential to be awesome, and despite my frustration towards some of it, I truly believe that it will be.
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