RuneScape 2

RuneScape 2 is 3D Java based massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), launched by Jagex Ltd. in March 2004 and was the sequel to hit online game Runescape (renamed RuneScape Classic with its release). Both games are now considered part of a RuneScape series.

The game has a unique done medieval fantasy theme probably most similar to games such as Warcraft III or EverQuest but with often with a less serious tone and extensive original content ideas. One of the more unique aspects of the game is the ability to do more mundane and non-violent tasks, such as cooking pizzas, fishing, hunting for treasure or thieving cakes, silk and gems from various stalls.

The game is one of the largest online game rivaling games such as CounterStrike in terms of the number of people playing at any given moment. There are often over eighty thousand players online at once, and on busy weekends, over one hundred twenty thousand players, spread across its 80+ servers (new servers are added regularly). These servers are located in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and The Netherlands, making it one of the largest online Java games in the world. There are also a few servers running the "classic" version of the game (split between free servers and member servers). Players represent a wide range of nationalities and ages, though, as Jagex's own polling has shown, the majority of players are teenage males.

Many improvements over the old game came with Runescape 2 including both graphics, terrain, features, and it also includes a whole new player interface, which separates the main-view, game-options, minimap, and chat into four different screen areas, allowing tasks to be performed more efficiently and conveniently

These areas are:

• The main-view – Which now enables players to zoom up and down in order to see the world more clearly.
• A game-options area – A new panel on the side which combines all the gaming functions into one space (Level Status, Attack Style, Prayer, Magic, Quests, Armour page, Inventory page, Friends list, Ignore list, Music player, Player controls, and log out function)
• The minimap – Now permanently visible in its own area and has extra icons indicating the location of important locations such as: shops, dungeons, and quest points. Also, when a player clicks on it, a small red flag will appear and the character will walk in that direction until it reaches the point or the player changes destinations.
• A dedicated chat/message area

Many other new features were implemented in RuneScape 2. Shopkeepers and bankers just like in Runescape classic do not serve customers one at a time, allowing many players at once to use one shop. This had been a major problem on crowded servers in some of early post-beta versions of Runescape Classic, though not for very long. Random events (see below) replaced the controversial "fatigue" system.

Overview

The game is set in a fantasy world, where players control their own avatars representing one's self. There is no overall objective or end to the game, aside from a general goal of increasing the characters abilities and passing benchmarks. However, there are plenty of tasks that people can perform in the game. For example, players can interact with each other, by talking, trading, and even fighting (though fighting is restricted to the wilderness, and the duel arena in Al-Kharid; that is a members only feature). There are several instances in which a player found his/her soulmate in the game. Quests can also be undertaken, such as the Dragon slayer quest. However quests are not compulsory and players have the option of not completing any of the in-game quests if they so desire. There are many other activities such as fishing, crafting, mining, woodcutting, and smithing. As these activities are performed, a character will become more skilled at the activity. It is not uncommon for a dedicated player to spend in excess of four hours a day training his character; there are even a few cases of players regularly spending over ten hours a day online.

Playing the game

The new player to Runescape 2 comes to a tutorial island. Although initially coming to a tutorial island may seem boring to some, Jagex has determined this action to be imperative to understanding future gameplay. For those stuck, moving around is executed by left-clicking on a piece of land. While on tutorial island, players learn about fighting, communication, cooking, banking, doing quests, and other skills. Once a player has completed the tasks assigned on tutorial island, he is transported to the city of Lumbridge. From then on, players can upgrade their characters in the fashion that they want. They could travel around the "real-life" player's world between cities such as Varrock, Falador, Port Sarim etc. Players could also travel around by raising their magic level to a level high enough to perform a teleport to some of these major cities.

Graphics

The graphics of Runescape 2, while not revolutionary on the whole, are a major improvement over those of Runescape Classic, and while they are largely inferior to most MMORPGs available, they are of good quality for a freely-available, Java game. The world is rendered in complete 3D as opposed to the 2D on 3D images of Classic. Similar but different types of weapons, such as longswords and shortswords now have different images. Players are also given much more choice in creating character models, from hairstyle to facial features. Magic, prayer, and ranging, the three possible modes of combat, now include improved, unique animations for each. The game can be run on high or low detail level. The advisory specifications for high detail is 128MB of RAM and 600MHz processor clock speed and for low detail is 32MB and 300MHz.

Magic

Main article: RuneScape Magic Skill

Magic requires a certain amount of runes, as opposed to mana, the currently most popular cost system for magic. Additionally, some spells may require special staffs such the three different staffs of the three main Runescape Gods: Saradomin, Guthix, and Zamorak, or the "Iban Staff" for "Iban Blast". Of course, there are a few minor gods as well, ranging from Iban, the claimed son of Zamorak, to Hazeel. Newly available in RS2 for both paying and non-paying players is the added ability of runecrafting, which allows players to craft their own runes. Players can still choose to buy their own runes from the witch Betty, Aubury in Varrock, stores in the Magic Guild, or (the fastest way, although a bit costly) to buy from another player who already has thousands of runes. A new feature has been introduced recently from Jagex for mages. Now mages have their own armor made from splitbark. You can acquire it by cutting a hollow tree and presenting the bark to an odd-looking wizard in the Wizards Tower. Even more recently so, a number of new teleporting options and spell have been added to make it easier to travel from place to place.

Equipment

For the melee class, often called "warriors", there are bronze, iron, steel, black, mithril, adamantite, runite, and dragon metals for both armor and weapons. Available weapons include: daggers, short swords, scimitars, longswords, two-handed swords, hatchets, pickaxes, battleaxes, maces, throwing knives, arrows, halberds and more. Available armour includes: chain body, plate body, plateskirt, platelegs, medium helmets, full helmets, wooden shields, square shields, kiteshields, etc. Most of these items are available in each kind of metal. Dragon is a metal that has slowly been added to, and all of its items look unlike items of other metals. The dragon medium helmet and chainbody, for example, has a pair of horns. Strangely, the newly added Dragon Platelegs don't have any horns or markings. The Dragon Square Shield has a skull on it.

Rangers typically use long and shortbows made of 'regular' logs, oak, willow, maple, yew, or magic wood, as well as arrows and throwing weapons made of all the metals bronze to runite. Armor for them includes leather, hard leather, studded leather, green dragon hide, blue dragon hide, red dragon hide, and black dragon hide. Vambraces, the most powerful handwear not obtained in a quest, are made of the above listed items and require ranging experience to use.

Mages typically use robes as armor, and staffs for weapons. Not much variety, but spells require mystical Runestones to be cast, and there are many types of runestones. Elemental staffs can provide unlimited runes of their element when wielded, but otherwise runes are expensive. Mages also have access to splitbark armor, but this armor is very expensive and cheaper alternatives often give better magical bonuses.

Aside from this basic equipment, many other weapons and armor are obtained by way of quests, but the sheer variety of these items makes it a very difficult task to list them all.

Combat mechanics

Players in Runescape generally fall into three major classes: warrior, ranger, and mage. There is no actual definition of these classes; people generally level up their statistics respective to these classes. However, all of these classes use Prayer. Warriors are possibly the most common class; fighting in melee mode increases Strength, Attack, and Defense. Wizards are the second most common class and emphasize magical spells. In RS2, magic use has greatly proliferated due to significantly increased damage. Lastly, there is the Ranger, which emphasizes skill in archery and projectile throwing. All of these styles increases hitpoints (HP).

RS2 has a class triangle, whereby a Warrior defeats Ranger, Ranger defeats Wizard and Wizard defeats Warrior (analogous to the rock, paper and scissors triangle).

Some people have chosen to train each of their combat skills to the same level. There is no way of defining their exact class, although it is suggested by the armor they wear. If they have a significant level of each of the three class's skills or none then there is no way of making a definitive classification.

Warrior or melee class players usually use smithed armor and weapons made from resources which can be mined. They must tend to attack, strength, and defense levels. Attack levels increases the chance of doing damage. Strength increases the amount of damage that can be done. Defense decreases the chance of receiving damage from a melee attack.

Range class players usually use some type of leather armor. This can be normal, hardened, studded, or a dragon type of armor. They also use a bow which can be made from types of wood that are cut from trees. Range offense is determined by ranged attack bonus (determined by the quality of your equipment) and ranging level the former determines how often you hit, the latter how hard you hit. Range defense is determined by the ranged defense bonus (determined by the quality of your equipment) and your defense level, both of which only affect the chances of a miss and have no effect on the maximum damage that can be done.

Mage class players use runes, often accompanied with a staff that increases magic or allow that player to go without a certain type of rune. Their runes are crafted from rune essence or found. Some types of rune can't be crafted. Armor is generally not worn by mage class players, because it lowers damage that spells can do. Magical offense and defense to magic attacks is determined by mage level.

Player demographics

In March of 2004 a poll of the age and gender was done on the official website. The poll was only open to members, so it is potenially not as indicative of the total player base. Also, since it was not controlled in any way, people could put false answers. People who are unable to become members would be under-represented and the potential making up an answer does exist. Either way it is one of sources of information on the player base, whether it is correct or not.

The poll results:

• The poll question: "Which of the following Age/Gender group do you belong to?", and the results
• Male under 15 years of age : 5492 votes / 48%
• Male between 15 and 25 : 3918 votes / 34%
• Male between 26 and 40 : 533 votes / 4%
• Male over 40 : 264 votes / 2%
• Female under 15 years of age  : 237 votes / 2%
• Female between 15 and 25  : 357 votes / 3%
• Female between 26 and 40  : 302 votes / 2%
• Female over 40  : 270 votes / 2%

In January of 2005 another similar poll was conducted. The same flaws existing in the last poll were also present here. It is to be noted that the overall number of players had risen dramatically, and there is no decline in any particular group's numbers in the game(at least not among the paying members), even though the percentages have shifted.

The poll results:

• The poll question: "Which of the following demographic groups do you belong to?"
• Male under 16 years of age : 42170 votes / 66%
• Male between 16 and 25 : 12463 votes / 19%
• Male between 26 and 40 : 2382 votes / 3%
• Male over 40 : 1067 votes / 1%
• Female under 16 years of age : 1769 votes / 2%
• Female between 16 and 25 : 1305 votes / 2%
• Female between 26 and 40 : 946 votes / 1%
• Female over 40 : 844 votes / 1%

Random events

A variety of random events can take place in the game. Jagex maintains that this is to help prevent macro programs. They can also add variety to some of the more repetitive activities in the game.

Players must respond to most of these in the correct manner or will receive a negative effect (such as being teleported across the map) Some of these negative effects can be quite annoying, but most can be easily avoided if players are paying attention. Some random events will also give players a reward if they react appropriately. The random events which give rewards are generally far more popular. Some players dislike random events which can give penalties but no rewards and consider them annoying hindrances.

The following is a list of the different random events in the game at the time of writing.

• Guardians: Being quite dangerous and annoying, they include River Troll, Rock Golem, Watchman, Zombie, Tree Spirit, and Shade. River Trolls generally attack you when you have been fishing in the same place for a long time. Tree spirits and Rock Golems may rise when woodcutting or mining, you may even be hit 3 times in a day by a rock golem if you are unlucky. Zombies and Shades may rise when you have buried a lot of bones. Guardian monsters are always considerably tougher compared to player they are attacking, but their loot might be worth fighting for.
• Annoying: Swarm of Insects, tree changing into an Ent, Whirlpool in water, Smoking Rock, Poison Gas, and Moving Fishing Spots.
• Inconveniences: random breakage of equipment such as pickaxes when mining and hatchets when woodcutting. You can generally avoid these by not mining a smoking rock, not trying to cut down an Ent, or not fishing where there is a Whirlpool or Big Fish. Damaged equipment is easily repaired though, either by player himself or by visiting certain NPC's with required skill.
• Teleporting: Mysterious Old Man will sometimes appear, and teleport a player to a special location. In order to return a player must accomplish a given task, such as mimicing a mime or navigating through a maze as fast as possible. A generous gift or special ability is granted for the accomplishment.
• Gift Givers: Drunk Dwarf with beer and kebab, Genie with magic lamp, Mysterious Old Man with a strange box, and Strange Plant. If ignored, even gift givers can hurt a player (Dwarves and Plants), or teleport him to a random location on a map (Genies and Mysterious Men). When A lamp is rubbed, you can choose what skill you want to gain experience on.(ex. you want to gain experience on mining, you click the mining icon on the box that pops up). Strange box is a special item, since it can multiply when unattended. Unless a player opens the box and solves the riddle inside, entire inventory might fill up with them. Once all boxes have been cleared, a small gift is given, usually an uncut gem, uncut diamond if lucky but a small sum of money when unlucky.
• Treasure Trail: while working on the Member's feature Treasure Trails, one may encounter a Mage of Saradomin or Mage of Zamorak after digging for a casket. These are very powerful.

Mini-games

There are some other things to do besides the usual quests and skill leveling, which are essentially games within a game. These include for example Fishing Trawler, Treasure Trails, Mage Arena, Agility Arena, Gnomeball, Games Room, and Castle Wars. A pseudo minigame is the kingdom management from the quest Throne of Miscellania. All of the these mini-games, however, are only for member players.

Members

Players can also become members for $5 USD a month. Members receive large map areas, new items, more quests, and weekly updates. Members are also less likely to become banned than "free to play" players.

External links

• Official Runescape Links
  • Official site
  • Jagex Software
• Runescape Websites
  • Runescape Tavern (Forums)
  • Runescape help site (Fansite, forums)
  • Salmoneus's Realm of Runescape (Fansite, forums, guides, and much more!)
  • Rune Universe
  • Runescape Community (fan site, guides, forums)
  • Runescapia
  • Runevillage (fan site, guides, forums)
  • Rune Headquarters (fan site)
  • RS Inn forum (fan site)
  • Runescape Tips(fan site, forums)
  • Fields of RuneScape (fan site, guides, forums)
  • RuneCrypt (fan site, forums, great community)