Rusty Lake (Developer)

*This article is about the developer. For the location, see Rusty Lake.*

**Rusty Lake** is the developer/creator of the Cube Escape series and other related premium games such as Rusty Lake Hotel, Rusty Lake: Roots and Rusty Lake Paradise. Also, Samsara Room, a game independent from the Rusty Lake universe and the main inspiration of the Cube Escape series, was made by them under a different name.

Rusty Lake is based in Amsterdam in the Netherlands. The Developers have been creating Cube Escape games since the summer of 2015. Inspired by the Twin Peaks series, they created Rusty Lake as the central location of their games. Due to not having the budget and time to create a big narrative game containing a lot of text and voiceovers, they decided to develop small point-and-click games which use mostly visuals to tell their stories.

They also run the Rusty Lake blog which feeds news about the development of upcoming games. Aside from creating games, their website also provides game portals for many other popular adventure, puzzle, room escape games, places for submitted fanart and their own merchandise store.

## Introduction

*Where dark creatures live under the tranquil water surface.*

*Where you can hear voices in the trees.*

*Where ancient artifacts are waiting to be found.*

*Where the paintings come alive.*

*Where nothing is forgotten.*

*Where the birds lay black eggs.*

Rusty Lake offers the best and newest adventure, room escape and puzzle games. We select only the most beautiful, complex, original, mysterious, disturbing or confusing. Games with a fascinating story, ambience or game-play. Made by more forward-looking developers. A game should be an experience, even if it’s played in the browser or on mobile. You can only unfold its mysteries by using your mind and imagination.

## Games Created

(For the games they have created, see List of Games.)

## Known Cooperators

* Voice-overs, trailers and walkthrough maker: Bob Rafferty ~ Personal Facebook page
* Voice-over for Dale Vandermeer: Infant Tyrone
* Music composers:
	+ Kevin MacLeod (From Cube Escape: The Lake to Cube Escape: The Mill, "The Lake Suite" for Cube Escape: Birthday)
	+ Victor Butzelaar (From Rusty Lake Hotel till now) ~ Personal Facebook page.
* Website management and Beta tester: Ruben Aldenhoven
* Landscape painter (For Rusty Lake: Roots and Cube Escape: The Cave): Johan Scherft ~ Personal Facebook page.

## Awards and Recognition

* Won Best Narrative Award @ Casual Connect Tel Aviv: Rusty Lake: Roots.
* Nominated Best Indie Game and Best Narrative Award @ Casual Connect Amsterdam: Rusty Lake Hotel.
* Nominated Best Narrative Award @ Casual Connect Tel Aviv: Cube Escape: Seasons.
* Nominated into Top 10 @ Google Play Indie Games Contest - Febuary 16, 2017: Rusty Lake: Roots.
* On Kongregate:
	+ 3rd Place Weekly Contest - May 10th, 2015: Cube Escape: The Lake.
	+ 2nd Place Weekly Contest - May 17th, 2015: Cube Escape: Seasons.
	+ 4th Place Monthly Contest - June 3rd, 2015: Cube Escape: Seasons.
	+ 4th Place Monthly Contest - July 3rd, 2015: Cube Escape: Arles.
	+ 1st Place Monthly Contest - September 10th, 2015: Cube Escape: Case 23.
	+ 2nd Place Monthly Contest - October 10th, 2015: Cube Escape: The Mill.
* ​On Newgrounds:
	+ Daily 5th Place - May 3rd, 2015: Cube Escape: The Lake.
	+ Daily 2nd Place - May 12th, 2015: Cube Escape: Seasons.
	+ Daily Feature - June 14th, 2015: Cube Escape: Arles.
	+ Daily 2nd Place - July 1st, 2015: Cube Escape: Harvey's Box.
	+ Daily Feature/Weekly 2nd Place - August 10th, 2015: Cube Escape: Case 23.
	+ Daily Feature/Weekly 3rd Place - September 13th, 2015: Cube Escape: The Mill.
	+ Daily Feature/Weekly 2nd Place - February 22nd, 2015: Cube Escape: Birthday.
	+ Daily Feature/Weekly 3rd Place - April 25th, 2015: Cube Escape: Theatre.

## Trivia

* Rusty Lake is a two-man team. They intend to keep a low profile, though they have given their names as Robin and Maarten.
* By January 2017, Robin was 26 and Maarten was 32. Both of the Developers' birthdates are between April 19th-25th.
* The team officially opened Rusty Lake Discord server on September 12th, 2017. (Invite link below.)
* Robin is Master in ICT Law and Maarten is Master in Landscape Architecture. They together came to gaming as a hobby, first created a few news-based games (Snowden's Leaks: The Game, Save Harr) then started with Cube Escape and finally work full time on Rusty Lake.
* In its first year, Rusty Lake was funded partly by LoyaltyGame, a company founded by one of the team members. LoyaltyGame do not own the Rusty Lake company however, which remains independent.
* Although Rusty Lake was officially announced on April 25th, 2015, the blog had already been active since March 25th, 2015.
* Their address: Lab 101, A Lab Amsterdam, Overhoeksplain 2, 1031 KS Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
* The maximum amount of time they decided for each game's development is 2 months, with the exception of Rusty Lake Hotel and Rusty Lake: Roots.
* Victor Butzelaar and the Developers work in the same office. He works in Lab 206.
* The Developers came across Johan Scheft when he was having some saving issues in Rusty Lake Hotel.
* You can play a small HTML5 game on the banner only on the main website for desktop. This was unavailable due to the website update from February 4th, 2017, but restored on September 9th, 2017.
* The font used for titles and such used to be hellogoodbye, and is now Amatic.
* The font used in the logo of Rusty Lake that is displayed on top of the main page of their official website is "Coffee Shoppe Espresso".
* The Rusty Lake Studio brought attention to this wiki in a blog post titled "The Cube Escape Wikia", now known as Rusty Lake Wiki.

## External Links

* Main Website
* Cube Escape games
* Twitter
* Facebook
* Instagram
* Youtube
* Kongregate
* Newgrounds
* GameJolt
* Discord invite link

## Gallery

Rusty Lake Avatar from April 6th, 2015.Rusty Lake's Avatar from May, 2015.Rusty Lake's Avatar since June, 2015.Pictures of the developers and the people they work with.
## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Meet The Artist: RUSTY LAKE
2. ↑ Rusty Lake's One Year Anniversary!
3. ↑ Snowden's Leaks: The Game
4. ↑ Save Harry
5. ↑ Welcome to the Rusty Lake Blog, Rusty Lake Blog
6. ↑ Press
7. ↑ RUSTY LAKE’S ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY!
8. ↑ http://www.a-lab.nl/members
9. ↑ THE NEW RUSTY LAKE PROJECT IS COMING TOGETHER!, Rusty Lake Blog