This is continued from: The First Four Years [2001-2004]

Barrows - 17th May 2005

 

One of the highest impact updates of 2005 was the Barrows. This update added a whole new top tier of equipment with cool special powers.

 

Farming - 11th July 2005

 

A new skill was released in July 2005, one that required a style of play not previously seen in RuneScape. It involved doing some setup by planting crops, and then leaving and returning later to gain your rewards. It took a while for some players to get their heads around this concept. They could be seen standing still at farming patches for over half an hour complaining their potato still hadn't grown yet.

 

Recipe for Disaster - 15th March 2006

 

For RuneScape' hundredth quest, we decided we would pull out all the stops and go for something a bit special. This was an absolutely mammoth quest, with different parts of it being worked on by different developers. In fact, we’d never had so many developers working on one project at once, which meant there was quite a lot of potential for things to go wrong. We were a bit worried that the title 'Recipe for Disaster' would become suitable for the quest in another way... Fortunately, things actually went smoothly, and our hundredth quest proved popular with a wide range of players.

 

Construction and player-owned houses - 31st May 2006

 

Player-owned houses had been planned for a long time. In fact, I had once told players that we were hoping to release them in the summer of 2001, which technically makes it our most delayed update ever!

 

A lot of the problem is that we’d originally planned to allow players to buy houses on the main world map. It quickly became apparent that we had so many players that, if we stuck to this plan, the world of RuneScape would consist more of player-owned houses than everything else put together! Houses had to be put on hold until Andrew gave us the ability to create instanced areas in RuneScape. Because houses had been so hotly anticipated and for so long, we saw a significant increase in members on the week that they were released.

 

Karamja Achievement Diary - 8th May 2007

 

We released our very first Achievement Diary (now named Tasks) on this date, and it was to be the first of many. From a developer’s point of view, I like these updates, as it gives players incentive to try out all sorts of different bits of content and maybe find something new that they enjoy.

 

Clan Chat - 6th August 2007

 

This useful tool has done a lot to help create communities in RuneScape. It is used by plenty of traditional clans, but I’ve been impressed with the myriad number of other ways in which it has been used. Many of the chats are common tools for finding people who are playing the same piece of content as you. For example, there are now clan chats for various distractions & diversions, doing new quests, or for training various skills.

 

God Wars Dungeon - 28th August 2007

 

This update contained not one, but four new boss monsters into the game, plus exciting new equipment including the awesomely powerful godswords.

 

Wilderness and free trade removal - 10th December 2007

 

Probably our most controversial decision to date, so much so that we’re now running a poll asking if we should reverse it! It was never something we wanted to have to do, but we felt backed into a corner by the huge number of rule breakers who were proving to be a threat to the very existence of the game.

 

There were some positives that came out of it, though, as it caused us to release a slew of useful updates to replace what was taken away. The most significant of these was the Grand Exchange, which revolutionised trading methods. It became far easier to find the items that you wished to buy than previously.

 

Clan Wars was also very significant. For the first time, people could set up large group fights with a structured set of rules as defined by clan leaders. Also, both the Assist System and item lending function are very useful additions to that game that we otherwise might not have developed.

 

Summoning - 15th January 2008

 

This was our first new combat skill released since the launch of the game. This skill had been hinted at for a long time and was highly anticipated by players. It had a long development time and evolved a lot as to what it would do. During development it had been called Animal Lore, hence why pets are associated with the skill.

 

RuneScape HD - 14th July 2008

 

This was our biggest engine update since the release of RuneScape 2. Players running the new graphics mode gained a significantly improved visual experience. This update was a huge amount of work for our Graphics and QA teams, as many of the game’s graphics needed to be updated for the new mode. RuneScape HD also bought with it the popular option to play RuneScape in a resizable window.

 

Summer’s End - 15th September 2008

 

This quest brought with it the strongest ever boss monster to be released into RuneScape (up to that point): the Corporeal Beast (level 785). It has only just now been trumped this week with the release of the fifth God Wars Dungeon boss, Nex (level 1001)!

 

While Guthix Sleeps - 26th November 2008

 

While Guthix Sleeps introduced a new level in questing, it being the first quest in the Grandmaster category - and we wanted to do something epic. This quest took many months for us to develop (and many hours for players to complete). It dealt with some key elements of the world’s plotline that we had been planning to reveal for a long time.

 

A new CEO - February 2009

 

Mark Gerhard becomes the new CEO of Jagex.

 

Dungeoneering - 12th April 2010

 

A new skill is released. This is an update we had been hoping to do since the launch of RS2. With huge numbers of monsters, puzzles and equipment in the dungeon, it took many staff to complete this update. It has had far more development work put into it than any other skill to date.

 

RuneFest - 28th August 2010

 

Our first real-world event! This was as much of an experience for staff as it was for players. Having never done anything like this before, we learnt a lot about how to organise things as we went along and we were never entirely sure how it was going to work out. As it happens, it was a good event and practically everyone who attended was very positive about the day. From our point of view, it was great to meet so many players face to face and really get to see how passionate people are about the game.

 

Well, that brings me to the end of this blog. It feels strange to think that RuneScape is 10 years old already. Many of the events that happened years ago still feel like yesterday. We’ve gone from being a small bedroom run project to one of the most popular MMOs out there; I feel immense pride in how far we’ve come.

 

We’ve retained the most popularity out of all the MMOs that released in that era. Most of the others that were around when we launched have tailed off since then and we’ve overtaken them all. By continuing to update the game and keep things fresh and exciting, RuneScape has thrived, and our plan is to continue to do so for years to come. Here’s to the next ten years!

http://services.runescape.com/m=devblog/view_post.ws?post_id=112

 

I've been playing since two weeks before RS2's public release and I remember each of these things as they happened. I have to say that I am thoroughly impressed by the direction that RuneScape has come ever since I first saw it on MiniClip all those years ago. Here's to 10 more years :grin:

Really short and kinda boring. I wish he'd put a lot more effort in and cover more stuff. :\

it seems i started playing somewhere between may 2005 and july 2005 intresting

 

~~~legoman187~~~

Didn't even mention Hunter. Shows how much of a rush-job that skill was.

Ah I remember barrows coming out.. Was one of the earlier things I actually "remember" happening. (before that I was basically still figuring out how runescape works). - I joined somewhere in december 2004

Ayup, I played before all this but I remember barrows like it was yesterday, I was amazed at someone having full dharoks (minus helm) at c-wars, I WANTED THAT AXE. I was with my other family during farming, but I came on to collect seeds the month before it was released (or was it a week?) I didn't get to enjoy the release of that due to family.

--

 

I missed construction, farming, summon and hunter releases. I was there for slayer and dung though.

 

 

Why didn't they mention slayer :( ?

I remember when Construction came out. It was actually the first time I was online for a system update. I panicked when I saw the system update message, so I logged out and went to the home page (which wouldn't load). 20 or so minutes later, it finally loaded and I shouted to my brother downstairs who was playing Halo 2. He promptly kicked me off our then shared computer for the rest of the day :angry: .

 

2006 was the best year for RuneScape, imo.

2006 was my favorite year...

 

2009 sucked according to the blog lol... new CEO which apparently was bad news ha

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't 2009 the "year of improvements" or something along that line? It logically wouldn't make sense to talk about an update released years prior just because it was changed ever so slightly.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't 2009 the "year of improvements" or something along that line? It logically wouldn't make sense to talk about an update released years prior just because it was changed ever so slightly.

 

Makes sense, though I quit playing in January 2009 and have only played for about 1-2 weeks at a time over winter and summer breaks since then, so 2009 is a pretty unfamiliar year to me.

 

edit: reviewed the news pages for 2009... mostly just upgrades for already-existing features like the run energy update

 

though the new content (besides) quests sure sucked that summer lol... the new PvP drops, Mobilising Armies

 

the end of 2009 was very well done though thanks to Mod Chris L's high lvl updates (extreme potions, Nomad's requiem, barbarian assault horn, ancient curses)

No mention of Geoff Iddison? dude served em almost 2 years...

Oh lol, I remember all the rage directed at miniclip kids. Delicious tears.

Aaah, these years have been great.

 

2008 is my favorite, mainly for first grandmaster quest, summoning and HD.

Also, didn't GE come out 2008? Or was that released around same month as free trade/wildy removal?

I remember the rage directed at Miniclip kids... from the other perspective... I was like 9 3/4 years old when I started playing and I had my favorite cartoon as my username. To this day, the only individuals who remain on my ignore list are the ones who insulted me/my name back in RSC. All of them have quit, but it's more the principle of making a child cry that I'm not so fond of. Oh well, I'm 16 now and I'm the only one of all my irl friends who still plays (besides my brother) :razz: .

Mod Chris L makes epic updates. Mod Chris L for CEO!! Or some sort of position where he is responsible for high level updates :shades:

 

Hmm I've always wondered... which J mod came up with the Slayer skill? <3: whoever did, they would do an amazing job in making a Shapeshifting skill :-D

A little disappointing :( Other than a few extra pieces of information, it's mostly just a timeline of RuneScape. That doesn't give us much more information than we already knew. I would have preferred to see a lot more effort put in with more "behind-the-scenes" information detailing how they came up with these ideas, why they implemented them, etc.

Pff they didn't mention how construction was a completely random update that they never mentioned in any BTS, other than stating we could now sit in chairs.

Oh lol, I remember all the rage directed at miniclip kids. Delicious tears.

 

I'm fairly sure I was a Miniclip kid. :ugeek:

Yes, and we all shed a tear.

Na, just kidding <3

And yes, as tripsis said, this is kind of a normal timeline of Runescape. Pretty much just the basic big things that happened.

There's no small insight on other smaller updates that did great change to rs.

Lol.

1 update noteworthy in the last two years...

 

And yes, Mod Chris L for CEO plz! Good idea.

Seems to be the only mod who is stil in touch with the playerbase.

Really short and kinda boring. I wish he'd put a lot more effort in and cover more stuff. :\

This - seems incredibly half assed.

I'm just happy that they're giving us a time line, I think it's cool.

I'm just happy that they're giving us a time line, I think it's cool.

We already have news archives.

Oh lol, I remember all the rage directed at miniclip kids. Delicious tears.

 

I'm fairly sure I was a Miniclip kid. :ugeek:

 

I was too, if you count a 26-year-old dude looking for a way to goof off during boring grad classes.

No mention of Geoff Iddison? dude served em almost 2 years...

 

I try not to mention the extreme phobia of ventriloquist dummies I had as a kid. Went on for about two years as well, but it still doesn't make it conversation-worthy.