The groundbreaking MMO, RuneScape, will be celebrating its 20th anniversary with a year-long questline alongside many exciting content drops that all center around the past, present, and future of the beloved game. The extremely popular MMO first released in January of 2001 and has done nothing but thrive since with over 1,000 content expansions and updates and release upon multiple formats. The game has seen the most success it has ever had amongst players in the past few years with 1.2 million players joining in 2020 alone.
British developer Jagex has continuously expanded and supported the game since its release in 2001 with plenty of updates and patches. In 2016, the game was completely rebuilt from a browser game built within Java to a full standalone coded format that improved the games graphics and overall quality. This also allowed the game to be released across multiple platforms such as Microsoft Windows, macOS, and Linux. In February of 2013, the main game's sister system, Old School RuneScape, was released for both iOS and Android. The main game got this same treatment in beta form in October of 2019. Jagex has said a full release for RuneScape on mobile platforms will be arriving sometime this year.
Jagex detailed the vast amount of 20th Anniversary content coming to both versions of RuneScape in a press release post on their website today, January 4th 2021. The post details a year-long string of events being kicked off with an in game celebration dubbed "The Grand Party", which starts today. Next, a multi-part epic storyline will be introduced that will take players through RuneScape's entire history and detail a coming conflict with the Elder Gods, the creative entities of Gielinor. Old School Runescape does not seem to be missing out on the fun with plenty of content of its own. A questline involving the Green Gnome Child character will be introduced that will allow players to battle classic monsters, such as demons and dragons, from the game's past. This also marks the year that Old School RuneScape arrives on Steam.
Both RuneScape and Old School RuneScape have seen peak player counts over the past few years. Old School RuneScape saw its highest ever concurrent player count at 173,000. Alongside the plethora of in-game content being dropped in both versions, Jagex also details some merchandise that will be releasing to help celebrate the 20-year-old game's great success. Dark Horse Books will be publishing a companion book, titled 'RuneScape: The First 20 Years – An Illustrated History', to commemorate the event as well as a special collector's edition vinyl soundtrack that is loaded with both classic and modern tracks from throughout the game's historic run.
RuneScape has had such a massive impact on the gaming industry due to its developer's dedication to always deliver an expansive and easily accessible world for it's players. Boasting a whopping 7,306 days of continuous operation, the game stands out for being "always on" and always free. This has allowed an ever-expanding player base of all demographics to access it's expansive world, battles, quests, and activities. Starting as a low graphics browser MMO, the game now stands next to MMO titans such as World of Warcraft and The Elder Scrolls Online in player dedication and popularity. According to the development team, they hope to see another 20 successful years of questing, monster slaying, and friendships across the land of Gielinor.
Source: Jagex