What do I do? This game seems boring

[AterSol]

The world just seems empty, I cant talk to hardly any npcs, and there is like nothing to do but mine a rock and sell it for money. Why are so many people loving this game? I tried to do a bounty but it gives you no direction in how to find them or what to do.

[ReD2222]

If you feel boring with the game - I suggest you going full throttle on MODDED Kenshi :)

[AterSol]

Originally posted by ReD2222 Black flammable gold:

If you feel boring with the game - I suggest you going full throttle on MODDED Kenshi :)

What mods do you recommend?

[Hatsune Neko Gaming]

Kenshi doesnt direct you in what to do, you have to find a direction and do that.
if you want to mine ore for money, do that.
loot bodies around cities after the guards kill them. do that.
bounty hunting, is a lot harder. as you have to happen across said person. or use the wiki for named individual's.

[Harmless NPC]

There aren't really traditional quests or goals so don't expect to progress that way. For me so far the whole point has been learning about the world and systems by experiencing them, often the hard way. The game gives back what you put into it - it won't feed you content like Skyrim does.

[Undead Rufus]

Bounties usually give a general area, but you have to roam around to find them. If all you've been doing is mining, a bounty target will just kill all your guys anyway.

Kenshi is a sandbox. World states can change based on certain player actions, but by and large the game doesn't care about your existence until you make it care.

If you think the world is too empty, you can always turn up the nest multiplier.

Definitely browse the workshop. Overhaul mods like "Reactive World" or "Living World" are nice.

"Clean and Speed" can help with performance.

"Legendary of Kenshi" makes the game harder.

"Dark UI" and "Transparent UI" are basically required equipment for me.

There are all sorts of mods for armor, weapons, animations, races, bounties, food and followers. Shameless plug: my own follower mod is called "Evelyn (Recruitable Character)."

Getting the most out of Kenshi also entails being able to tolerate certain level of jank, but it's one of my most-played games.

[OntologicalWeevil]

I hope they add more interactions and quests in their sequel cause the game being a "sandbox" isn't an excuse for it to be so devoid.

It's a sandbox in the most banal sense, you can shove sand around and that's about it. Stamp on the ant or two. It's like the barebones of an RPG.

[Hatsune Neko Gaming]

quests will not be added in the second game, the Dev is kind of against them.

[Cattrina]

The game is not void of content, if you think so, you have not seen the world, talked to the people nor experienced it. You just have to decide what it is YOU find worth your time

Do you prefer fighting? Grow an army and conquer the world (need a mod to this, in vanilla one of the other factions will take over the town you conquered)

Are you a scholar? Like solving mysteries? Talk to people, read books, gather lore and figure out what happened thousand years ago and why it's a desert now. YES this game actually has 'an ending'. It comes via this path. It's when you figure it out. To crack it you need a squad with all the unique recruitables. This is one of the reasons not many have figured it out, some dialogues are unlocked by the presence of such unique character and you cannot ever figure it truly unless you meticulously speak to NPCs with these characters.

Wanna be the trader-king? Craft, farm, distill and make yourself a small trading emporium. (There is not much mechanics for this in vanilla and those are slightly broken, get the NPCs shop more or such mod)

Wanna be the drug-mafia? You can. Just manufacture contraband and annoy guads all across the land!

Wanna thrill and excitement? Become a ninja-thief and sneak in various facilities and take all their stuff without them noticing.

[Cuddle_Rat]

It's a game that gives you the tools to make your own fun. The world is provided, the lore is there to find (albeit in a souls like fashion where you piece it together yourself, as opposed to having it lectured to you). It's like, to have a good long term run in Kenshi you have to have a set goal, or Roleplay reason for continuing on, for me the run ends when I've finally accomplished what my character has set out to do. I may be extremely niche here but for everything not said by npcs, I create it in my head, write a story as I go, have conversations and character building.

I dunno, maybe it's not for everyone, Kenshi, with it's particular design choices but I've 800+ hours that tell me it's a pretty good game *if* you accept it for what it is and get creative with what is provided.

[Ghin]

The game is more structured like real life in terms of how you find things to do. You don't go into a gas station and ask the dude for a pack of smokes, beef jerky, and a quest. Similarly, nothing interesting will happen if you sit in a shack by yourself. You need to go around and look at the world.

The game is basically designed to throw things at you and creates a story out of that. I suppose that's what I like about it: that the game doesn't tell me what to do.

[ReD2222]

Originally posted by AterSol:

Originally posted by ReD2222 Black flammable gold:

If you feel boring with the game - I suggest you going full throttle on MODDED Kenshi :)

What mods do you recommend?

That depends on what aspect of the game seems boring to you. If you want combat - there are some mods that make the game harder with the enemies (Like my favorite Urban Legends mod - Mist ghouls). UWE (Universal Wasteland Expansion) is a global overhaul mod that also improves HN, UC and Shek Kingdom armor and weapons. The list is really large to pick from. The last resort is the "Legendary of Kenshi" which is not fair IMO. But if you seek challenge - that might help you.

[Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia]

The areas most devoid of life tell the biggest stories, to those strong enough to survive in such areas that is.

Large areas are empty, but this lets you settle those areas without having to look elsewhere because someone else is already claiming that area. When you go to areas like Bast or Vain you will find lots of life... and death.

[Morkonan]

Originally posted by AterSol:

The world just seems empty, I cant talk to hardly any npcs, and there is like nothing to do but mine a rock and sell it for money. Why are so many people loving this game? I tried to do a bounty but it gives you no direction in how to find them or what to do.

The problem is likely that you're staying in the same place, mining rocks for money... :)

There's nothing wrong with that, at least not at first, but Kenshi's main draw and why some people do enjoy it isn't because you can mine rocks for cash.

Explore.

Kenshi's main draw is encountering unique areas in the game, different biomes, seeing different towns and peoples, fighting different sorts of enemies, and improving the character's in your "player_faction." You may even want to search for a good place to build a "Base."

Read the Bounty you picked up. What does it say? The target may be on the other side of the map...

Bounties will help to draw you out from safety... and into danger. But, otherwise, the game largely relies on you exploring on your own initiative and not because some sort of quest system pushes you there.


I wouldn't recommend any content mods until you have a good familiarity with most of the game's mechanics. You won't know what the mod is adding, otherwise, and won't know how its elements will effect gameplay.

Most players, including myself, would recommend the "256 Recruitment Limit" mod. (There could be others that do the same things or more.)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=705119823

This will allow you to have more characters and more groups, making it easier to tailor groups for certain purposes.


Crafting can be a "Big Deal" in Kenshi. This requires you to own at least a building or two in a Town(s) so you can construct the necessary workbenches and storage/etc. It is possible for you to craft nearly anything in the game from buildings you own in a Town. Though, to unlock the ability to be truly self-sufficient, you'll need to found your own base. A good part of most player's early and mid-game gameplay is searching for a suitable location that they would like to build a base. I recommend you have at least ten or more characters with decent equipment and combat stats all above 20+ else... you will have a bad time. (More and higher is better and best.) Once you have a Base of your own, and that's not a mandatory requirement by the way, you will likely be somewhat focused on ending certain threats by Raiding groups. That can help direct your gameplay for quite awhile, too.

Exploration is the really big draw for Kenshi. The world is a very interesting place with a ton of places to explore. It does, however, require you to act on your own initiative to do that.

[Legiondorf]

1. Solo, don't get knocked out and you will appreciate all loot lol.
2. Char edit is great make something that looks amazing. + for fatties.
3. Get good mogs. Armoured rags/skirt thank me later.
4. Roam the land with caravans while levelling. Just a simple man/woman/bug making their way across the wastes.
5. Level first char then branch out / endgame etc.

[OntologicalWeevil]

Originally posted by Cattrina:

The game is not void of content, if you think so, you have not seen the world, talked to the people nor experienced it. You just have to decide what it is YOU find worth your time

Do you prefer fighting? Grow an army and conquer the world (need a mod to this, in vanilla one of the other factions will take over the town you conquered)

Are you a scholar? Like solving mysteries? Talk to people, read books, gather lore and figure out what happened thousand years ago and why it's a desert now. YES this game actually has 'an ending'. It comes via this path. It's when you figure it out. To crack it you need a squad with all the unique recruitables. This is one of the reasons not many have figured it out, some dialogues are unlocked by the presence of such unique character and you cannot ever figure it truly unless you meticulously speak to NPCs with these characters.

Wanna be the trader-king? Craft, farm, distill and make yourself a small trading emporium. (There is not much mechanics for this in vanilla and those are slightly broken, get the NPCs shop more or such mod)

Wanna be the drug-mafia? You can. Just manufacture contraband and annoy guads all across the land!

Wanna thrill and excitement? Become a ninja-thief and sneak in various facilities and take all their stuff without them noticing.

99% of the content doesn't involve interesting interactions with the people of the world. When you are interacting with them, you're either trading or killing. If there's no interesting characters to interact with it's only half a world.

It's a shallow sandbox and it's a shame because it can be so much more.