Rust Console Edition is, simply, a console port of an 8-year-old PC survival game that has managed to stand the test of time. It may not perform as smoothly on console yet but the desperate fights for survival against hostile forces still remains.
My two minutes into Rust Console Edition I was killed by a bear. “Seems about right,” I thought to myself.
Rust was released on PC nearly eight years ago, remaining on one of those many “why did it take so long to port?” lists. As a younger person with an under-powered PC, I watched the burgeoning survival genre with titles like DayZ and Rust, wondering why no one thought to expand the audience. Sure, I’d probably be terrible at them but was always willing to experience the zeitgeist.
And so there I was, mauled by a bear. Reset. I spawned at what looked like the same beach, a short distance from my assailant. In fact, I think I saw the bear walking away from my corpse to join another bear. In my underwear I skirted around the edge of the beach trying to bounce up some rocks to higher ground. But I started getting cold. Instead I wanted to travel to what looked like a lighthouse on the other side of the beach. I tried using a boat docked nearby but it was out of gas. I tried moving past the two bears from a distance but they froze in place when I got close and after a few seconds attacked. I tried to run but they were faster. Reset.
Survival games are a mosaic of these agonizing, unimpressive defeats that usually culminate in frustration or that empty feeling of making no headway. Rust is often about those lows, just as much as the highs. The game can be unrelenting and mean, it’s kind of the point. Yet it’s also about overcoming the odds, meeting new players, killing those other players, starting impromptu communities, surviving, and having your progress completely wiped away.
Interestingly, Rust wipes its servers frequently. Some monthly, some weekly. Eventually, nothing remains. It’s a fascinating take on the genre and a player’s sense of progression. I experienced my first server wipe a couple days into playing Rust Console Edition, right when the servers were being shut down for the early preview period. I felt a calm, knowing I would come back and no one would be too far ahead of me in terms of crafting and exploration. Every few minutes that server granted every player inside of it an item or two, with other servers following the same less traditional logic, just to keep things interesting.
Players who manage to maintain a consistent foothold in Rust during the course of a server must be some incredible, persistent, sleepless human beings.
Other players online, not bears or radiation or the elements, are the true obstacle in Rust. My first fellow player I encountered typed out “don’t shoot” when we were close. Quite funny considering I just died and literally had nothing to myself. Being fairly fresh on the game we both kept a small distance from each other as I bashed a tree with a rock to get wood. I watched them die to a bear. I wanted to help but I was too far away. The bear killed me soon after because I stood at the edge of a cliff and wanted to look at the scenery and peruse the controls.
Frequently, however, you will die at the hands of someone else without them blinking an eye. Voice chat is proximity based so if a player isn’t muted, you’re going to hear them for better or worse. Everyone in this game is out to survive. You will come across a massive monument hoping that there is valuable loot inside not blocked by a locked door. Hopefully that loot will last long enough to fuel a campfire or build a bed and weapon to allow for deeper ventures into the world. Most of my first deaths in Rust Console Edition were from bears, then they became less of a threat.
Hearing gunshots in the distance or footsteps close by invokes a weird sense of dread and adrenaline. Are you equipped to fight someone else if they come close? Possibly. Picking off newly dead players or cleaning up the mess of a fight you weren’t involved in is easy. But what if that person off in the distance is fully stocked? These are the kinds of judgement calls Rust asks of its players. The world is a deadly dog-eat-dog world and you better believe that not everyone is going to play fair.
With the sole purpose being to survive, what do you expect? Rust Console Edition features building, crafting, and combat like the PC version. Walking across the world I saw buildings made by other players in the short amount of time since servers went live. You can always tell when an experienced player makes something and when a reviewer abandons a makeshift shack because they were just testing out crafting. At the basic levels of item management and crafting, Rust Console Edition is easy to wrap your head around. Menus don’t appear too clunky and a limited number of resources means there isn’t much to make. But this is still a game with its roots in a mouse and keyboard and there are few ways to make that kind of interface easier to use.
Developer Double Eleven has done an admirable job translating mouse and keyboard to a controller. Using the control sticks to move building pieces around is imprecise at times but fine. It’s more of an issue with aiming and shooting a weapon. Rust Console Edition isn’t frequently imprecise but in the midst of trying to best another player with a potentially worse gun, every bullet counts and not feeling like players have tighter controls can be an issue.
Personally, these minor gripes came fairly early as I was bashing a tree with the rock players spawn with after death. By hitting a red “x” on a tree, players can demolish it faster. But even that simple act took an excessively long time because I had to keep moving around the tree after missing the mark. While control and input problems can be annoying, they do fade a bit as players become accustomed. There are several games I’ve played on mouse on keyboard that I would rather use a controller for and I’ve seen the way players no-scope in Call of Duty, so with enough patience and a few patches it’s possible.
Rust Console Edition is not completely ready for the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S. Currently, the console port is optimized for the previous gen. I spent a fair amount of time playing the game on PlayStation 5 and experienced minor glitches and server crashes. At times I had trouble logging in or a server would be a bit lagged. Graphically, the game is not exceptional by any means. It looks rough will likely need some time before it receives necessary polish. Yes, it’s an old game and there is some charm there but I’m sure the community has worked to bring Facepunch Studios’ vision into the future on PC.
To even the playing field more I did play the game on PlayStation 4 Pro for a bit and didn’t notice a significant change in my experience. My woes with the controller are more foundational than generational but I can’t say that I noticed a significant change in performance. I’m sure there are times when the software and hardware clash but I never came across any significant, game-breaking issues when playing on either console. Of course, your mileage may vary on this one.
Rust Console Edition is a game about surviving whatever odds are presented to the player. And the threat of other players is definitely the most overwhelming of odds. Those looking for a relaxing, mildly passive survival game will find their dreams crushed when they return to the game after a few hours or days and have their buildings destroyed and their items stolen. Everything in Rust persists, even when you need sleep. Players need to fortify their walls and lock the doors and hope a raid of online players don’t decide to surprise you when you’re sleeping or awake. Then again, you might be a part of a raid, wreaking havoc on a server in the quest to become more powerful, only to eventually betray those random friends you first met and grew with. Rust Console Edition may be unpredictable in ways both good and bad, but it is the core Rust experience through and through.
