Examine

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An example of examining.

Examine is a feature in RuneScape that allows players to examine objects closely. Almost anything in RuneScape can be examined, whether items, non-player characters, interactive scenery, and even non-interactive scenery. To examine an object, right-click it and click on "Examine" (see Game controls). The examine option is usually the last option when you right-click an object. If a monster's combat level is higher than yours, then the examine option is second to last. A short description of the object will appear on the chat interface.

Examining items is often not very useful for anything other than interest. One particularly unhelpful example can be seen when examining opal bolt tips, which yields the message: "Opal bolt tips." Examining some items or scenery during quests can be valuable, or even necessary. For example, examining the levers on the bottom level of the Abandoned Mine during the Haunted Mine quest lets the player know which lever is which. It may also be useful to examine coins 100k or more to find their exact value because when there are more than 100k coins, they are listed in 100k, 1000K, 10M, 100M, etc.

Examples of Examines

Jagex often uses examine text to include cultural references or humour.

For example:

• Examining a war tortoise returns the message "Definitely not teenaged, although the jury is out on its ninja skills." This is a reference to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

• The Examiner, "Upon examining the Examiner, you examine it is indeed an examiner!"

• A skeleton in the wilderness, "He died of natural causes, like a massive dragon, or something".

• Skeletons in the Slayer Tower yield two different examines: One reads "How do you make a skeleton laugh?" and another reads "Tickle his funny bone."

• "Growing Wheat" in the Impetuous Impulses minigame, "Kids grow up fast these days".

• Young impling, "A young impling. It's not fair"!

• Sin Seer in Seer's village, "She's honest about the things you aren't."

• Camo equipment from the Drill Demon random event, "Examine what?"

• Rug Merchant, "A man who deals in rugs", a take on a phrase about a rug dealer.

• Adventurer, "He's in a pretty nasty spot, in a pretty nasty pot. With some cabbage." The adventurer is about to be boiled alive.

• Head Chef, "Despite his name, rarely actually cooks heads." Chef is found at Cook's Guild.

The examine text is initially decided upon by the developer who makes the object, though it is occasionally adjusted by editors.

Player-made examine

The most notable in-game entities that cannot be examined are human players. Player spoofs, such as the ones seen while riding Gnomecopters, have the 'examine' option. Their examine text is simply 'A player'. However, they are just non-interactive NPCs and are not players.

Many players would like to be able to define their own examine text that others can read, and have posted this opinion on the RuneScape Forums. However, this suggestion remained on the "Do Not Suggest" list, a Jagex-controlled list of suggestions that players were not permitted to discuss. Each Suggestions forum has an identical copy of the list in its forum specific rules.

The reason for this policy seems to be the potential problem of people attributing inappropriate examine text to themselves. Mod Craddock said of the proposal: "It's quite a nice idea but it could be quite difficult for us to stop players from writing horribly insulting examines. Can you think of any solution to this?" Players responded by saying that examine text should be subject to the chat filter, and inappropriate text should be reportable under the Rule 1 - Offensive Language. They have even suggested that all player-made examine text should be checked manually by Jagex before "going live", and offenders should have their right to provide their examine text revoked.