Jeff Kaplan's new game, The Legend of California, may have big Rust energy, but don't think it's a cowboy-filled clone

The Legend of California hasn't even dosey-doed into early access yet, and already I've seen a flurry of comparisons being made between Kintsugiyama's upcoming Western-themed survival game and Rust. I can't say I'm surprised, considering studio lead Jeff Kaplan has marked it as a key inspiration. However, the former Blizzard VP has made it very clear early doors that this isn't some yee-haw copy-paste of Facepunch Studios' iconic shooter.

At the weekend, Kaplan and studio co-head Tim Ford took to Twitch, embarking on a meaty ten-hour stream that had more than its fair share of memorable moments. As the questions poured in, one chatter queried how core pillars of Rust, such as base-building and raiding, would factor in. Kaplan was quick to state that The Legend of California is a "very different" experience than what Rust vets are used to.

"I would never want to mislead Rust players into thinking this is cowboy Rust or California Rust," Kaplan stresses. "We are much more balanced between a PvE and PvP-type game." Offering a key differentiator, Kaplan says that The Legend of California won't have base raiding by the time it hits early access. Kaplan likens Kintsugiyama's approach to something more akin to World of Warcraft Classic's PvP, whereby it's wholly opted into.

"We're hoping to have full PvP servers for the people who are into it," Kaplan continues, "but we don't have a base-raiding system yet. I would love to [implement one], that sounds like a really cool feature, if we do well in early access and we keep developing the game, and it's a thing that our playerbase is super into." I can certainly see PvP-exclusive servers lapping base-raiding up, so it's nice to know that there's scope for that more hardcore experience, depending on how The Legend of California shapes up.

For now, the core experience is far more cooperative, but that's not to say that PvP is a simple afterthought. "We've designed world events, there are zones, we have a whole loot system around PvP," Kaplan confirms during the stream, which you can watch here. So, if you do dive into The Legend of California in search of a good ol' fashioned shoot-out, you hopefully won't be left disappointed.

The Legend of California is currently accepting sign-ups for its upcoming playtest. You can sign up in the hopes of getting access on Steam here.

During his recent interview with podcaster Lex Fridman, Kaplan shared that he had gleaned plenty of inspiration from Rust. "I love the resetting worlds," he notes in particular, "it's a great mechanic and one I want to evolve and work upon." Though Kaplan and Co. haven't cemented how resets will work in The Legend of California, he tentatively posits once per month.

"We want it to be fast enough that you're not too attached [to your gear], but we wanna make it rewarding," Kaplan says. "The trick is coming up with not 'why am I upset that the world resets?' But 'why am I excited that the world resets?' We know players can get very angry about resetting worlds, but [for] anybody who's played 5,000 hours of Rust like some of us, the resetting world is the magic."

Kaplan's sitdown with Fridman, like the weekend's livestream, was an absolute trove of insights. Between Blizzard's early fears that WoW would only "be successful for five years," and Kaplan's thoughts on AI, it's great to see such refreshing candor from one of the industry's leading lights.