Jeff Kaplan's The Legend of California: Red Dead Redemption Meets Rust in New Open-World Western Survival Shooter

Move over, Rockstar. If Red Dead Online 2 won’t live on, legendary World of Warcraft and Overwatch designer Jeff Kaplan may have exactly what fans are looking for as he reveals his new studio, Kintsugiyama, and their first game - The Legend of California.

The game’s Steam description reads:

“The Legend of California is an open-world, action-survival shooter set on the mythical Island of California during the Gold Rush era. Explore a vast, untamed frontier and forge your legacy alone or with friends.”

Kaplan spoke on the Lex Fridman podcast, discussing the vision for the game along with many other industry topics. The Legend of California features a handcrafted, voxel-based world that takes many creative liberties, avoiding a strict focus on historical accuracy while still maintaining the look and feel of California - even though California exists only as an island within the game. This hyper-realistic approach will likely draw comparisons to Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption and its online mode.

Though Kintsugiyama is a small team of only 34 people, they have taken on the ambitious challenge of combining Red Dead Redemption–style Western gameplay with a survival experience Kaplan closely compared to Rust. Players will start with nothing upon arriving on the island and must learn to survive by crafting tools, weapons, and structures, building from small beginnings into a thriving settlement.

Players are encouraged to explore the surrounding areas, which feature dozens of POIs (points of interest) that evolve over time, changing and moving across the map. There are no difficulty levels; instead, the game uses tiers of regions that vary depending on the world seed. World seeds act as servers, which Kaplan explained with the following example:

“Mojave might be the easiest newbie area on ‘your’ server (world seed), but on ‘my’ server it’s an end-game tier-four area.”

Kaplan notes that many will perceive the game as a Western survival simulator, though he believes it aligns more closely with an action game that includes survival elements. The game is already available to wishlist, and the team plans to launch an alpha playtest for a select group of players.

Kaplan also explained that, for the first time in his career, he will be releasing a game in Early Access. While he acknowledges that Early Access may not be for everyone, he believes it will allow the team and the community to craft the world of The Legend of California together.

Let us know what you think of this new game from Jeff Kaplan and his team in the comments below.