Line #0 Trivia/RuneScape


1	* AbandonWare: ''Classic'' was shut down for good in August 2018. The reason why it was shut down was because the game was too difficult to maintain and had numerous unfixable bugs.
2	* AscendedFanon:
3	** Prior to Ironman Mode's introduction, some players would choose to play in a self sufficient way. Ironman Mode would make this playstyle an official way to play.
4	** [=RuneLite=] is a third-party client that's popular because of its many features and quality of life updates. After a few years, it became popular enough to warrant a link to download it on the official Old School website. It's also one of the few third-party clients that's approved by Jagex.
5	* AscendedFanNickname: The skill used to craft runes has always been called "Runecrafting" by players since it was introduced with ''[=RuneScape=] 2'', even though everything in-game just called it "Runecraft". Eventually, the skill was officially renamed "Runecrafting"... in 2008, '''after''' ''Old School'''s 2007 backup. The skill is still called "Runecraft" in ''Old School'' ten years after the servers went up, and fans are still unaware that it doesn't end in "-ing".
6	* AuthorsSavingThrow:
7	** ''Old School'' was introduced in response to the players who got rubbed the wrong way by the Evolution of Combat. For those who weren’t interested in playing ''Old School'', Jagex introduced a “Legacy Mode” that turned off the mechanics of the Evolution of Combat.
8	** Way back in the day, you had to carry a watch and a sextant in order to dig up a coordinate clue. Not having them in your inventory would lead to you not digging anything up, even if you were in the correct location. After complaints from the playerbase, ''Old School'' removed the necessity to carry these items, so now you just have to dig in the correct spot.
9	** Gaining favor in Kourend was often seen as an unpopular mechanic. In early 2024, the favor system was completely removed from the game.
10	* {{Blooper}}:
11	** When Tree Gnome Village is completed in ''Classic'', the quest complete message says "Well done, you have completed the treequest". This was the quest's debug name.
12	** The Construction emblem has a rogue green pixel in its lower left corner.
13	* {{Defictionalization}}:
14	** Some food items, such as "crunchies" and "battas," were sold as real food during [=RuneFest=], a fan event organized by Jagex. The official ''[=RuneScape=]'' cookbook also includes recipes to make your very own.
15	** The official merch store sells real party hats.
16	** Woox, the first player to complete ''Old School'''s Inferno, was given a real Inferno Cape as well as life-time membership.
17	* DummiedOut:
18	** When the ability to poison weapons was removed from the game, poisoned weapons automatically had their poison removed, and weapon poison was turned into a new drinkable potion that applies poison to your attacks for a limited time. However, the old items weren't removed entirely--for some time after the update, poisoned arrows could still be received as drops from certain enemies, and baby trolls named after poisoned items retained the (p) tag at the end of their names.
19	** Icons for soul, astral, and wrath runes exist in the data for Guardians of the Rift, but go unused.
20	** A sound for a horse getting hit exists in the game's code, but was never used.
21	* InMemoriam: The pub in ''Old School'''s Ferox Enclave is named after the Old Nite, a famous player who died from cancer in 2006.
22	* InspirationForTheWork:
23	** The 20th anniversary book reveals that this game was inspired by various tabletop and computer games. It was also inspired by fantasy novels like {{Literature/Discworld}} and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien.
24	** The book also reveals that the Sandwich Lady was inspired by a "slightly aggressive" woman who hung around Jagex's offices and sold sandwiches.
25	* MeaningfulReleaseDate: "The Ribbiting Tale of a Lily Pad Labor Dispute" was released on March 20th, which is World Frog Day.
26	* MemeAcknowledgment:
27	** One of the achievements in the Steam version of ''Old School'' is called "[=FashionScape=]".
28	** The "Why fletch?" combat achievement is a reference to a meme players in Wintertodt like to throw around.
29	* MilestoneCelebration:
30	** Recipe for Disaster, [=RuneScape=]'s 100th quest, and was followed by "Dimension of Disaster", the 200th quest. Both feature serious amounts of ContinuityNod toward the prior 99 quests. Dimension in particular even seems to include MythologyGag {{Easter Egg}}s everywhere you look.
31	** The game itself sends out server-wide announcements whenever a player maxes out a skill, as well as global announcements when a player maxes all their skills or earns the Completionist Cape.
32	** For the 15th anniversary of Runescape in 2016, the Gower Brothers (AKA the original creators of the game) helped design a new quest to be added to the game. Jagex also began working on a documentary about the history of the game, that was finally released on April 9, 2017, which can be viewed [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RNK0YBdwko here.]]
33	** ''Old School'' celebrates its birthday every February with an in-game event.
34	** ''Dragon Slayer II'' was released on January 4th, 2018, the seventeenth anniversary of the game.
35	* MoneyDearBoy: In December 2010, the American company Insight Venture Partners purchased majority ownership of Jagex, the developers of [=RuneScape=], after slowly buying into the company since October 2005. Since then, the Squeal of Fortune was introduced in February 2012, Solomon's General Store followed in July 2012, the cost of membership has gone up sharply, and the number of [[{{Microtransactions}} microtransaction]] promotions now tends to far outnumber the quantity of in-game content updates. This has, not surprisingly, led to frequent accusations from the player base that Jagex and IVP are caring more about the game as a [[CashCowFranchise revenue stream]] rather than as an online community.
36	* OfficialFanSubmittedContent:
37	** The "Poison Apple" pub in southeast Ardougne was designed and voted on by players.
38	** The name of the sea monster Thalassus from the "Deadliest Catch" quest was suggested and selected by the public.
39	** The Chaos Giant and Ikadia from Birthright of the Dwarves were also the result of a [[http://services.runescape.com/m=news/a=13/dwarf-quest-competition-winners competition for fan-made designs]].
40	** With the advent of Rune Labs, players can now suggest ideas for new content to be added to the game which can be supported by other players, is then reviewed by a content team within Jagex and finally voted for its inclusion in the game by the wider community.[[note]]Due to lack of player participation however, it was discontinued in 2016.[[/note]]
41	** Whenever a new quest is coming in ''Old School'', Jagex holds a contest that challenges fans to create a title screen that relates to the quest. Jagex then picks a few and the community votes on a winner. Whoever wins gets their design used for the title screen.
42	** Jagex held a contest for the design of the Mythical Cape, with the winner’s design being the one used in the game. The seller of the cape, Jack, is named after the user who designed the cape.
43	* OldShame:
44	** Theatre/RomeoAndJuliet, to the point where they edited a four-year-old letter (Issue 14 of Postbag From the Hedge, published December 2006) just to further erase the quest's existence. However, a reference is made to them in the 200th quest, where they are present as severed heads. Romeo also has a role in the Gower Quest. Interestingly, the quest is still in ''OSRS'' despite the many years it's been active and even is a requirement for the "Making Friends with My Arm" quest.
45	** The 20th anniversary book reveals that Jagex didn't like to acknowledge the Falador Massacre between 2006 and 2011. They would later acknowledge that it happened, and would even celebrate its tenth anniversary with events in both RS3 and Old School.
46	* OrphanedReference:
47	** With the removal of the Random Event [=NPCs=] (who were designed to punish people who extensively used macros to farm gold), several events that occur in quests no longer make sense to new players, such as Osman being kidnapped by Evil Bob in Recipe for Disaster and the Drunken Dwarf getting eaten by a troll in My Arm's Big Adventure.
48	** Party Hats are worth an incredible amount of money due to their rarity. The Wise Old Man stole a blue Party Hat since it was so valuable... back in 2005, when the game was still fairly young. However, Party Hats are re-released every year in ''Old School'', so they're worth a whole lot less. The Wise Old Man still wears his hat in ''Old School'', even though it isn't really a symbol of wealth anymore. In Swan Song, your character constantly bugs the Wise Old Man to give you his hat, even though you can likely just buy one yourself or wait until Christmas to get one for free.
49	* PromotedFanboy: The game being as old as it is, it isn't very surprising that many [=JMods=] and developers are or were members of the playerbase. Probably the most famous example is Mod Ash, who was a moderator on the ''[=RuneScape=] Classic'' forums before becoming a Jagex employee in 2004 and the principal developer of ''Old School''. Many of the quests he developed are rife with meta humour and fandom in-jokes, and players often message him on twitter for live tech support.
50	* PropRecycling:
51	** The falling rocks in the Motherlode Mine reuse the model for the pet rock. Because of this, the falling rocks will be wearing party hats during any Christmas events.
52	** The Armadyl crossbow in ''Old School'' reuses the model for the Hunters' crossbow, but with its colors changed.
53	** The Graceful outfit was originally a recolored version of the rogues' outfit.
54	** Blood runes use the same sprite as water runes, but are recolored red.
55	** The models for several Summoning creatures that were in the 2007 backup's data were repurposed as monsters in ''Old School'', since at the time ''Old School'''s developers had no art team or a way to add new assets to the game.
56	** The Nightmare Zone is an exact duplicate of the King Black Dragon's lair. Similar to the case with the Summoning creatures, this was done because the developers didn't have a way to create new assets at the time. The development team also pokes fun at this; a cow hangs around the entrance of the Nightmare Zone, but there was no way to remove it due to the lack of a map editor. This cow can show up randomly inside the Nightmare Zone as a "boss".
57	* RoleEndingMisdemeanor: Ian Taylor, the longtime composer for the game, was fired in 2021 due to sexual misconduct.
58	* ReferencedBy: In the episode "Point Blank" in ''Series/WhiteCollar'', a character mentions the hidden message in the song "[[http://runescape.wikia.com/wiki/Norse_Code Norse Code]]".
59	* ReleaseDateChange: Archaeology was initially slated for release in late January 2020. It was postponed until late March of the same year.
60	* ShrugOfGod: Jagex deliberately left Zaros's alignment ambiguous for years. He's since been described as a god of control and fate, leaving his morality ambiguous but [[BlueAndOrangeMorality unknowable]].
61	* SurpriseRelease: When the Third Elite Dungeon, "The Shadow Reef", was released, along with it came a surprise quest, "Curse of the Black Stone", that provided a narrative through-line for the first three elite dungeons. It was meant to be a sort of BottleEpisode, with as few new assets made for the quest as possible outside of the dungeons, but it was still well-received upon release.
62	* TrollingCreator:
63	** Jagex likes to have fun with the playerbase on April Fool's day. In 2004, they added much-requested horses to the game, but in turns out they were actually just toy horses. The next year, they added "Dragon Plates" to the game, which were spinning plates with a picture of a dragon on it.
64	** A head of cabbage can be a reward from a master clue scroll. The odds of getting one are the same as any ultra-rare rewards.
65	** When a bird's nest falls out of a tree, the sound of a bird chirping will usually play. However, on rare occasions, this sound will be replaced by the sound of the Armadyl Crossbow's special attack, which is a horrific screeching sound. Needless to say, this sound might scare the bejesus out of an unsuspecting player.
66	* WhatCouldHaveBeen:
67	** Sir Ewain Ouse, the Signature Hero character who was later redesigned as Sir Owen Sonde. Sir E. Ouse would have been a clean-shaven blond knight whose spotlight quest portrayed him as a BadassInDistress. To contrast, Sir Owen is a scarred, stubbly dark-haired KnightTemplar whose spotlight quest [[spoiler: kills him off completely, and gets worse from there]].
68	** [[https://runescape.wiki/w/God_Boxheads God boxheads]], cosmetic overrides for the head, were planned for release alongside "Kindred Spirits". They were scrapped due to negative player feedback.
69	** A second batch of Invention-related updates were planned, which included content for levels 100-120, machines, full access to the Invention Guild, and additional technology trees. While initially confirmed cancelled on [[FanConvention RuneFest 2016]], they eventually saw release on 18 September, 2017.
70	** Jagex had intended for an event to occur for the first Hardcore Ironman to [[TooDumbToLive die from insulting]] [[spoiler:Jas]] (which counts as an unsafe death), where everyone on the server would turn to face the Heart of Gielinor and simultaneously facepalm. This sadly never came to fruition.
71	** After Menaphos, two more area expansion updates were planned for release on September and December 2017. These updates were confirmed suspended in an "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83YJoWTPWIU Unfinished Business \| Release Strategy Update]]" video, as two more large-scale updates in the same year would've been too much.[[note]]Anachronia would eventually be released in July 2019.[[/note]]
72	** The Church of You, presented at [=RuneFest=] 2013 by Mod Mark, would involve the player character being worshipped by others, and be able to establish relationships with other [=NPCs=] visiting the church. It was confirmed scrapped per the [[https://www.reddit.com/r/runescape/wiki/futureupdates "Future Updates" document in Reddit]].
73	** A (now-archived) [[https://archive.is/xbBd2 NeoGAF forum post]] from an ex-Jagex developer gives some insight into the development of Desert Treasure, which included questionable elements such as players being teleported directly to the quest giver upon logging in (regardless of whether or not they had a members account), the quest giver being the boss NPC[[note]]This would cause issues wherin the quest could not be started if another person was fighting the quest giver.[[/note]], and monks of Zamorak chanting an Islamophobic phrase. Yeah. After the person making the quest had their employment terminated, the user got to work on the quest using assets from the previous developer, which essentially explains why Desert Treasure takes place almost everywhere ''except'' the desert.
74	** Great Kourend was originally going to be named “Great Goureng”. But the developers noticed that the pronunciation of "Goureng" was very similar to "Göring", the last name of a Nazi military leader and war criminal, so it was shiftily changed.
75	** Old School was originally going to be called “Legacy [=RuneScape=]”. The “Old School” name was inspired by old school hip-hop.
76	** Instead of Archaeology, the Necromancy skill was proposed to release in Spring of 2020 as a major update for that year; instead, Necromancy released in August 2023.
77	** Originally, the events that Sir Owen recounts to the World Guardian following the events of Azzanadra's Quest, involving him fighting off a horde of zombie centaurs and providing a proper follow-up to "The Death of Chivalry", was going to be a proper quest; it never released, and Mod Stu, who was responsible for developing Sir Owen's story, allowed for his inclusion in Azzanadra's Quest with the caveat that the events of this Death of Chivalry follow-up be treated as canon, leaving the possibility for the quest to be developed at some point in the future, but set in the past relative to the current storyline.
78	** The Ruinous Powers, a new set of prayers, were originally going to be a reward for completing Desert Treasure II. However, after feedback from the community, Jagex decided not to implement them.
79	** The original design of Kourend would allow the player to support one of the five houses to become the next monarch, and this was the original purpose of the favour system. However, the quests that came out over the five years after Zeah's release would ultimately railroad [[spoiler:Lord Kandur Hosidius into becoming the next king of Kourend]], making the favour system [[TheArtifact rather vestigial]]. In late 2023, Jagex discussed removing the favour system entirely and instead locking its reward space behind the Kourend Questline, and the favor system was removed in early 2024.
80	* WordOfGay:
81	** Overlapping with WhatCouldHaveBeen, a pair of items were meant to be implemented into Nomad's Elegy-- a letter from either Korasi or Jessika, to be delivered to the surviving half. The text of these letters were released [[http://services.runescape.com/m=forum/forums.ws?341,342,333,65985724 here]] for LGBT History month 2018, incidentally confirming that both characters had romantic feelings for the other.
82	** A [[https://twitter.com/Jagex/status/1362378862240407554 2021 LGBT History Month tweet]] from Jagex reveals that Charos is pansexual.
83	--->''"Charos is long-lived and multi-loved and it was immediately clear when we were writing him that his loves and lusts could not be contained to a single gender, so we began writing him as pansexual."''
84	** A tweet during the same event also revealed that the Makeover Mage and Elena from Plague/Elf Questline are also pansexual.

Context Trivia / RuneScape