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The RuneScape Forums provide an opportunity for community discussion.
The Community of RuneScape broadly refers to the collective group of people who have an account. These are divided into members (those who pay a monthly fee and have full access to game content) and non-members (those who play for free with no time limit, but have limitations on skills, items and other content).
The community includes Jagex moderators (Jagex staff members) and player moderators (ordinary players who Jagex hand-picks as trusted, and who have extended capabilities when reporting players).
Members and high-level free players may also contribute to the RuneScape Forums, where the community can discuss various aspects of the game and website, speculate about future updates, and make suggestions for new content. The forums also include a section called "Community - Plan events and interact with other players". Jagex has described the forum community of RuneScape as "the second largest in the world".[1]
Player demographics
Gender
The community is composed of players of both the male and female genders, though there is a skew towards male players. In February 2008, Geoff Iddison (the CEO of Jagex at the time) claimed in an interview that the player base was "over 60 percent male", though the interviewer speculated that the true figure was likely to be higher than this comment would suggest.[2] Indeed, a poll conducted just one month later showed that 90% of respondents claimed to be male.[3]
Three months after that, in June 2008, Jagex CEO Geoff Iddison said in an interview: "we’ve got some plans there" to redress the imbalance.[4] Evidence of this appeared around the beginning of September, when the RuneScape banner across the top of the homepage was changed to feature two female warriors prominently.
The gender ratio of runescape players is very disputable, as the player is represented by an avatar who could choose a character of the opposite gender. Also, the in-game Make-over Mage is able to change the gender of any player at any time. Recruitment Drive even requires all male players to change their gender. This helps to explain the dispute in the player base and poll.
Ages
There are no publicly-available official figures on the distribution of players' ages, even in aggregate form. However, in June 2008, Geoff Iddison (the CEO of Jagex at the time) indicated in an interview that most players are in the range 8 to 18 years old, and the trend is towards younger players.[4]
Iddison's successor, Mark Gerhard, said in an interview in May 2009 that the average age is 16.[5] There are two major "spikes" (sharp peaks in the graph) at ages 14 and 18, with secondary spikes at ages 19 and 28. Only four percent of players are under 13, despite the fact that the rules have been relaxed to allow under-13s to play.
| “ | Like, less than 4% of our players are under 13, and the average age is 16. There are two major spikes; one at 14, and one at 18. And then obviously secondarily one at 19 and weirdly one at 28. I guess that's all of us logging in ... But the real average age is 16. And there's this perception that there's 8 year old boys playing the game and it's mad. | ” |
— Mark Gerhard [5]
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However, Jagex's measurements of players' ages may be inaccurate, since they are presumably deduced from their dates of birth (which players enter when they create their accounts). For a number of years, people under the age of 13 were not allowed to play. If someone attempted to create an account and their date of birth showed they were under 13, they would automatically be prevented from creating an account. The website would also leave a cookie on the user's computer to show that they had been refused an account based on their age, and this would prevent the user from trying again and lying about their date of birth.
However, if the user deleted the cookie and lied about their date of birth, they would be able to create an account and play. This is strictly against Jagex's terms and conditions, especially since the company has legal responsibilities regarding under-13s, but it was technically possible. Under-13s are now allowed to play,[6] but cannot use chat facilities except Quick Chat.
The effect of players lying about their dates of birth in this way is that the official figures will show ages artificially skewed towards higher numbers, and make the player base appear older than it actually is. It is also possible that some players may lie about their dates of birth to make themselves appear younger than they really are. It is unknown as to what extent these two effect counteract each other.
Nationalities and languages
Players represent a wide range of nationalities, with local servers already available in four continents, namely the Americas (the United States, Canada, Mexico, Brazil and Argentina), Europe (the United Kingdom, Lithuania, Poland, Ireland, Belgium, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden), Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), and Asia (India).
Former Jagex CEO Geoff Iddison had stated in an interview in May 2008 that he intended to expand the RuneScape player base into parts of Asia (specifically Malaysia and India) and Eastern Europe, but ruled out Japan.[7] After Iddison's resignation, his successor, Mark Gerhard, confirmed in February 2009 that this was still the plan, but added "the time frame is not absolutely certain yet."[8] RuneScape was launched in India in October 2009, with Zapak being the exclusive marketing and distribution partner.[9] Present at the launch were Rob Smith (Jagex's COO), Rohit Sharma (Zapak COO), and Bollywood actor Aftab Shivdasani.
| “ | RuneScape is amongst the top online games in the world. With over 6 million users a month it is the worlds second largest MMOG (Massively Multiplayer online game). We are very excited to exclusively launch this game in India. | ” |
The game itself is currently available in five languages: English, German (beta launched on 14 February 2007[10]), French (launched on 11 December 2008[11]), Brazilian Portuguese (released 24 July 2009[12]) and Latinamerican Spanish (launched on 24 April 2013[13]). Additionally, Mod Jon H (a Jagex moderator) announced on the 15 October 2008 that a splash screen in the Dutch language is now available at www.RuneScape.nl.[14] In 24 April 2013 a Spanish version of the game was launched, despite the fact that a poll in August 2008 showed that more players wanted Spanish than wanted French.[15] A year later, in August 2009, Jagex CEO Mark Gerhard admitted that there still was not "a specific timeframe" for a Spanish version.[16]
Players who speak languages other than English tend to gravitate to worlds that are populated by other players who speak the same language. For example, some worlds have a significant percentage of players who speak French, Lithuanian, Dutch, or Spanish (in the last case, Worlds 135 for F2P and 78 for P2P).
Impact of The Player Community
The community as a whole has a large influence on the nature of the game. Whether it is on the forums or through special polls, Jagex have managed to integrate many of the players ideas into the game itself. In-game, the community is mixed due to it being widely available to so many people. There is subsequently a variance in player behaviour throughout the game. Newer players tend to be unfamiliar with the rules, therefore they are more likely to be in breach of some without being aware of the consequences. The community in general is friendly, although in some cases players may be subject to verbal abuse or in extreme cases cyberbullying. In the past, there was a substantial amount of players who exploited Runescape's free-trade system for personal benefit. These included bots and scammers which were rife in the community before Jagex made the controversial decision to remove these, at the cost of eliminating free-trade between all players. In response to previous decisions, players have organised riots and even quit playing. The sensitivity of the players has made making such updates in the future a cautious decision for Jagex.
Famous Players
Established players within the community may go on to achieve celebrity status amongst their peers. This can be formed through having high skills, producing amateur films, or more rarely, being famous in the real world. These players are generally well perceived and they also are responsible for much of the conversation topics that arise in a typical encounter on Runescape. For example, Zezima, a pay-to-play player who held the top spot for overall highscores for a considerable time, was idolized by all sorts of players.
Moderators
A moderator is a player who has been entrusted by Jagex with extra capabilities, such as the ability to punish rule-breakers. This might include the ability to mute or ban offenders. They are divided into three types - Jagex moderators (Jagex staff members), player moderators (ordinary players that Jagex has hand-picked and entrusted with extra capabilities), and forum moderators (ordinary players who have the ability to perform administrative functions in the RuneScape Forums).
Jagex moderators
Jagex moderators ("J-mods") are employees of Jagex, and occasionally log into the game to talk to players. All Jagex moderators with the exceptions of Paul, Andrew, and Ian, have "Mod" as a prefix in their names. In RuneScape, they are identified by a gold crown beside their names, visible during public and private chat. On RuneScape's official forums, the gold crowns are shown beside their name, and their posts appear highlighted in gold. They have the ability to alter their skill levels at whim and may generate items within their inventory to assist in testing content before it appears in the publicly in the RuneScape game. Jagex moderators also have the ability to appear at any location in the RuneScape world. They do not appear in the high-scores tables.
Player moderators
Player moderators ("p-mods") are regular players who have been carefully selected and invited by Jagex to help maintain the order of the RuneScape environment, keeping it safe and free from rule-breaking. Player moderators are identified by a silver crown beside their names when they send any sort of message in the RuneScape game. They are given the ability to mute players for a period of 48 hours and send priority abuse reports that are directly sent to a member of the Jagex team. Player moderators have access to the Player Moderator Centre, an area on the RuneScape website that allows them to perform their role more effectively. P-mods are not expected to spend greater periods of time playing RuneScape than normal players, and are not even obliged to make use of their special abilities.
Forum moderators
Forum moderators ("f-mods") are normal players who work to carry out the tasks of managing the RuneScape Forums. Forum moderators were hand-picked from a group of normal players by Jagex staff because of their ability to prove consistently that they have the temperament and judgement needed to help monitor fairness and rule breakers in the forums. They are given the ability to move and lock threads, hide posts or entire threads, edit titles, and temporarily ban players from posting. Like player moderators, they are given a private set of forums that are primarily used to help perform their role more effectively. Forum moderators have a green crown beside their name, as well as a green background when they post on the forums. They are not identified by a crown beside their name when they send a message in the RuneScape game.
As with Player Moderators, Fmod get no benefits from Jagex for their role, which is entirely voluntary.
Jagex's community involvement
The early days
When RuneScape was relatively new, Jagex was often involved in community affairs. Examples of activities that Jagex used to participate in include:
- Player achievements: Jagex used to use system messages to announce achievements and player events, such as the wedding of Ladymedusa and M_Oldfield in February 2002, where Paul Gower performed the service[17]
- Jagex used to publicly welcome new staff (see Update:New kids on the block), but no longer does so.
- The news list used to include a "Community" section[source needed], but this has since been removed
- Other affairs: in January 2003, Jagex announced the real life wedding of Lady Pooh and Topcat0711, the in-game and real-life weddings of Pugxsi and Jenstarr, and the death of Siw39. However, these announcements have all been removed, presumably because it conflicts with Jagex's rules against solicitation[18] and giving out personal information. With so many millions of players now active, it would be impractical to list weddings and marriages for all players, and it would be unfair to list some and not others.
Detachment from the player community
For a time, Jagex became more detached from the community. For example, the company stopped listing fan sites for security reasons, although some saw this as a move to depart from the community. Jagex staff members no longer post on fan forums, or at least not using their Jagex names.
There used to be a messaging system on the website where you could directly send a message to Jagex, and most of the time receive a response. After what was probably abuse and spam of the system, it was silently removed. Now contacting Jagex with a problem can be quite frustrating, as you have to post on the forum and wait much longer for a response.
Re-involvement with the community
In more recent times, Jagex has been taking steps to try to become closer to the player community. They created a Twitter account in December 2008 to keep players up-to-date.
When Mark Gerhard took over as Jagex CEO in February 2009, he started by stating that the company will be more open, and its staff will participate more in the community with other players.[19] In March 2009, Jagex created their own Facebook account[20] and a LiveJournal account.[21]
A poll in April showed that early interest for these accounts was poor, with 68 percent of respondents saying they had not visited any of them or had not heard of them, and only 12 percent having visited at least one.[22]
Jagex also began creating in-game events, such as international castle wars tournaments, which Jagex mods are reported to be seen at. They also began holding machinima contests, which Jagex members would judge, and then arranging the winner to meet Jagex and their headquarters in real life.
The company also now announces certain player affairs, just not on the official website. For example, it congratulated Telmomarques on reaching level 120 Dungeoneering via Facebook.
Also, the zombie outbreak event required players to protect J-Mods from being zombified, and allowed them to kill J-Mods that had been zombified.