Open world sandbox adventure survival with resource scavenging multiplayer game 'Rust' has been updated to have its zombie enemies removed. That's quite an unusual move for a gaming company with the current popularity of DayZ, Walking Dead and many other zombie media and games proving popular. Also the Rust about page lists DayZ (and Minecraft) as an influence upon the game. IGN thinks that the move to remove zombies is "a first in the world of gaming". Rust is developed by Facepunch who previously enjoyed success thanks to Garry's Mod.
Rollercoaster success
Rust has been a "knocked on our arses," surprise sales hit on Steam Early Access said developer Facepunch's Garry Newman. Ironically Facepunch had planned to have a low-key, slow-burn build up of popularity with its Rust alpha release on the Steam Early Access platform. "Our player counts have exploded our wildest dreams," exclaimed Newman. He is right to be excited as Rust has sold three quarters of a million copies since its launch on a month and a half ago.
Why remove the zombies?
In his blog post, explaining the zombie liquidation decision, Newman wrote; "Yep. We did it. We decided we couldn’t hold off any longer. The longer we keep zombies in – the more complaints we’d get about removing them. We are forcing ourselves to deal with it. We are no longer a zombie survival game!" But you can't just remove a major gaming foe from a game so... "They’ve been replaced with red bears and wolves. You hate them. We know. They’re just plugging a gap for now. All will be revvvealed."
This Rust update wasn't just about putting zombie lover's noses out of joint and Newman lists several improvements to the game's wildlife, resource objects and bug fixes in the game, you can read about these tweaks in full here. Also you can see and explore further information, screenshots and videos from Rust on the official webite. Meanwhile the developers would like to remind everyone that the game is Early Access, still in development and just the bare foundations of what is to come.
