All the news the island lets us print
Vol. 2026-10No. 1PvE Hardcore edition
The wipe day briefingEarly edition
A new island opens clear, inheriting one name's runaway record
Season 2026-09 closed yesterday afternoon after 28 days and 263 residents, and it closed the way it had run almost the whole way through: X_X T0A5T3D on top, 4,181 NPCs killed and 235 hours and 12 minutes logged, with nobody else on the island within a thousand kills of him by the end. BzK took the casino's biggest prize of the season along the way, 829 coins looted in a single payout. Both marks are now sitting in the open, waiting for whoever on this new map decides they want them.
That map came up at 13:52 EDT today, seed 1970479863 pressed into a fresh 4000 metre square, 45 named monuments scattered across it from Airfield to Underwater Lab, including, for reasons the map generator keeps to itself, two separate jungle ruins. Thirty five days are on the clock before it all resets again.
By 14:53 the island had already logged four fights, a tight little cluster of puzzle loot, and one life seven players deep. Clear skies held for the whole of the first hour. Thirty five days is a long time to ask that of a Rust server.
Twenty eight days, two hundred sixty three residents, and a lead nobody closed
Season 2026-09 ran from 3 September to 1 October, 28 days that carried 263 residents through it. The final standings closed out looking like a foregone conclusion well before the end: X_X T0A5T3D on top with 4,181 NPC kills, 726 coins looted, and 235 hours and 12 minutes on the island. MB finished second at 3,208 kills, 686 coins, and 128 hours and 42 minutes. crass_user took third at 3,089 kills, 513 coins, and 99 hours and 30 minutes, with Sir Sniffalotapus just behind in fourth at 3,081 kills, 214 coins, and 96 hours and 36 minutes.
The record boards told the same story twice over: X_X T0A5T3D's 4,181 kills and 235 hours and 12 minutes stand as the wipe's benchmarks going into this one. BzK, well back in the standings proper, still walked away with the season's single biggest casino haul, 829 coins looted in one payout. Across the wipe's five issues the paper's spotlight fell in turn on CapCon, Thick 'Ems, Lil-Poot, and maks.internetov, four residents whose weeks on the island looked nothing alike.
Season 2026-09 opened on 3 September with seed 1970479863 pressed into a fresh 4000 metre square, and closed 28 days later on 1 October having logged 263 residents, a combined 5,037 hours of play, 87.9 thousand NPCs fought off, and 23.9 thousand barrels hauled back to base before the lights went out on it for good.
One name sat over almost the entire season: X_X T0A5T3D closed with 4,181 NPCs killed and 235 hours and 12 minutes logged, both clear of whatever marks the wipe before it had left standing, and nearly a thousand kills clear of MB, the nearest resident on the board. BzK took the casino's biggest prize of the season on the way, 829 coins looted in one sitting, a record that beat the wipe's own earlier mark by a comfortable margin.
The weather went the distance too, clear on the day it opened, thundery and squally within the first week, settling for good into a steady drizzle by the time the gates closed. In between, a life or two made its own case for the books: one closed at just over nineteen hours and 189 players down, the longest anyone held onto a single life all season; another, on a quieter day, spent its entire forty seven minutes alive fast asleep and closed without a mark against it either way. That is, as much as anything, how the island does business. It takes you however you come.
Three things said out loud on day one
The wheel at the Large Oil Rig gave CapCon a 2,184 scrap night last wipe off a 104 scrap stake. This paper expects this wipe's biggest single payout to land under that figure, the house having had a month to think about it.
X_X T0A5T3D's 4,181 kills and 235 hours stood unchallenged for weeks at a stretch last wipe. The bet here is that whoever leads this wipe's NPC board won't open that wide a gap, not with the old mark sitting in plain view for every new arrival to chase.
The island opened clear this afternoon, same as it did at the start of last wipe, and clear almost never lasts the first week out. Expect the forecast to turn within days.
Whether anyone threatens X_X T0A5T3D's 4,181 kills and 235 hours from last wipe, or whether the island spends another month watching one name run away with the board again.
Which of the forty five monuments on this map, from the Jungle Ziggurat to the Underwater Lab, the population settles on as its new home base over the next 35 days.
Whether BzK's 829 coin payout gets tested at the wheel early, or whether the casino keeps closing the way it has before, badly, for the house's guests.