30th January 2003 - Bandwidth tripled!

The San Francisco servers have now been upgraded to work through a faster network switch. The upshot of all this is that there is now three times as much bandwidth, and players should experience less lag to these servers.

30th January 2003 - Letters 9 online

We are pleased to announce the release of the ninth 'letters' page, which you can check out through the main Letters section.

We're not so pleased about what seems to be going on with the RuneScape gods at the moment though...

29th January 2003 - Runescape romance turns real

Yet more wedding bells! So Runescape rings DO have special properties.

"I started playing 8 months ago...The last thing I was looking for was another relationship, especially via an internet game. But find one I did, or it found me..."

Lady Pooh met Topcat0711 whilst playing Runescape, and being more charming than the seven hundred odd Topcats that had preceeded him, they soon became trading partners. An act of chivalry took the relationship to a whole new level.

"One day he'd won a stake duel... because of the winnings I teasingly said 'hey wanna be my rs bf?' not meaning it... But after that we joked about it and kept talking, until we fell in love through Runescape and got to know each other better."

Lady Pooh, who hails from Ohio in the USA, is now set to become Mrs.Topcat0711. She even flew over to his native Australia, swapping server-lag for jet-lag to be with her new love.

"I've been here in Australia for 6 weeks now and we get along great! We are making long term plans and its all thanks to you! We just wanted you to know that you created more than just a game...it's a connection to life and happiness." So it's official then: Cupid does exist. As an NPC in Runescape.

29th January 2003 - In low HP,and in health

It had to happen eventually. When 200,000 people interact online, it can only be a matter of time before someone pops the question...

We heard from PugXSi, a veteran of Runescape who is currently 4th overall with 1473 total stats. At 99 in magic and 96 in firemaking, there was still one stat that seemed to be eluding him: romance. Then Runescape "gave me something I didn't think possible- eternal happiness with a fantastic woman."

The woman in question was Jenstarr, a regular of the Dwarven mines. PugXSi soon noticed that she was a bit handy with a pick. "She worked extremely hard to become a rune miner...I hadn't seen such devotion to a skill before."

Sensing that they had struck gold, the two miners would chat online for hours. "It didn't take me long to develop real feelings for her", and an in-game marriage duly followed. Some time later, PugXSi flew from England to the U.S. to meet Jenstarr in person.

A second trip took place at Christmas, but it was more than just santa hats that were up for grabs. On January 3rd PugXSi and Jenstarr got married at a local courthouse. "Runescape is the sole factor in bringing Jen and I together, and for that, Jagex will always have our gratitude." Don't thank us, PugXSi, thank the magic of the runes.

28th January 2003 - Dangerous Agility

All budding athletes and gymnasts out there will be pleased to know that there is now an even better way of improving your agility. Just head down to your nearest deep wilderness...

We've put in a high level assault course for anyone who is hell-bent about building their agility XP. So pack yourself a napsack and get ready for some serious lava-dodging action.

Of course you do run the risk of dying painfully in a hail storm of arrows, but nobody said that getting perfect abs would be easy. As our head of Customer Support would say: no pain, no gain.

28th January 2003 - Report Abuse

Please note that that the report abuse button is for serious abuse only. Before you contact customer support, please try to make the distinction between malicious insults and friendly banter.

So please do not report people just for the sake of getting them into trouble- we're not trying to create a police state here!

Certainly we are keen to crack down on those who are spoiling the game for others, but we also want to strike a balance with the idea of freedom of speech.

The upshot of this is that you should only report someone if you feel genuinely offended or upset by what they are saying.

Sensitive souls should note that the Runescape chat filter is already there to stop people from swearing. I think I speak for everyone at Jagex when I say that I hate such crudeness as much as the next massively multi-player online roleplaying game; but if a word has already been censored, you don't need to report it.

By the same token, it is a waste of time getting into 'tit for tat' abuse reports. We try not to get involved in petty squables, and we have no plans to introduce a Report Abuse abuse button...

28th January 2003 - Gnomeball

Sporty types will be pleased to know that they can now take part in the world-famous game of gnomeball. Down at the gnome stronghold, those cheeky little gnomes have cleared a piece of land about the size of a football pitch, and err, decided to play football on it. Well, almost.

Firstly, when I say football, I am not referring to the game where people try to propel a spherical object with their foot- hence football.

Rather, this game is closer to the American version of the sport, where huge musclebound gladiators enact a fusion of chess, war and ballet whilst hitting each other with heavily reinforced plastic. Hence football.

Take away the chess, ballet and plastic and you've got gnomeball, where tackling your opponent basically means wacking them as hard as you can.

And with gnomes being such good-hearted little creatures, they do at least have the decency to point out that they're about to hit you. Now you'd never get that from Warren Sapp.

27th January 2003 - Shilo Village Quest online

Rumours of a distant village in the southern part of Karamja Island have been filtering through. It appears that the mysterious Jungle island still holds a lot of potential adventure. It is said that strange items are to be found, unique to this part of the world, ready and waiting for adventurers brave enough to search for them. Of course, there is hearsay that these treasures are protected by supernatural guardians, but it's highly unlikely, surely? Also the jungle has it's own dangers, what with well camouflaged spiders and the deadly Jungle Ogre. Who knows what terror lies further south?

When considering all this, it might be best to just stay at home? Perhaps the danger is too much and the rewards not enough? Yes, brave adventurer, stay another night in the warm inn, feed your face with another warm meal and worry not about the untold riches south of Karamja - or the terrors that guard them.

(Go to Shilo Village Quest Page)

24th January 2003 - Newsletters

To make use of our exciting new website, we will be posting the Runescape Newsletter online from now on, and it will NOT be emailed out to players any more.

This will also get round the problem of fake newsletters sent out by those nasty scamming types, as well as making Saradomin's words of wisdom available to a much wider audience.

Speaking of his holiness, the big man has been rather quiet in the last few weeks- I hope he's OK...

24th January 2003 - New Quest coming!

Attention all quest-hungry adventurers!

Some of you may have noticed the lack of updates in the last few weeks... to the untrained eye it could appear that the Jagex team is spending all its time updating the website.

But worry not! We are pleased to announce that there will be a big new update next week, and an exciting new quest from the one they call Tytn. Those of you who enjoyed his Jungle Potion debut should get ready- 'cos this time, things get pretty dark...

24th January 2003 - Runescape is good for you!

Anyone who has played Runescape for a little while will know that massive sense of achievement you get when you kill off a tough baddie or complete a long quest. But do such achievements ever spill over into the world at large?

Apparently so! We heard from one player whose mother was addicted to smoking before she discovered the wonderful world of Runescape.

According to Zjbirdx- Josh Bubis to his friends- his Mum used to nag him about playing too much. Finally, she logged on to see what all the fuss was about.

"Before that, she would smoke so many cigarettes...Now she hasn't smoked since she started playing."

As Nightfoxe, Marjo Bittle is now working on a whole variety of new skills, but the inhalation of nicotine isn't one of them. "Now, she hasn't smoked since she started playing. Thank you so much, you might have saved her life from cancer or some other problem from smoking. Runescape is my Mum's anti-drug. THANKS!!!"

No problem Zjbirdx: I'm sure even Zamorak would approve.

23rd January 2003 - Wedding bells at Jagex!

Simon Brace, Jagex's most eligible batchelor is no longer eligible. That's right, someone's actually agreed to marry him! Runescape players will know our husband to be as "modsimon". The scourge of hackers everywhere, Simon frequently appears on-line, valiantly fighting customer support related crime.

A certain girl by the name of Becky is the lucky lady in question, and Simon assures us that her decision was not made under duress. As the man himself says:

"There's this little lake in Birmingham that we walked down by after I took her for a meal. I got down on one knee, whipped my ring out and proposed to her under the stars with swans watching us on the lake. The diamond sparkled in the moonlight but it could never compare to the sparkle of her eyes, the way they light up whenever we're together :-)"

With his fiance preparing to become Mrs Becky Brace, Simon has set a date for 14th February, 2005, in what promises to be the mother of all updates in this young man's life. On behalf of Jagex and Runescape may I take this opportunity to wish you both the very best of luck!

(Now we'd like to say that they fell in love over Runescape, but that could never really happen... could it?)

21st January 2003 - New News Section

As you will no doubt have noticed, the Runescape news section has had a makeover. This is part of our effort to communicate to you more often, and we will be regularly posting news in the appropriate sections that you can see above.

Clicking any of the category names will show only news of that type, most recent first. Clicking 'All Categories' will show you all news items.

We hope that you will find the new news section easy to use, and more importantly, up to date with current Runescape affairs.

21st January 2003 - Credit card fraud warning

Don't accept membership from other players - doing so is dangerous!

We would like to remind everyone that you must NOT allow another player to pay for your runescape account membership.

If someone offers you either a low level members account or offers to upgrade your own account to a members account (usually in return for runescape items), the chances are that the way they are paying will be fraudulent. When we discover this, we will cancel the payment, and then ban your account permanently. So please do not fall for this trick.

The general rule is, if its too good to be true, it normally is!

Fraudulent payments will be unearthed and result in automatic and permanent bans for all concerned. All transactions are logged. We can track and prosecute anybody attempting to make fraudulent payments. It is not allowed to pay for the membership of someone outside your family.

14th January 2003 - Siw Midtrud

It was with great sadness that we learned of the death of Siw Midtrud, SIW39, a long time player of Runescape. Siw passed away last month after a long time fighting against disease.

Siw was an avid player of the game, currently ranked at 512 on the all-time list, with atttack of 81/81, strength of 91/91 and herblaw of 73/73.

Siw was popular and well-loved by a great number of the Runescape community. Our thoughts go out to her family and friends.

11th January 2003 - New website -RuneScape

Hi there,

So by now I imagine you're all enjoying the new website. Less clutter, more space and generally a more Runescapey feel. I'm sure there will be some who don't approve, but Runescape will always have its diehards, ready with an anecdote about the days when you could pk everywhere, and the economy held its value. Just remember that they will have fought in more wars than you, so they're entitled to be a bit upset that inflation has wiped out their pension.

But with Tom's Grand Tree Quest last week, and Tytn's Zombie Queen Quest coming soon, I'm sure that even the most po-faced players will be smiling right now. So this might be a good time to point out that the newsletter is now every two weeks, as the more observant amongst you will have already noticed.

25th December 2002 - Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from the Jagex team. We're dropping some Santa hat's today at random intervals in random places. They're just a bit of fun though, so please don't be too upset if you can't find one. If you manage to get more than one then please consider giving them to your friends as Christmas presents. Of course you can sell them but's not really the spirit of Christmas :-)