RimWorld is like a virtual story generator where you, as the player, take care of a group of people stranded on a strange planet. You help them build a safe place, grow food, and do other tasks to survive. You don’t really control them, you just give them tasks and priorities and then the colonists naturally decide what to do. Along the way, unexpected things happen, like storms, raids or simply visitors. These events create unique stories. It’s a bit like being the director of your own sci-fi drama, deciding what the characters do to overcome challenges and make a living on this new planet.
The following is a retelling of my playthrough with two friends.
🔴 Content Warning! RimWorld is a harsh world and survival is hard. The story below includes references to animal and human cruelty.
The story begins when a pod crash lands into an open area. Three people come out: the doctor Dr House, the gunner PewPew, and a 64 years old lady named Babushka. And the lady’s dog, a Labrador named Pantufa.
Here and there are trees and berry bushes. Those trees need to be chopped and those berries need to be collected, because a shelter needs to be built and mouths need to be fed.
They quickly prioritised building a rectangular room, just big enough for three people to sleep on the ground. It was uncomfortable but it was better than sleeping outside in the cold and at the reach of wild animals.
The colonists noticed the little food and medicine they had was rotting outside, so they expanded the room a bit more to accommodate a storage area. They also noticed the dog had nowhere to sleep, so they built it a wooden box. That would be fine for a puppy but not an adult Labrador. He could not possibly fit there, maybe just its head. That was a waste of fine wood and craftsmanship.
PewPew was not much of a talker, he was more of a shooter. Dr House on the other hand liked to socialize, and the only person he could talk to was Babushka. The two became good friends and one day he proposed to her. Love doesn’t pick ages. Maybe being stranded and out of options played a role in that too. The two now wanted to sleep together and have some privacy as a couple. So the original rectangular room was turned into a common area, with a new dining table and chairs, and on the side a corridor was created leading to their new individual bedrooms, now with proper comfy beds.
Let me tell you about Lassie. She’s a female Labrador that was found bleeding on the ground. Maybe she was attacked by a predator which had to run away, who knows. PewPew carried her and Babushka treated her.
She became part of the colony and Pantufa, the male Labrador, was very happy about it. Actually, ever since Lassie joined the colony the two dogs have been breeding like rabbits. There were puppies everywhere.
The colony received a quest from a neighbouring tribe: Two legendary bows worth a small fortune are waiting to be collected nearby. It’s only a two day trip and there are no enemies in the area. It should be easy, right?
Babushka and PewPew decided to go together, just in case something bad would happen and they had to face a wild animal or a hostile human. Babushka quickly said goodbye to her husband Dr House – they would only be apart for two days after all.
The weather changed and it became very cold outside. Winter was coming.
Food was usually a problem, as there was little for humans and even less for dogs.
For some reason (me, the player), the colonists decided to farm and harvest hay so the dogs could eat it – turns out they can’t, they are not horses, they’re dogs, they eat meat.
Given food was scarce, the dogs were forbidden from entering the fridge area. And so, the dogs’ starvation began.
Something else was hungry – hungry for blood. Two mice went mad and started hunting for anything they could attack. The dogs went immediately inside the house. The human was not so lucky.
While Dr House was on his way to the prison cell for some maintenance work, one of the mice attacked his leg and his walking slowed down. He crossed the door but sadly it didn’t close on time.
Now, there was nothing between him and the wild animal.
You would think a 37 years old healthy and intelligent man could defend himself from a little mouse. You would be right. There’s only one little detail. Dr House is a pacifist. He rejects violence, any kind of violence, even if it is self-defence.
You will soon find out that his values are stronger than his flesh.
The second mouse joins the first and together they attacked Dr House until their thirst for blood was quenched. Alone, in the cold, he died of blood loss.
Babushka and PewPew are on their way home, less than a day away, when Babushka had a terrible feeling. She felt her heart ache, as if something bad happened.
With the mice gone, the dogs were no longer bound to their home. Pantufa looked at Dr House’s body freezing outside in the cold. We can only guess what it must have thought, but it was probably something like “you aren’t going to need this anymore, are you?” When Pantufa hauled Dr House’s body to the stockpile area he only had one leg.
Nature is often brutal, but one thing is sure: Nature is not wasteful. When Babushka and PewPew arrived at the colony, the dogs were no longer starving.
Babushka called for her husband but he never came, nor was he ever found. Nothing remained besides some bloody pieces of clothing. Babushka assumed he was devoured by a massive wild beast. She never found out about the small rodent assassins and the hungry best friends of Men.
The winter continued and Babushka was freezing outside. She did most of the work in the colony, and now with one less person she had even more work to do. At this point, they were only two humans plus a pack of 15 dogs.
She started a tantrum because of the cold and the passing of her husband. Who can blame her? The tantrum soon ended because she collapsed due to hypothermia. PewPew rescued her and saw she had frostbite in all her fingers. PewPew treated her fingers but her nose was gone forever.
What a dreadful winter.
A person named Sandra appeared running away from a warg. Babushka ran as fast as she could given her old and damaged spine. When she got there, Sandra was already on the floor bleeding.
Babushka fired one bullet and the warg went after her. She was brutally attacked and knocked to the ground. PewPew arrived, killed the warg and carried both women home.
Sandra would die on the same day due to blood loss. Babushka would recover but her leg was gone. Even after death, Babushka was still connected to her husband through fate, as both of them lost one leg because of a canine.
The future was looking grim until one day a miracle happened. From the sky, another pod crashlanded, and three women came from the sky: Daenerys, Jynx and Ivy.
Daenerys had the idea of building “the wall”, a wooden barrier that would protect them from the outside dangers. PewPew suggested the creation of a shooting area, with turrets and sandbags, to defend the colony in case of an attack. He did love shooting. He called it “the kill box”.
Next time they would be prepared.
By now, the colony had 20 dogs and too many mouths to feed. The colony decided to “snip snip” the males to avoid more puppies and had to euthanise 8 dogs.
They did not die in vain though. They were turned into steaks and the fur turned into chairs.
Nothing is created, nothing is lost, everything is transformed. Basic laws of physics.
PewPew died. Metal pods crashed into the house, precisely on top of the infirmary. He was treated but he could not make it. Jynx, his wife, became a widow… for a couple of months at least, then she found a new boyfriend.
Remember Babushka’s missing leg? Well, the remaining colonists decided that she deserved better, for everything she went through and all the help she provided to the colony. So they made her a prosthetic leg.
They called their best doctor, Jynx, to attach the new leg and she failed. Somehow, while attaching the leg Jynx managed to cut Babushka’s belly, arm and ear.
So they made another leg. And Jynx tried again. And failed again.
They made another. Jynx tried. Jynx failed. You could say it was… jinxed.
They made a 4th leg and tried a 4th time and… it worked! Finally Babushka could walk properly again. She was still under the influence of the anaesthesia and there she was, outside, building new turrets. That’s Babushka for you.
Sometimes the colony was attacked by hostile tribes. During those raids, some of the attackers would fall on the ground, incapable of walking. Our bullets and our traps were to blame.
But they were not savages! They could not leave them dying there of the floor. Not before trying to convince the defeated enemies to join them, that is.
That’s how a man of green hair joined the colony. The medicine, food and propaganda he received finally broke his spirit and he decided to join, out of his own freewill. He was named Verdocas, after his hair.
One day, he got depressed and decided to dig up a body.
So he went to the graveyard, dug up PewPew’s body, and carried it all the way to the dinning room, where he placed the body, so that anyone could see a skeleton with clothes laying on the dinning table. People didn’t like it.
Speaking of prisoners, one time the colonists captured two raiders. They spoke with them and one of prisoners said he would never join them because he hated them. Oh really?
“Set him free”, said one of my friends, “it’s useless to keep him there”. Yes, yes, I’ll set him free… after I set him free of some little things he has inside him.
Jynx went to the prison cell and extracted one of the kidneys, then the other, then his left lung, then his heart, then he died, to no one’s surprise. What was surprising though was the market price of those organs. Each kidney was worth 500 silver. In those little four refrigerated boxes there was three times as much money as the colony had gathered during several in-game years. Profit!
They were trying for so long to find a sustainable way to make money. First thing they tried was drugs, by farming smokeleaves and producing joints. Each joint was worth 12 silver and took lots of effort. Then they tried to make cloth out of cotton. It was profitable but it took a long time to harvest all that cotton. But kidneys? Every attacker now had a 1000 price tag over their head, and with frequent raids that became our “get rich quick” scheme.
Oh and one more thing: while Jynx was extracting the organs from the unwavering prisoner, in the next bed was the other prisoner that they were trying to convince to join the colony. He did join them. Maybe that was the motivation he needed.
The weather outside became weird. The sky was covered with dark clouds, but they looked purplish, as clouds do after a sunset. Then it started raining. One full day of never-ending rain. Then another. Then a week. Then a month. Then our colonist estimated it would keep raining for at least a season.
There was nothing they could do but wait. And maybe sow some rice, to take advantage of all this rain.
They noticed that people who went outside and got soaked in the rain aged faster. People got scared and decided to stay indoors. The season would soon end, just like the rain, right? People built some roofs outside, so that they could get some fresh air without getting hit by the rain.
The season ended, but not the rain. People got bored of always playing chess or poker indoors. They built a “man cave” inside an actual cave they mined out of boredom. It was furbished with a widescreen TV, some sofas and a pool table. They also moved the chess table inside, so that all games were together. This was a nice opportunity to upgrade the stiff wooden chairs of the chess table to some comfy arm chairs made out of human raider leather (nothing gets wasted remember?). They were happier, for a while.
Another season ended, but not the rain. The colony had an indoors farm plot but it was not enough to feed 11 people. Soon enough they were running out of food, again. They bought some raw meat from a trader and quickly brought it home. It added a few more days of food but it would not solve the problem. The hunters volunteered to go outside and hunt some wild animals. So they did, adding more days of food to the colony and subtracting more days of life to their lives.
Another season ended, but not the rain. Eventually the colony gave up. Life is short, and now it would be shorter. They accepted their fate and carried their colony work as if there was no dangerous aging rainfall outside.
One day, after 18 months, it stopped. The rain stopped, the dark clouds opened to let the sun shine on the wrinkled faces of the colonists. They noticed that Babushka, the oldest person in the colony with 70 years now, was mysteriously immune to rain. And thus the old grandma watched the boys and girls age 10 years while she only aged one. She already had plenty, she didn’t need more.
When she finally felt the warmth of the sun she became so inspired that she decided to tame a wild brown bear. In normal circumstances there’s an 80% chance of getting mauled by the bear, but not with Babushka. She just placed her hand on top of the bear’s head and just like that, Misha joined the colony, Babushka’s pet brown bear.
The tranquility of the once peaceful colony was shattered as six wild animals, driven mad by some mysterious force, launched an assault. Four massive rhinos, a lone squirrel, and an unsuspecting duck ignored our kill box and went straight to one of our modest wooden doors.
Soon the door shattered and the animals were in. The corridor was narrow. That meant that only 3-4 people could shoot at the same time because there was not enough room for everyone. All of our colonists were equipped with guns but they could only use them while ranged. The animals quickly closed the gap and the guns were useless. The rhinos bashed against the first line of people. Two rhino hits were usually enough to bring a human down, either unconscious or bleeding on the floor.
One by one, the colonists were all trampled. The aftermath was one rhino dead, three people dead, two unconscious, and ten bleeding. The only good thing in such a terrible scenario were the faithful dogs, which rescued the people on the floor and carried them to the medical beds. Beautiful. Useless, but beautiful.
You see, if everyone is either bleeding or passed out, there’s no one to play doctor. The only slim hope was for the unconscious colonists to wake up and treat the wounded. As they waited, colonists started dying left and right by blood loss.
One of the unconscious colonists, Ivy, did wake up eventually. Surely she thought she was having the worst nightmare, an infirmary full of people either dead or bleeding. She slowly walked to the corridor to get some medicine from the fridge.
Remember the rhinos? There’s still three out there and they’re still very much crazy. So as soon as she showed up, one of the rhinos charged against her. RIP Ivy. Actually, RIP everyone. There was no chance. They were done for.
Yet, in the middle of the bloodshed and desperation, a figure emerged. Literally, a black man dressed in black.
The colonists heard rumours about this, that sometimes when a colony is hit with a devastating event, fate may pity on them and send a person dressed in black to attempt to fix things. Could this person be their last and only hope? They would soon find out.
He ran into the infirmary, carrying medicine with him. He treated one colonist, but then… something changed. He was pushed to the edge of his own sanity by the horrors that surrounded him. In a moment of despair and madness, he used his bare hands to snuff out the life of one of the very colonists he sought to protect, right next to the person he just finished tending to.
That was it. The colony was brought to its knees and there was no way to get back up.
They were beaten by four rhinos and one squirrel. And one duck too.
GG.
