Facepunch Studios, the company responsible for developing the popular open-world multiplayer survival game Rust, provides a glimpse of what players can expect in the near future.
10 Years in Development
Rust, for those who do not know, celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2023. The open-world survival game got numerous features last year, including drones, pings, tugboats, chat emojis, parachutes, and rail linking, among many others.
Since it was released 10 years ago, the popular title received over 370 content updates, sold more than 16 million copies, and experienced its peak player count of 244,000. Despite the impressive numbers, developer Facepunch Studios shows no signs of stopping. In fact, the company has recently divulged information about new content that players can look forward to this year.
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Carry the Load
The company is set to introduce useful backpacks to Rust in a major content patch slated for release on February 1, which is aptly named the "Backpack Update."
According to Facepunch Studios, backpacks are a new craftable item in Rust that allows players to carry more items with them. Backpacks are pretty useful, especially if players scour for some much-needed resources in the open world.
While it won't be officially introduced until early next month, players can try the new item out in a public beta that will be released soon.
Performance Improvements
Facepunch Studios is also looking to improve the backend processes of the game. In terms of performance, the company is looking to reduce the game's memory usage to provide more consistent frame rates. This is great news for those who are playing Rust on lower-end systems.
The company will intensify its efforts in the first two months of 2024 to rectify certain issues concerning global rendering as well. For those who do not know, global rendering encompasses the number of buildings players can see at a time, as well as the view distance of structures. When it was implemented in the past, the company was quite ambitious about the feature and it ran into a bunch of issues, which have yet to be fixed to this day.
If all goes well, the company might make global rendering available to the public again sometime in March.
Better Anti-Cheat
Cheaters are always a problem for multiplayer titles like Rust. That is why the company partnered with Epic Games to thwart evildoers from ruining the experience of legitimate players.
Rust apparently uses Epic's Easy Anti-Cheat (EAC) program. Although Facepunch Studios did not disclose the specifics as to how EAC detects and punishes cheaters, the company did say that it is working hard to constantly improve the program via silent hotfixes.
The company said that it will be dedicating more of its resources to make the game's anti-cheat measures better than ever!
Content Overhaul
In addition, the company shared that it will make changes and improvements to some of the game's old content. Here is a list of the changes that will be implemented in the near future:
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Older monument reworks and improvements
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Continue experimenting and making meta changes to gunplay
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Softcore game mode Improvements
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Hardcore game mode experimenting
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Experimenting with progression
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Improvements to AI
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Improvements to events such as the patrol helicopter, Launch site APC and Cargoship
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World environment
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Underwater exploration
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Missions
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Using our data analytics to identify less commonly used items and balancing
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Experimenting with new ways/events to encourage players to engage with PvP
So, what can you say about the company's plans for Rust moving forward? Let us know in the comments!
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