For those who hate Rust

I’m going to start this off by saying all art is subjective. Not all of you need to hear that, but I want to be sure everyone is aware. There can never be a final truthful opinion on a level, some people hate the levels you love and some people love the levels you hate. It is for this reason I can never satisfy all of you with the end result. Some of you claim it is too empty, or too awkward, and for your opinion that is fine. None of these things are facts, though, and you cannot truthfully present them as such. People can create for whatever reason they want, but I like to create for my own growth and satisfaction. I am usually satisfied with less detail than most, but it doesn’t make my opinion wrong. I will not add detail in this level for detail’s sake, or to fit your wants over others’. Ever.

As for the gameplay, please form your opinion on it after playing it yourself. Just like visuals you cannot create a level that everyone will enjoy. The appearance of Rust’s gameplay is unpleasant to some of you, I’ve seen quite a few people remark on how terrible it looks to play. If you haven’t played it yet, you cannot say playing it is unpleasant. I personally find Rust’s gameplay to not only be my best gameplay but also the most fun gameplay i’ve ever played in all of my time in GD. That’s my opinion. I have spent several months reworking the gameplay and making it as fair as I can, but it may not seem that way from looking at it. Believe me, I have spent over 100 hours revising, reworking, and talking with my 23 playtesters about how to make this level as enjoyable as possible. Do not dismiss it as “cancerous” or “trash” if you have not tried it out for yourself. I would hope you would be pleasantly surprised with what you find, but I cannot guarantee that.

Let me make this clear: I am not making a level this difficult for the attention. It is not meant to be some spectacle to behold. It is meant to be the hardest level I can verify, plain and simple. I’ve mentioned this before, but making your own gameplay in your own demon level gives you a lot more freedom to make the level harder than others. If you are looking to beat your next hardest level, most of them will have issues that you don’t like. If you make your own level, you can take away those issues and you’re left with a ridiculously hard challenge for yourself. I enjoy building my own hardest levels, I did it with Acu, and here I am again doing it with Rust.

I would also like to point out the resemblance this level has with Sunset Sandstorm. It was not intended for this to appear like a one-up from that level. I had been playing Black Blizzard and felt inspired by that level, but I needed a song to go with it. I looked and looked for songs but didn’t find any that inspired me. I had the very beginning of a layout made already that used “Outlaw” by Creo, and it just so happened that was the only one I had really liked so far. The resemblance to Sunset Sandstorm was inevitable, though, since both were inspired by Black Blizzard and used the same song. I tried to distance the look of it as much as I could from SSSS while still fitting with the song, and landed on a sort of broken, decaying technology theme. Please do not compare this to Sunset Sandstorm. I know this will happen anyways, I expect it, but it was really just coincidence and I didn’t want this whole issue to ever come up. I am crediting Crohn44 as inspiration as well because it is hard to get that level fully out of my head while building, so in a strange way it was still inspiration.

It’s okay to hate Rust. I already know countless people will. But please take the time to make your own informed opinion and don’t hate on something for reasons that are so subjective I cannot do anything about.