That date in February of 2002 was the first time that Jagex introduced recovery questions. Ok, I'm in the same boat of pics=proof, in that I don't have any old screen captures anymore. I don't even play much any more, just occassionally log in and walk around a bit, wearing all my old goodies...but I'll tell you about the REALLY old version of runescape classic. Heck, even my original tip.it account disappeared after several years, and I created a new one, since even this site has undergone major changes. Oh, and take a peek at my avatar...I made it with a screen capture from way back, and spliced a mask onto a sheep :D I began playing in early 2000, when there were less than 2,000 beta testers. There were only 3 servers initially, and it was not uncommon at all to see Paul or Andrew Gower themselves walking around in the world (with the characters named the same). Most folks these days would say "Andrew who? Paul who??"...but EVERYONE knew who those guys were then, and it was always a big to-do when they were spotted. They were the makers and heroes of our newly developed game, Runescape. The average load per server was typically less than 400 persons on, and at night, the population per server often dropped to less than 30. Initially, Jagex encouraged, published and "ranked" fan/support sites, right on the main menu. That's how I came across Tip.it. The were categorized as bronze, silver, and gold, based on how much info they had and how up to date they were kept. Way back in the early days, there was no wilderness. Player vs Player combat was available throughout the world, with the only safety being the first floor of Lumbridge Castle. There was no tutorial island, so you literally spawned at the Lumbridge Castle gates, with a pickaxe and a jug, and figured it out on your own. My first death occurred approximately 2 minutes after I started playing, since I tried attacking another level 3 character at the Lumbridge general store. Oh, and pick-axes weren't weapons then either...just tools. The only option one had was to to either be a PK or a non-PK. You could change your mind, but only twice...then, you were locked in to that role permanently. It was not uncommon for PK archers to shoot you through the windows while you were trying to buy something at a general store. Banks were far between, and only held money. You could make deposits and withdrawals in denominations of 10, 100, or 1000. You got it...you died, you lost your stuff. If you were lucky, you were within walking distance (that's right....no running)from Lumbridge to where you died, and the PKer had left a few things behind. There was only one bank in Varrock, and one in Falador. Actually, most of Varrock was undeveloped, and the east side (that now has a bank, costume shop, tea stall, etc) just had a wall, with a sign that read "site for future player houses". That was the far east edge of the map. Eventually, about mid-late 2000, banks held items (but only one screen's worth). There was a total of about 9 quests. The "ball of wool" quest was the absolute original. When I started playing, the Al Kharid desert was the newest additon, and people were talking about it. There wasn't much to do there then, except mine and do the Prince quest. And, on the subject of mining....the rocks had no color to indicate what they were. And, there wasn't much way to tell what the respawn rate was. Your choice of pick axe was bronze...and that's it. It wasn't until wayyy later that different pick axes came about. And, one click was one strike...no single click mining, and you kept going until the inventory was full. It made for a very tiresome skill building. Adamantite was the armor the really successfull players wore. There was no Rune, no dragon, no range or wizard armor. The only other "status armor" was Black armor, and it was fairly rare. And, there were no black shields or weapons. Those were introducted in early-mid 2001. The first rune item introduced was the medium helm, around mid-late 2001. Later, when the Champion's Guild was created, they began selling rune items upstairs. The highest amulet was the Diamond amulet. Eventually, and after many player requests, the Rune 2-hander was introduced. It was the most powerful weapon in the land, and anybody who was anyone owned one. The prices for them the first few weeks were close to one million...although the economy didn't have nearly the amount of people contributing, so one million then was almost the equivalent of today's 12 or 15 million. The monks monastery was introduced in (If I recall correctly) 2001, and people began wearing the robes, as the new fashion statement. The only color capes available were blue, black and red...with the blue being one hitpoint higher in value. Dying of capes also became available in late 2001, just before the party hats came about. The last big quest developed before Pay-to-play happened, was the Karmja island dragon slayer quest (late '02/early 2003)...thus introducing the very first dragon of any color. And, karamja was just a tiny island, not the huge thing it is now, with Brimhaven and all the southern portion. I can remember HUGE debates and polls on here regarding if RS should have p2p or not, since we were all sorta spoiled in having a free game. I can remember when any and all items were tradeable. Even things such as Blurite. I actually paid a higher player to go into the ice cave and mine some for me, since my combat level was too low to escape the ice giants and make it out alive. And, speaking of combat....once you were engaged, there was no running (err, walking) away. You had to exchange at least 3 or 4 hits before you could try to flee. That made for some very tense moments when your health was hovering around 1 or 2 points, and you had all your precious belongings at stake. It wasn't until much later that certain quest items and holiday items became untradeable, due to the complaints Jagex was receiving about the out-of-whack economy and fairness of drops. As for magic and ranging. There were two crossbows, pretty much equal. The basic style, and the phoenix one used for the quest. There was only one type of bolt. Bows came in short or long, that's it. No different wood types. Arrows were all bronze. When P2P came about, different metal arrows came about. Eventually, iron and steel arrows became available on the free servers. We were up to about 14 servers at that point. I can remember an early "glitch" that allowed some of the first P2P players use iron arrows in a free world. Magic's changes have had the most to do with runes. There was no rune essence mining. The basic (fire, water, air,chaos) have always been there. Death runes and Nature runes came later. Blood runes came with the creation of P2P. Strength potion used to be purple. It was really the only potion available, except for the "spot remover" potion...which was the first truly useless item. Then one day, strength potion changed to yellow once the first drink was taken. Then, it just became yellow all the time....never heard a good reason why. And, there was no cross-levelling your potions into bottles. You just used one up completely and moved to the next, to avoid making extra items in your bank inventory. And, as for famous glitches that have taken place: Years back, there was a glitch that allowed you to climb up the outside of the white knight castle, using one particular spot, and walk around in the dark "above the world". There's still probably a character or 2 stuck up there. At times, the servers would freeze, and they would have to be reset. I can remember once doing a ton of gold bar making, then having the server reset. All my items were back in my bank account, and I had to do it all over again! And, none of the old players can forget "Phat Friday", in early 2003, in which somebody finally figured out how to legitimately duplicate items through a trading glitch. Pink (now purple in RS2) party hats were at the top of the economic food chain, and suddenly became worthless as someone had finally let the secret out, and began reproducing hundreds of them. Then, a rumor began spreading that Jagex would deactivate accounts that were found to have numerous party hats. The main "trading spot" for most of RS1 was in the Varrock Castle courtyard. The entirety of Varrock was packed like sardines that day, as people came zooming in to collect party hats left laying on the ground, by others worried that they would get banned. A similar event had happened previously, although no duplicating had occurred, with the first Halloween Masks. On that day, a rumor had spread widely in-game and on forums, that the masks would disappear after halloween. So an awful lot of people just discarded them or gave them to friends for the day. Well, I could probably type about the memories for hours, but I won't bore you any more. And, to answer the question many of you probably have of "so, do you own like every holiday rare item?" My answer is "yes, in multiples" :-$ I think the only one I've given up over the years is the "disk of returning", which was a silly little novelty which you can read about on the RS site. Yes, I did visit the "black hole" that was once in the back of the Dwarven Mine...and found it to be kind of a silly waste of 10 gp (which was the original going price for the disk, purchased from a dwarf). I love reminiscing about the old game, as much as I enjoy the latest version. :mrgreen:
