Kenshi: A Game Like No Other

Kenshi is a game that I've been playing for a while now, and the more I play it, the more I love it; it's the sort of game that will make you quit after your first failed attempt at a playthrough. When I first opened it up, I had no idea what I was doing, I had watched a video of someone talking about it and instantly I was intrigued; it seemed like my kind of game, and I was right because it is.

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What Is It?
There's no other game quite like it - the game gives you so much choice, and really just plops you into this horrible world, and the only thing you can try to do is survive.

The important thing to note about Kenshi is: You are not special. I was thinking of putting a full stop behind each word there to truly emphasize that point, I think it needs to be understood before tackling this kind of game. You. Are. Not. Special; You're not the hero; You're not the main character; You're weak, and start the game as a nobody, who is forced to go up against disgustingly horrific creatures and people, just to have a slight chance of survival your only option is to stay close to a major city for a bit, while you gather your bearing's.

On my first time playing this game, I spawned into a little town called The Hub. You'll be plopped into the same town if you choose the standard start, and you'll have 1,000 Cats - The Currency of Kenshi is Cats, and I don't know why -With this meager sum of coin, you'll have to go and buy some food because without it you'll start to starve and as you slowly stumble toward death all of your stats will decrease; not that you have any, to begin with

I started mining some Iron just outside of the city, which I thought would be safe, it was... for a while. Then a group of starving bandits attacked me and stole my food, I picked myself up, healed, and got back to work.

Dust Bandits - Source Link

After a while, I noticed there was a fight at the local bar in town, between some Dust Bandits and the locals. I waited on the sideline and then decided to get involved - thinking I would earn some exp; I was wrong - I got beaten up again, this time though, I was severely injured and was picked up by a local as the fight ended. Brilliant. I thought. Assuming they were going to heal me up and let me recover. Nope; they instead walked me outside and left me on the ground with the rest of the dying. Then, wouldn't you know it, I bled out and died. Game Over.

I was so annoyed by this, and turned the game off and said, "What the hell did I buy?" I was pretty frustrated, but half an hour later I was still thinking of the game, wondering what I could have done differently. Don't get involved. Was the first thing on my mind. Then, I loaded it back up, and this time I was determined to do better - which I did. - I learned much more about the game while playing, and even explored a bit more of the map, and after a few hours into that character, I died once more.

Kenshi
See, this game is tough, tougher than most other games. Most games give you a little reward now and again, Kenshi on the other hand, rewards you in a different way; surviving in Kenshi is a reward in itself. You get small endorphin rushes just for making it a bit further than you previously did, you get a small boost with every stat you see being boosted, every small encounter that you survive, and then, when you get into a serious playthrough you start to feel much happier, but, no matter how far you get, or tough you are, you're never quite comfortable. I've never had a character who was immune to death; each death I received was also my fault, in one way or another, and made me rethink certain playthroughs and styles.

Here's An Image Of The Map - Source Link

The Story
There isn't exactly a story, instead, survival is your main priority. But then there are so many ways you can go about playing this game, once you get to a point where survival has become a little easier.

I like to build a base, and collect up other NPCs who become player characters once you pay them - they join your squad and in the early days of the game it is much easier to survive once you have a few people. The base building is interesting, and I find it really fun - you can set up anywhere on the map, but, you do have to be careful about whose territory you set up in. As each territory will offer different challenges.

1. The Free Cities - will come around every now and again looking to collect tax, if you don't pay them or ignore them, they will return again with an army and offer you one last chance to pay a now higher rate of tax for the trouble.
2. The Holy Nation - are religious zealots who come around every now and again asking you to pray with them, if you set up in their territory you better have a bible, because being caught without it more than once will result in a beating and potential enslavement. Also, if you speak with the prayer group who come to your base as anyone other than a human man, you'll be in trouble.
3. The Shek Kingdoms - the shek are a warrior people who come around every so often for a fight, the interesting thing about the Shek is that they have a semi-honor system. Where they will fight you and if they beat you in battle they'll mock you, but they will heal you. If you beat them they will respect you but will continue to send bands to your base to prove themselves.
4. The Cannibals - If you set up in the Cannibal Plains, you will be attacked regularly by groups of them, who will not only beat you, but they will take any unconscious squad mates and take them back to their camp to be eaten.
5. Slavers - Will attack regularly and capture and enslave anyone they can get their hands on - funny enough, these guys are a perfect example of how you make your own story. So, I was in my base, and we got attacked, the slavers barely won the fight and the survivors managed to get up and take a few of my people back to their walled-off camp. By this point, I was fairly tough and sent my entire group over for a rescue mission, which went okay. I didn't take them back by force, instead, I snuck in with my main character and managed to get them out, it was a long drawn-out process, but in the end, I was able to rescue my people.
6. Others - there are other factions who can be a nuisance, and animals can be a good source of food, but all are pretty brutal, especially in large numbers. There are other factions too, but the ones listed above are ones I have dealt with in previous playthroughs.

Potentially Going To Start A Playthrough Of This Game
So, I was doing a playthrough of this before and got about six episodes in, and to be fair, it was the first time I tried a continuous playthrough and the first time that I actually received a fair few views doing one.

The problem I faced though and one thing I noticed was that the views were great for the first episode, I think I reached about 200 views on episode 1 and after that, the views dropped off as expected. But, the reason for this and the reason I stopped was my own fault.

I streamed it on Twitch, then took the VOD from episode one and uploaded it unedited, then for the following episodes I started to cut them down. Episode 1 was about 2 hours long and took ages to upload/ render. So I decided to edit them down to about 40-50 minutes thereon, because of upload time and entertainment value. But, I fell out of continuing it because the work I put into the following episodes wasn't worth it as episode 1, in my opinion, was sullied by the lack of editing. I mean, I even went AFK a few times, so that must have been a chore for people to flick through.

This time will be different, I'll start up a tutorial-style episode for the first one and then continue on naturally from there, I just need to find some time to do it, which I will hopefully do over the next few days/ weeks.

It's a fun game, and I've always wanted to do a playthrough of something; Kenshi, to me, seems like the perfect game to do this for. It can be entertaining, especially discovering the world and introducing it to people who have maybe scrolled past it countless times on the Steam store.