[2021] Labor of Love Award Final Voting

A lil somethin somethin: You can find the details for this event on the announcement page here.

Thanks to everyone that nominated Rust for the Labor of Love award. We have now reached the final stage of voting so we need your votes once again!

You can do so now by clicking the vote button above and to show our appreciation if Rust wins the Labor of Love Steam award, we'll give you (the community) control on designing a new deployable item in the game!

If you haven't already voted we'd like to show you in some words, pictures and videos why Rust is a Labor of Love for us!

Rust came to life because Helk and Garry felt there was something missing in the games they were playing and set about making a game they could play how they wanted to play it, Rust was started in Unity Engine 4 and was playable in a web browser and keys were sold in a dutch auction and as the player base grew the game was made into a standalone version and released on Steam in early access on 11th December 2013.




Work continued at pace, new features being added like the research bench, a new water system along with a new sky system, bugs being squashed, some quite serious.





It was decided we needed a better way of telling guys what we were doing in the background so weekly updates were started and with that came the Friday blog in March 2014.

Not long after this, we realised Rust was getting too big for Unity 4 and we were getting seriously limited on how much we could grow which would impact on how you could play and enjoy the game, it was decided we would switch to Unity 5 and while you continued to enjoy playing the game we would completely rebuild the game from scratch. It was a huge decision and task but made Rust what it is today.

In July 2014 we started the Community Blog which would showcase what our players and creators were doing in Rust from builds and raids to erm ... rituals to Garry.



By the end of 2014 the groundwork for the Rust reboot was set, instead of the same map on every server, the island could be generated procedurally giving every server it's own identity.




Custom weapons were designed and modelled to give more of a hand crafted feel



New tools were created to help you get the resources you need, including the iconic rock and the hatchet. Useful for farming the animals that were added for food and more resources.





Having resources meant you were going to need a nice base to keep them in and the building system came to life, not only could you create the design you wanted with new building pieces you could now upgrade it to different materials to give your base more strength. This progressed from late 2014 into early 2015 as a system you might recognise today and you could also use a Tool Cupboard to give ownership to your base!






2015 continued to build up on the groundwork set and the islands got more procedural features like roads and power lines between the monuments.




Everyone had the same male character so It was decided we should add more varieties and also a female character which could all be randomly assigned to players, we also gave them armour for protection from each other.




By the end of the year we had added Beartraps, Assualt Rifle, Pump Shotgun, C4, Attack Helicopter, Ambient Sound, Gibbing, Decay, Paintable Signs, Rocket Launcher, Monuments, Assigning sleeping bag to friends, Repair Bench, Guitars, Building Upgrades, Player skin colours, Wounding, Hapis Island, Rivers, Research Table, Barricades, Bullet Penetration, Large Furnace, Loot, Decals, Ammo Counters, Blueprints System, Grenades, Horses, Landmines, Water Catchers, Crossbow, Code Locks, Draw-able Maps, SMG, Supply Signal, Floor Spikes, Language Selector, Pistol, Ladders, Throwables, Pickable arrows/spears and load of bug fixes, optimizations and visual improvements.

Rust also got it's first Christmas Event!



Shortly after, we realised weekly updates weren't really ideal for us, we'd lose a day of development time preparing the update and dealing with any issues that came up post update, this downtime would be less noticeable over the period of a month so the switch was made to the monthly updates you know today and have been happening since.

As you can see, the first two years kept us really busy, skip forward and the last two years have been just as busy pushing out content month after month. Here are some of the highlights and the associated update trailers!

Instruments DLC - For our first DLC we gave you the opportunity to get together and jam with your friends or annoy your neighbours.


Modular Turrets - Since it's creation, the turret came with an included assault rifle, we gave you the option to add any weapon (or trumpet) to your turrets!


Farming 2.0 - Brought you new ways of growing your own crops with automated watering systems to keep you supplied with food and cloth.


Rust+ - The companion app for your phones to help you organise your Team, control your electronics and receive notifications from in game.


Modular Vehicles - A new way of getting around the Rust island in a variety of setups depending on your needs,


Sunburn DLC - Our 2nd DLC full of summer essentials from lazing on a rubber ring in your pool to water pistol fights on the beaches.


Tech Tree - We gave you the option of unlocking blueprints on a linear path rather than having to find each blueprint in loot


During the Christmas holiday period of 2020 Rust received a massive boost when we were joined by a variety of well known streamers and content creators with events being run by OfflineTV and their friends and Egoland and their friends who spotlighted Rust to viewers who had probably never seen Rust or thought of joining us and gave us a huge boost with record player counts and viewership. This gave the developers a boost and spurred us on to bring more content for players to enjoy.


Freight Transit Line - A new underground system throughout the whole map which gives you another option for getting around the monuments.


Voiceprops DLC - Our latest DLC for recording and playback of voice and audio to making your own in game disco.


Underwater - Another new way to explore the environment, submarines to transport you around and underwater labs to explore and loot!


We hope this gives some insight into why we bring updates month after month to bring more content and new ways for you, our players to enjoy Rust and on behalf of everyone at Facepunch Studios we'd like to wish you a Happy Holidays and we look forward to what 2022 will bring!

P.S Have you voted yet ?