Hello! I’m not going to go on and on, but I am going to tell you what Kenshi means to me, and by extension what this mod means to me.

A short time ago, my life took a dark and unexpected turn. We all know how the sands can blow some days. Or weeks, or months, or… Anyhow there wasn’t much that could keep my attention or peak any interest. I have lots of games I know and love, but I soon found myself dreading to log on.

Then I saw a youtube video of Kenshi that caught my attention. It was on steam sale and I snagged it up and immediately started to fall in love with the desert, the twisted post apocalyptic tribalism, the fierce brutality in the midst of a beautiful landscape. I loved that it could be played like an open ended RPG or like an RTS with a 40 character squad, or even an RPG with a 40 character party.

When I learned HOW Kenshi was made, and by whom, and its story, I was even more intrigued to be a part of making someone’s dream come true. And so I set off from the Hub, again and again, in search of trade and adventure. And when I discovered all the wonderful mods made by the community and realized how one could truly customize Kenshi into the game THEY want to play, I had to learn how it worked.

And I found myself excited for something again.

And so I achieved toddler level modding skills and set out to build the game I wanted to play. Kenshi is a survival game and just like every other survival game you start off crafting an axe and chopping some trees, right? No? Ok, well surely you craft the pickaxe you need to mine that sweet, sweet copper, yeah? No?

I know Kenshi is not like any other survival game, but I hungered for a non-outpost, wilderness based life, away from the brutal Dust Bandits and the Holy Nation Priests with gristle flaps for souls. But it eluded me for some time.

I finally heard about Interactive World and was stunned by what the mod could do, but it had some stumbling points. Research for the base game was rearranged oddly and had humorous but vague titles. (“Stinky Pinky” anyone?) I didn’t read too good back in those days and since I couldn’t even figure out how to build a research bench, I sadly uninstalled it, scratching my brainbucket like a puzzled chimpanzee.

I daydreamed about taming the beast of a mod that was Interactive World. How did Stupendous Man get it to do so much? I was completely intimidated and had pretty much given up hope on a more fully fleshed out Survival / Woodcraft / Nomadic shade of Kenshi.

And then Tonechild!

Where I had faltered, Tonechild had soldiered on to achieve a respectable foundation that even my drool drenched hands could work with. And so here we are.

My goal, nay my passion, nay again, my obsession for this project is to curate a mod that provides Kenshi players the option to enjoy more of the features we have come to expect in modern survival games: logging, foraging, herbalism, and the ability to live a nomadic lifestyle.

With the exception of lumber being an ingredient for building materials (and there’s a patch for that!) It is my intention that the features and changes in IWK+ extend and blend into the game and the mod ecosystem as if IWK+ has added layers of gameplay between tech level zero and tech level 1 (ish).

I am totally fired up about this project.
I am absolutely open to ideas.
I, for sure, need tons of help from people smarter than me.

Give feedback, but most of all, enjoy some sand potatoes.

p.s.
I sure am sorry there’s a mod load order error, I don’t think I can fix it but I am still working on it.

-Mandalf