Tag: Runescape

RuneScape Preps For 2019 Premiere Club, Mining & Smithing Beta


The end of 2018 is nigh, and that can only mean one thing: The next annual Premiere Club package is going to be available from RuneScape. For the uninitiated, Premiere Club is an annual package of RuneScape membership that comes with extra goodies including an aura, exclusive outfits, pets, access to VIP worlds, chat badges, and more. This year the price is going up to $89.99, up from $79.99 in 2017 and still much lower than the $107.99 in 2015/2016. Details on the premiere club bonuses will be revealed later this week, while the membership itself likely won’t go on sale until the 15.

Meanwhile, Jagex is gearing up for another round of beta testing of the game’s mining & smithing rework. MMO Fallout previewed the last beta round way back in February, so hopefully Jagex is a bit further along in their development.

More information on this week’s updates at the link below.

(Source: RuneScape)

Old School RuneScape Launches Mobile Today


The world mourns its loss of collective productivity today as Jagex has officially launched Old School RuneScape out of beta in its mobile form. The classic MMORPG hits Android and iOS devices following months of beta testing, with over one million users having pre-registered. Users are able to log in with their existing PC accounts and continue on either platform continuing to level up their characters.

Jagex CEO Phil Mansell stated:

“Today’s launch of Old School RuneScape on mobile leads the charge as we bring two of the world’s most popular MMORPGs to the world’s most popular gaming devices. We believe in taking our living games to wherever our players want them and, with the mobile editions offering full and seamless cross-platform play with PC, players can now continue their adventures on either platform and on the move. The arrival of Old School RuneScape on mobile, and our ongoing work to also bring RuneScape to mobile, is testament to our investment in the continued growth for both titles and building our vision for living games.”

Runefest 2018: Jagex Cans The RunePass


I talked about the Runepass back in July and at the time I was hesitant to give any score to the feature given it was essentially in the state of a pilot program. While I noted that it did somewhat reduce the Dailyscape issue that plagued prior limited promotions, the pass just wasn’t worth it especially when compared to the competition. The Runepass was $10 and compared to other games that have released such a mechanic, it offered very little not only in rewards but in time, lasting about two weeks when most others run for a couple of months at a time and give a lot more for the same cost, if not cheaper.

The response from the overall community was also pretty negative, with players expressing doubts towards Jagex’s promise that a Runepass would mean less cash shop promotions, with many believing that Jagex would just opt to do both.

Well Jagex promised that they would go back and look at the Runepass before offering an update, and it looks like the Runepass has been shelved along with expansions. In a post on the RuneScape Reddit, Jagex stated that while Runepass was apparently successful commercially, it will not be coming back in the foreseeable future.

Before we try doing RunePass again we need to put a little more time and thought into it. For the time being, at least, those energies are better invested elsewhere, and our focus is better placed on instead ensuring the delivery of great game updates for 2019.

(Source: Reddit)

PSA: How To Play RuneScape Idle Adventures (Updated)


(Update: 6/18/19: As brought to our attention in the comments below, this method no longer works.)

RuneScape Idle Adventures was the product of a partnership between Jagex and Hyper Hippo. It launched into early access on Steam and was very quickly abandoned by developer Hyper Hippo and never made it out of early access. Rather than cut ties to its online server, an arguably simple task for a game that arguably shouldn’t need to be connecting to a server, Hyper Hippo decided that the best option would just be to cut off access to the game entirely.

Thankfully the internet is full of magic wizards who can macgyver a functioning game in three keystrokes. Reddit user awsjay discovered nine months ago that you can get RuneScape Idle Adventures (almost) fully functioning with literally one character change in the game’s code.

  1. Download the game (If not already active on your Steam account, you should be able to force the install through SteamDB)
  2. Get yourself a hex editor program. (I used this one because it’s simple looking)
  3. Go to the line highlighted below. The third number from the right will be 3A, change this value to 39 (as screenshotted)
  4. Save your change.
  5. Launch the game.

When I say the game is “mostly functional,” I’m referring to the obvious limitations being you won’t be able to buy anything from the store because the servers aren’t there. Otherwise the game is fully functional as far as they were able to develop it.

To prove this method actually works, I will be leaving my game broadcasting for the next day or so. You can see it active here.

(Source: Reddit)

Old School RuneScape Gets New Skill


This weekend marked Runefest, the annual festival of all things RuneScape. While discussing all things past, present, and future, Jagex announced that Old School RuneScape will receive a new skill in the form of warding.

Warding aims to fill a gap in RuneScape’s crafting. As the developer blog notes, while melee and range users have skills to create their armor, magic users aren’t so blessed. Mage equipment currently is either dropped from monsters or bought from players who in turn received them from monsters. The warding skill will aim to give mages their own alternative.

In order to craft armors, players will need to gather materials from skills such as farming, hunter, or killing certain monsters, using new crops and beasts that will be added alongside the skill. Rune energy will need to be drawn from the various monoliths scattered throughout the world. Soapstones will be used to draw runic wards on the ground, and then the materials are used to create the desired armor.

Warding will release at some point in the future. This marks the first skill available in Old School that is not in standard RuneScape.

 

Jagex Employee Fired, Police Called In Over Compromised User Accounts


(Source: Reddit)

Jagex this week announced that an employee has been fired and police have been brought in regarding “gross misuse of moderator privileges.” While the official post doesn’t go into much detail, reports from the Reddit forum indicate that the employee is Jed Sanderson, aka Mod Jed, and involves the now ex-staffer used his moderator status to compromise RuneScape accounts to steal excessive amounts of gold, presumably to either trade to other players or to sell on the open market for real money.

This isn’t the first time Mod Jed has been suspected of malfeasance. As a Jagex employee, Jed has been known to be a member of the Reign of Terror clan, a group notorious for using denial of service attacks against opponents in Jagex’s $10,000 Deadman Mode Tournaments. Jed was investigated last year in regards to these allegations and cleared of all suspicion.

“Following our investigation, we were able to resolve the issue before any significant impact was made to the wider game, or economy. We have also taken steps to return items and GP to any affected accounts. Whilst we generally do not return items or gold, we feel that given this unusual situation, we wanted to ensure no players lost out to the rogue actions of a member of staff. We are actively working with the Police regarding the incident, but given this an ongoing legal matter we are unable to provide further details.”

Given the enormous real world value of the gold stolen (estimates in the tens of thousands), Jagex has noted that it is actively assisting the police in investigating the matter. Players affected by Jed’s actions have reported receiving the items back that were stolen from them, or as close as possible as Jagex can ascertain the damages.

(Source: RuneScape)

Old School RuneScape Mobile To Launch October 30


Jagex today announced the official launch of Old School RuneScape mobile will take place on October 30. The launch will bring the popular MMO to both Android and iOS devices, allowing gamers to play cross-platform with players on PC, and will be playable with existing accounts/characters.

Conor Crowley, director of game development at Jagex, stated:

“2018 has been a year of significant milestones for Old School RuneScape on mobile, from the first closed betas at the start of the year, to the successful Members Only Beta and recent Canadian and Nordic soft launches over the summer, but none of them have been as highly anticipated as this. We are incredibly proud to confirm that Old School RuneScape on mobile is now just a matter of weeks from a full launch; we know our players – both existing and returning – have long wanted to play the game they love while away from their PCs. The countdown to 30thOctober is underway!”

The app is currently available to pre-register for on the iOS and App Store. Old School RuneScape had previously soft launched in Canada, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, and Norway.

(Source: Jagex Press Release)

Old School RuneScape Introduces Taxes On Duel Arena


If Jagex isn’t careful, they’re going to have players throwing tea into Port Sarim.

The only guarantees of life in RuneScape are death and, apparently now taxes. This week’s update to Old School sees the implementation of several changes to combat real money trading, and the main headliner is the inclusion of taxes on duels. Winners will be charged a percentage depending on the size of the stake, ranging from .25% to 1% (see illustration above), and cash bets will need to be within ten thousand gold in value.

In addition, it will no longer be possible to stake items. Unlike most of Old School RuneScape’s changes, this update was not polled to players for approval.

(Source: RuneScape)

RuneScape Classic Officially Shuts Down


The earliest commercial version of RuneScape has shut down today after seventeen years of service. RuneScape Classic, previously known just as RuneScape, launched in 2001 with a handful of servers and an even smaller handful of developers, going on to amass far more interest than creator Andrew Gower could have ever anticipated. In 2004, RuneScape launched a major update to its engine, introducing RuneScape 2 and relegating the initial version to the now unsupported “Classic” title.

Jagex has kept the Old School servers online for fourteen years despite not officially supporting the product, and eventually shut down the ability for new accounts to even access the servers due to the sheer number of bot accounts and Jagex’s inability to provide updates due to the game no longer being supported. Account registration was periodically opened up over the years, and in May it was finally announced that the servers would be brought down for good due to accumulating bugs and Jagex’s inability to keep the game properly supported.

Players gathered to watch the servers come down for one last time today, with the event permanently etched in digital stone via the Twitch link below.

Diaries From RuneScape: Old School Mobile Beta


I went into Old School RuneScape’s mobile beta with two questions in mind: How well this game would run on my Google Pixel (original, non XL), how well it would perform in my office which is a lead-wrapped dead zone, and how many seconds it would take my Pixel to be drained of its battery. Sorry, make that three questions.

The answer is surprisingly well on all accounts. I didn’t have much reason to doubt that my Pixel could run RuneScape at a good framerate, although I will never underestimate the ability for phones to mess up running the kind of software that computers of 10 years ago could pull off without a hitch. The game equally performed well in an area where Youtube videos regularly have trouble loading (thank you Cricket), and ultimately it drained by battery only slightly less quickly than I assumed it would.

Mobile Old School answers the demand for when you still want to play RuneScape uninhibited by having to go to work, school, or other obligations. It’s honestly the perfect game to port over to mobile, considering 80% of the leveling in the game is best played while having something else do to and not looking at the screen. Jagex designed the user interface from the ground up, and it makes intuitive use of the touch screen controls in order to present a game that is not horrible to play over a long period of time.

I was afraid that the awkward finger tapping controls of your average phone game would compound the already slightly awkward controls of RuneScape, but Jagex has managed to pull off a rather smooth system. Many actions in the game are notably slower than their PC counterpart, especially anything that would require you to right click (hold your finger on screen), but OSRS compensates making it rather easy to right click NPCs even when they are moving. Clicking anything while your character is running can be a chore, but then again I find it equally a chore to do so in the full version.

The only parts of Old School RuneScape Mobile that I didn’t like were factors that ultimately have nothing to do with the phone itself. Tapping the screen with my fingers is responsive, but everyone’s fingers become fat sausage links when you’re dealing with a game that tiles its buttons on what feels like a 10×10 pixel radius. There’s also the matter of battery, which RuneScape just ate a percentage of in the time it took me to write this previous sentence. I’m sure most of you are familiar with the fact that cell phone batteries these days just suck, and if you’re the kind of person that wants to game on their phone or do anything more taxing than idling, and doesn’t carry around a battery pack, I unfortunately can’t help you.

Thankfully Old School RuneScape Mobile uses the same accounts, same characters, same servers as its desktop version, so when you get home and you’re ready to play on the big screen, you’ll be able to transition without a hitch.