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RuneScape, often shortened to RS, is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) by British developer Jagex and is programmed in Java. Over two million active players across 132 internationally located servers make RuneScape one of the top online video games. RuneScape was launched on 4 January 2001 and offers both traditional pay-to-play (P2P) and unconventional free-to-play (F2P) membership. RuneScape is designed to be accessible from any location with an internet connection, to run in an ordinary Web browser, and to be undemanding upon system resources.

Players, shown on the screen as customizable avatars, can see and interact with each other while playing the game, engaging in combat, trade, cooperation, or just chat. The primary activities of RuneScape are combatting non player character monsters and other players, developing a variety of skills through training, and accumulating wealth. Players can set their own goals and objectives; there is no linear path that must be followed.

RuneScape takes place in the realm of Gielinor, which is divided into the Kingdoms of Misthalin, Asgarnia, and Kandarin, the tropical Karamja island, the Kharidian Desert region, and the lawless Wilderness, among others. Players can travel throughout the world on foot, by riding in vehicles such as boats, mine carts or gnome gliders, or by teleporting with magic spells. Each kingdom, island, or forest area offers different types of monsters to fight, different materials to process into usable commodities, and different quests to complete.

RuneScape is updated regularly, usually weekly, by Jagex. The majority of content updates are accessible only to P2P players, while others affect all areas of the game including the free areas. Updates can bring new areas to explore, new items to collect, new skills to train, and new monsters to fight.

Overview

RuneScape is a MMORPG comparable to Guild Wars, Everquest, and Final Fantasy XI. Players set their own goals in the game, deciding which of the available activities they wish to pursue. Players can increase their experience (train) in any of the available skills from combat to construction, complete quests, develop skills, and hang out with friends and other players. Players interact with each other through chat, trade, mutual missions, mini-games, and visiting each other in their houses.

During peak hours, RuneScape usually has more than 150,000 players online. The record for the largest number of simultaneous players is steadily rising. In March 2006, a record 197,000 simultaneous players was reached. This record was broken on June 2, 2006, when over 202,000 players were online simultaneously, making RuneScape the most popular online Java based game in the world. Jagex maintains 133 international servers, or worlds, for RuneScape and RuneScape Classic. Each of the 131 RuneScape servers is limited to 2,000 players, allowing 262,000 simultaneous players. The two RuneScape Classic servers are each limited to 1,250, allowing 2,500 players.

The RuneScape servers are located in the United Kingdom (20 servers including the 2 Classic servers), the United States (79), Canada (14), the Netherlands (6), Australia (6) and Sweden (8). RuneScape is usually updated weekly, with the common addition of new quests and items. Larger updates are less frequent and can include additions of new locations, skills, items, or mini-games.

History and Development

Version One: The first version started out as a one man project. Andrew Gower, the developer, started working on the original game in 1998. This version was very different from the RuneScape of today. It had isometric graphics, and was originally titled 'DeviousMUD'. This version was never released to the public, and only a few people ever saw it.

Version Two: Andrew scrapped 'DeviousMUD', and started work on a complete rewrite in 1999. Despite being a complete rewrite, this version was very similar to the first, with the same graphics as the first, but with some name changes. This version was released as a public beta for about one week, and then withdrawn.

Version Three: Andrew started yet again with a third attempt in October 1999. This time, he had some help from his brother, Paul Gower. The isometric view was replaced in favour of 3D graphics and 2D sprites. The game was renamed RuneScape and released to the public on 4 January 2001. This version is still online today, but only for limited RuneScape members. It is currently called RuneScape Classic. This version was also featured on TechTV's show The Screen Savers as a part of Megan's Download of the Day segment on January 25, 2002 On 12 January 2006, play was restricted to members who had logged in at least once since 5 August 2005. No more accounts for this version can ever be created.

Jagex Limited is Formed: In December 2001, Jagex Limited was founded as a commercial operation. Jagex acquired RuneScape along with all related technologies and continued to develop the game further. Andrew Gower became its lead developer.

Members Launch: On 27 February 2002, Jagex launched an optional "members service", allowing players to pay about $5 USD a month to obtain access to constant updates on a regular basis, usually weekly. Paying members had a far greater choice of things to do, but it was still possible to play the game for free. In fact, the amount of free content was also increased. While not a new version as such, since the game still ran on the same game engine, this update did significantly change the focus of the game.

Version Four: Originally planned to be a graphical update, Jagex went for a complete rewrite and introduced a new game engine, changed the graphics to full 3D, and made many other significant improvements. While in development, this version was called RuneScape 2. The name was changed to simply RuneScape, but the name RuneScape 2 is still used to differentiate between it and RuneScape Classic. An incomplete beta of this version was made available to members on 1 December 2003, and the finished version was launched on 29 March 2004.

Version Five: On 16 May 2006, Jagex upgraded RuneScape's game engine, improving aspects of it, such as the chat filter. Version 5 appears to the player to be basically the same RuneScape as Version 4 as the upgrades are much more low key than previous changes; however, this version has major changes in the underlying programming. Most importantly, they reduce the amount of memory the game uses, which will allow the game to be expanded and improved in many ways without increasing its load time for most players. This is the current version of RuneScape being promoted by Jagex, and is the version most people associate with the word RuneScape.

Combat

Combat Knowledge Base Page

Combat is an important aspect of RuneScape, as killing monsters is one of the most direct ways of gaining wealth in terms of both cash and items. Combat is also needed to complete many of the quests in the game and can be used to fight other players. Combat levels are calculated using the seven combat skills: attack, strength, defence, hitpoints, magic, prayer, and ranged. Other skills increase players' total levels and overall rankings but not their combat levels. The maximum combat level in RuneScape Classic is 123, and the maximum in the current RuneScape is 126.

Combat is subdivided into three primary categories:

• Melee - fighting at close range with or without weapons
• Magic - fighting with magic spells
• Ranged - fighting with projectile weapons

Unlike many similar games, character classes do not exist in RuneScape. Players are not bound to a specific category of combat, and they may freely change between the three forms of combat at any time simply by switching weapons, armours, and methods of attack. Players can even carry the weapons and armours of all three combat categories in their inventories and switch back and forth at will. Many players also combine combat types to a degree. Players may choose to wear ranged armour and wield melee weapons, as melee weapons are more effective against mages while ranged armour provides the best defence against mages.

Weapons

There are many types of weapons in RuneScape, such as swords, bows and arrows, and magical staffs. Different weapons have different powers, strengths, and requirements. Weapons are generally ranked by attack bonus and speed, but consideration is also given to the availability of special attacks or other special abilities. Stronger players generally use more powerful weapons than weaker players.

Monsters

Many NPCs populate RuneScape. Some of them, such as shopkeepers, cannot be attacked by players, but many NPCs can be attacked. Attackable NPCs are known as monsters, whether they are human, animal, elemental, demonic, or perhaps something else. Monsters range from common, low level monsters like chickens to unique, much more powerful monsters like the King Black Dragon or Chaos Elemental. Each type of monster has its own strengths and weaknesses. Demons, for example, have low defence against magical attacks while dragons have extremely high defence against magic. Monsters may also be aggressive (they will attack any player who comes within range, regardless of level), non-aggressive (they will not attack players unless provoked, regardless of levels), or partially aggressive (they will attack only those players who are within a predetermined number of levels above or below their own level). This can serve to make certain areas unsafe for lower level players.

Player versus Player Combat

Players can choose to fight against other players in player versus player (PvP) combat in several areas of RuneScape. The most common place is in the Wilderness. In the Wilderness, players risk their lives and, more importantly, their items, challenging other players. Players can also engage in PvP combat in Castle Wars and the TzHaar Fight Pit, which are mini-games where players can enjoy fighting other players without risking their items. The Duel Arena, another mini-game, can also be used for PvP combat; here, however, players must agree on the rules and what each player is willing to stake, if anything, before the fight begins.

Skills

Runescape Skills Knowledge Base Page

Skills are the abilities that enable players to perform activities in the game. Players gain experience in a skill when they perform activities that utilise that skill, for instance mining a rock would increase the mining skill. In general, the higher level it requires to perform a task, the more experience points the performer receives, and the more desirable the result is. The combined skill level of a player partly symbolises the player's status in the game. The RuneScape hiscores tables can be viewed by all players, and players with higher combined, or overall, levels are well known. There are currently 22 skills including:

• Extraction skills

Mining, Fishing, Woodcutting

• Processing skills

Cooking, Smithing, Fletching, Crafting, Runecrafting, Firemaking

• Combat skills

Attack, Strength, Defence, Magic, Ranged, Prayer, Hitpoints

• Independent skills

Farming, Construction, Herblore, Construction, Slayer, Agility, Thieving

Random Events

Random Events Knowledge Base Page

When players train skills, they often encounter random events, which are usually NPCs that appear next to a player, requiring some type of player input. Some random events are simple, requiring a player only to click on the NPC or to leave the area temporarily; others require the player to navigate a labyrinth, answer a question, or imitate another NPCs actions. Players must respond to these events quickly and correctly in order to avoid a negative effect, such as being teleported across the map. Players correctly responding to random events can receive rewards of items or increased levels.

Random events have the benefit to deter players from macroing, which is the act of using a program to play the game with little or no human interaction. Postings by the Andrew Gower suggests randoms not only hinder macroers but alleviate monotony in leveling skills for long periods of time (refered to as grinding).

One problem with Random Events is in the event of a timeout or broken internet connection, players can be kicked off the server before they have a chance to remove their character from the game. In this time, random events can occur and kill or otherwise harm an innocent player. For this reason, random events are a controversial part of the game.

Quests

Quests in RuneScape are one-time adventures that serve a variety of purposes. The novice quests act as tutorials to acquaint new users with the various skills and abilities they will need in the game and are usually linear in nature. The harder quests are designed to challenge the skills of experienced players to resolve a world conflict of some kind, which might just open up a new area to be explored and exploited for fun and profit. Quests may be started in several places around the RuneScape world. All quests include some kind of reward, such as money, rare or valuable items, or an increase in skill experience. Most quests also give the player a number of "quest points", usually dependent on the difficulty of the quest. A certain number of quest points is required to start some quests, as a demonstration of ability. Some quests are part of an overlapping storyline, the most famous of which is the Plague City story line, which has been in RuneScape for several years and currently contains seven separate quests. On 15 March 2006, Jagex released the hundredth quest, Recipe for Disaster, which is a sequel to the first quest, Cook's Assistant.

Mini-Games

Mini-Games Knowledge Base Page

RuneScape has a number of mini-games, which are activities, somewhat like quests, that can be done multiple times. Located within the overall game of RuneScape, they take place in certain areas, and normally involve a certain skill. Many mini-games involve cooperative efforts or allow players to compete with each other. Popular mini-games include Castle Wars, Pest Control, and Barrows.

Membership

Players can choose to play RuneScape free (F2P) or to pay for extra content (P2P). P2P players can participate in all the activities available to F2P players; in addition, they also have access to quests, items, map area, skills, shortcuts, and mini-games that are not available to F2P players. The monthly fee when paid by credit card is £3.20, $5.00, $7.50, or €4.60. Other payment options, including paying by check or money order, charging to telephone bills, and using online cash processors such as PayPal, are available at rates that include additional service fees. In addition to more content, P2P players also have the ability to vote in polls and to post on the official forums. When the paid membership option was first introduced, content was updated usually weekly for members. Updates are still done on a weekly basis, but content for F2P players does receive occasional updates. Paid membership is also required to play RuneScape Classic.

Community

Main Article: RuneScape Community

Players of RuneScape represent a wide range of nationalities and ages; however, because the game itself is currently only available in English, almost all players speak English to some extent. Players who speak languages other than English tend to gravitate to worlds that are populated by other players who speak the same language. For example, some worlds have a greater percentage of players who speak Spanish, Dutch, or Lithuanian. It is not uncommon to see many languages on the chat screens throughout RuneScape.

Graphics

Although RuneScape currently has fully 3D graphics, some people argue that RuneScape's graphics are substandard. However, the game is developed using Java, which focuses on having graphics compact enough to be loaded quickly in a browser, and as such, there comes a point where the quality of the graphics cannot be further improved. Like many online games, RuneScape does not support Next-Gen graphics, but players are quick to point out that the quality of a game does not depend solely on its graphics. Since the game does not require a download or a CD to play, and it is played entirely in a web browser, the game's graphics will never reach the same standard as modern PC games.

Character Appearance

A lot of emphasis has been placed on allowing players to customise their character, however a human is still the only race you may play as. Players are given a wide choice in creating character models, from hairstyle to facial features and gender. Appearance can be further optimised by wearing or wielding different items, with each different weapon having a unique image. In addition to these small equipment changes, players may also change their appearance radically with special equipment, or during certain events. All morphs are temporary, and players cannot attack while morphed. Players may be transformed to frogs, eggs, mushrooms, and small animals such as chickens and pigs. Players wearing a ring of stone may transform into piles of stone, allowing them to avoid poison or weather effects such as desert heat. In Castle Wars, players wearing armour that conflicts with their team god will be transformed into imps, sheep, or rabbits. Players holding a monkey gree-gree from the Monkey Madness quest may transform into primates in specific areas.

Character Animations

There are many different animations in the game for the variety of things players can do, from combat to the numerous quests. There are also "emotes", which are animations that allow players to express an emotion whenever they choose. Players will start with most of the emotes, but some of the emotes must be earned, either through quests or from random events. The "scared" and "rabbit hop" emotes were only obtainable during past holiday events. If players did not unlock them during those events, they will never be able to obtain them.

Detail Levels

RuneScape can be run in high or low detail level. Choosing to run it on the high detail mode gives different things a more graphically intense texture and design. Choosing low detail gives everything a cleaner cut look and reduces in-game latency, commonly called 'lag'. Some monsters and landmarks will also appear less detailed in the low detail version of the game. Some objects that contain moving parts on high detail do not move on low detail, including the water spraying from fountains. Originally, the low detail version of the game was designed not to play sounds (for slower computers), but with a recent update, players using the low detail version of the game can now access sound effects.

Area Appearance

Since February 2005, Jagex has put a massive effort forward to update the RuneScape free world cities, beginning with Lumbridge and Draynor Village. In September 2005 they announced that Thurgo's Peninsula, which includes the Port Sarim and Rimmington areas, had been graphically updated. On the 20 February 2006, Falador and the Barbarian Village were graphically updated, along with the Lost City of Zanaris. The change to Falador was criticised heavily, as many players complained there was too much white in the buildings. As of April 2006, Jagex has added wilderness graphics. There are also occasional, unannounced graphical changes to some places such as West Ardougne, the sewer underneath it, and many items. Jagex plans ultimately to improve the graphics of the whole free world without causing more lag for people using dial-up internet connections.

Economy

The RuneScape economy is similar in many ways to real-world economies, as the concept of "supply and demand" plays an important role in determining the price of items. The currency used in RuneScape is gold pieces, mostly referred to as "gp" or "coins". Unfortunately, the RuneScape economy is plagued by inflation, as the number of gold pieces in circulation is unlimited and ever-increasing due to NPC drops and alchemy. Conversely, many valuable items decline gradually in price as more of them appear from NPC drops. As more players choose to pay a monthly fee for more content, prices tend to stabilise through greater demand and in some cases, as with the robin hood hat and ranger boots set, prices can even rise.

The recently added Construction skill seems designed to slow down inflation due to requiring payment to NPCs to get material to level the skill. It is easily estimated that it takes 55,000,000 Coins to reach level 99 Construction. Adding to this are items such as Demon Chair and Steel Dragon monsters players can make or purchase that cost 25 million and 10 million coins respectively.

Criticisms

RuneScape is criticised for a number of reasons:

• RuneScape's graphics are criticised as being substandard. Because RuneScape is designed to run in a web browser, the graphics are implemented in Java, and therefore will never reach the standard of other MMORPGs, such as MapleStory, EverQuest or World of Warcraft. Jagex has made attempts to improve the graphics in the free cities.
• RuneScape sometimes runs slowly and in-game "lag" is common. This is usually caused by playing RuneScape using older computers or slow Internet connections, although some players with good internet connections and good PCs still lag.
• Tasks in RuneScape are often repetitive, often requiring users to repeatedly click in the same pattern to train skills. Jagex designed the farming skill with this criticism in mind, but their efforts to make it less repetitive were criticised for making the process of levelling too complicated.
• Attempted scamming, is common in RuneScape, although this is a problem throughout the genre. Scammers, or those players who perpetrate scams, use diverse methods to trick their intended victims.
  • In the middle of a trade, scammers can remove or replace items they are trading, hoping the victim will accept the trade without noticing the change.
  • Scammers can ask victims to join a clan but first request a display of trustworthiness in which victims are asked to give valuable items to the scammer to prove their intent.
  • Scammers can try to trick other players into revealing their passwords by pretending that the RuneScape chat filter prevents users from typing passwords, therefore enticing victims, especially young players, to type their passwords.
  • Scammers can offer to trim armour, often while wearing a full set of trimmed armour as bait.
  • Scammers can offer to perform a task for their victims (for example cut gems or cook food) for free. While legitimate players may also offer to perform tasks, most will trade the finished product for the raw materials up front. Scammers, however, will run away with the items.
• Some players cheat by using automated bots or scripts to play the game for them. Jagex has taken various measures to prevent this. They introduced random events into RuneScape, many involving captchas that require a human response. In addition, Jagex has banned tens of thousands of accounts, and implemented a very advanced macro detection system; even so, a few players have still found ways to cheat. This problem is common throughout the genre.
• RuneScape's chat filter often censors words that are not swearing, bad language, or inappropriate in any way. It is also easy to use intentional misspellings, leetspeak, or symbols to bypass the filter, so swear words like "fuc|{" are still commonly used in RuneScape. Jagex made changes to the filter on 16 May 2006 that were successful in alleviating some of the problems, although other problems with the filter remain.
• Some players criticise RuneScape for not having enough free content. RuneScape does have a considerable amount of free content, but there are rarely any updates for free players, and few features for high-level free players. This is understandable as Jagex's ultimate goal is to make a profit, and the ads in the free version bring in relatively little revenue. Other users are dissatisfied with Jagex's Customer Support, especially for free players. Jagex is making efforts to increase the size of their customer support team, and the new Knowledge Base is expected to take some stress off the Customer Support team. However, Jagex has announced in the June 2006 "behind the scenes" page that they plan to make an addition to both free and member servers in the form of a new minigame.

Footnotes

1. "RuneScape new concurrent and active player records" - gamesindustry.biz, 22 December 2004. Retrieved 5 March 2006.
2. "Virtual gamers reveal themselves" - BBC News, 7 October 2004. Retrieved 15 June 2006.
3. "How gaming is all work and no play" - BBC News, 14 March 2006. Retrieved 15 June 2006.
4. RuneScape world map - RuneScape.com, retrieved 15 June 2006.
5. "5 new worlds in Stockholm, Sweden" - RuneScape Technical News, 27 March 2006. Retrieved 4 March 2006.
6. "6 new Australian servers online!" - RuneScape Technical News, 28 December 2005. Retrieved 4 March 2006.
7. "Free Download of the Day: Runescape" - g4tv.com, 25 January 2002. Retrieved 31 May 2006.
8. "Nearly 5000 RS-classic accounts banned" - RuneScape Customer Support News, 12 January 2006. Retrieved 4 March 2006.
9. "The biggest update ever..." - RuneScape Game updates news, 13 February 2003. Retrieved 15 June 2006.
10. "Weapons Update" - RuneScape Game Updates News, 29 March 2005. Retrieved 4 June 2006.
11. "Game engine upgraded!" - RuneScape Game Updates News, 16 May 2006. Retrieved 4 June 2006.

External links

• RuneScape – The official RuneScape website.
• Jagex site – The official Jagex site.
• Knowledge Base – The official RuneScape guide.
• Forums - The official RuneScape forums.

Official affiliates

• Miniclip (runescape.com)
• Mofunzone (runescape.com)

Major fansite

• RuneHQ

• RuneScape
• Massively multiplayer online role-playing games
• Java platform games
• Miniclip games
• Browser-based games