I’ll never forget my first night in Legacy. High atop Resource Mountain; alone and attempting to stay warm around a campfire in my newly constructed Wood Shelter. A sheer sense of terror permeated my being as footsteps approached. Immediately I extinguished the fire. Quiet as a mouse, I hid in my shack - if I don’t move, maybe they will think no one is home.

Although I had only spawned about an hour ago, the thought of losing all my worldly possessions (some wood and miscellaneous ore) to some dark figure in the night sparked a sense of fight or flight I had rarely experienced in gaming.

Shining his flashlight through the cracks in my hut, the stranger promptly jumped onto the roof via a nearby boulder. Detected, I hesitantly spoke, “Hello out there. Are you friendly? It’s literally my first night in the game.”

“Sure it is… hold on.” The stranger responds, immediately opening his steam overlay to corroborate my story. “Well I’ll be damned,” he said, “it is your first night.

“Come on out of there, I’ll give you some things to help you get started.”

Weighing my options, I cautiously exited my improvised abode. In front of me stood an imposing gentleman, adorned head to toe in Kevlar. He proceeded to drop several items at my feet. As the sun started to peak its way over the horizon, I hastily picked up three items I had never held before: a metal hatchet, medkit, and some radiation pills.

The stranger wished me well and carried on down the hill. Relieved, I spent the following day proudly gathering resources, building up my base, and even venturing into my first radtown with the help of the radiation pills bestowed upon me by my new friend. By that evening, I was feeling quite accomplished and secure in my first base. As I sat in front of my camp fire, I browsed the crafting menu to plan what I was to search out the next day.

Just then, I heard footsteps approach. My friend returning? Maybe to give some more items to me? Then I hear it; a thunk followed by high pitched beeping. “What is that?” I thought. A second later, the wall in front of me exploded. My ‘friend’ had returned with some other friends, and they immediately gunned me down.

I sat there in awe. All my worldly possessions, gone in an instant. I was hooked.

Sure it was frustrating to lose my items, but never had I experienced such a visceral reaction to a game. Never had I seen so many opportunities for social engineering, freedom to play however I wanted, and such an instinctual urge to protect my shit.

It’s experiences like that which have encouraged me to start my first server. The ongoing commitment from the team at Facepunch to not only rebuild the entire game from scratch, but to keep improving and adding things week over week, month over month, is what’s motivated me to devote the better part of 5 years to reporting on development and providing the best environment I can for others to play the game.

Like many of you, I’ve played video games since I was a child. From the earliest days of playing Duck Hunt on my uncle’s NES, to losing my life savings (about $10 at the time) on arcade games at my friend’s birthday party at Sports ‘n Games - I’m a gamer at heart.

In the more than 20 years, experiencing a variety of games across multitudes of platforms, I’ve never come across one as unique and captivating as Rust.

The steady development and monthly updates keep the game fresh and ever expanding. Although I may take breaks here and there, I’m always excited to come back and experience the newest additions for myself. I literally can’t think of another game which has provided such rewarding (and sometimes frustrating) experiences while continually growing and improving over time.

A mere peek at the roadmap and you can see the future of Rust is bright. Additions like RustNet, new vehicles, improved farming, multiple islands, new monuments, and more will continue to evolve and advance the game beyond our wildest expectations.

To Helk, Garry, André, Vince, Diogo, Petur, Tom, Alistair, Damien, Pål, Alex, and all the other developers at Facepunch: thank you for your hard work, creativity, and dedication to creating this miraculous game. I am so excited to see what the future holds, and will be here for every step of the process.

Community Team applications

You might be asking yourself, “That’s great and all, but why the hell did you write it?” Good question. I not only love reporting on the game, but I love building teams and community around it.

With that, we’ve opened applications for our Community Team. This group of people is planning a bunch of awesome events (including this year’s Charitable Rust) and we’re looking for passionate Rust players to join our ranks!

If you’re over 18 and interested in helping with the creation and production of community events in the form of building, video editing, plugin development, artistry, and more, please fill out our application by following the link below.