Old School Runescape's resurgence proves it's the perfect MMO for the modern era

Back in the early 2000s, your MMO options were far more limited than what they are now. If you had a decent enough setup and 15 bucks to spare each month, you'd play World of Warcraft. For the broke kids like me, the then-$5 subscription cost and modest system requirements (it was in-browser!) made Runescape the far more palatable option. WoW has long reigned as the king of MMOs, but the recent content drought has seen even its most ardent supporters bite the bullet and give Jagex's alternative a go, only to discover what I've been saying for the past two decades: Old School Runescape is peak.

Just this week, Old School Runescape topped out at over 200,000 concurrent players, just 30k shy of the record set in December 2024. This isn't surprising, considering how en vogue one of the best MMO games is right now. Alongside the launch of OSRS' massive Varlamore update, some of the biggest streamers in the game, including 'AnnieFuschia,' 'Guzu,' and Chance 'Sodapoppin' Morris, have been turning their audiences onto the joys of fishing up Dragon Harpoons, among other dopamine-eliciting in-game activities.

It's a huge moment for the game, and one which, in my opinion, it deserves. School sick notes and all-nighters I daren't tell my mum about set the cadence of my formative years. Whether I was farming Aviansies in God Wars, working on my Fighter Torso in Barbarian Assault, or getting my fishing reps in by the Barbarian Village, Runescape was very much my main escape from reality.

No matter how swanky the graphics got as gaming modernized, I would never trade up from the smooth, low-poly environs of Gielinor. Much of this is down to OSRS' writing, which is unabashedly British in tone and humor. Aside from the litany of Monty Python references, Jagex has a history of leaning into the absurd that's redolent of the Monkey Island series. This, alongside a healthy dose of fantastical whimsy, makes for some of the most endearing and memorable quests in gaming.

And then there's OSRS' best-in-class progression design. I made my current main while doing my Masters degree back in 2018. I effectively used it as the millennial version of Subway Surfers, AFK skilling to fulfill my stimulative needs as I pored over the driest academic literature imaginable. By the time I graduated, it was a solid mid-game account, but life happened, other games came out, and I stopped playing.

Fast forward to this year, and I got the bug again. Much has changed in seven years. From the introduction of new bosses like Scurrius to the advent of Leagues, Ironman mode, and even a new skill, Sailing, that drops soon, Jagex has continually evolved the game. That being said, the critical thing the studio has consistently gotten right over the years is ensuring all new content can be completed within the confines of its existing skill structure.

As competitors have continued to increase level caps and even revamp their power systems entirely (Destiny 2 must have gone through at least a dozen iterations at this point), OSRS has never strayed beyond the 99. Nearly a decade between logins, and my gear is equally usable as it ever was. I don't have to spend hours grinding to meet some new ceiling, and if anything, the new methods of doing things only make the experience better.

I fell down a huge Forestry hole while working towards maxing my Woodcutting, and while some of the minigames are a bit shit - the mulch event is an RSI waiting to happen - the rewards from this newer content were more than worth my efforts. Coming back to OSRS is like being met with a warm bath and a freshly-cooked meal after getting home from a long trip.

Of course, OSRS isn't perfect. Crappy minigames aside, botting has been a persistent thorn in Jagex's side since the Runescape Classic era, despite multiple major purges over the years. At this point, though, I can't imagine the amount of economic rebalancing the devs would have to do if they somehow culled it entirely, and there's a general symbiosis between real players and their automated counterparts. To be honest, botting has never perceivably impacted my experience, but it's something to be aware of.

Jagex, for its long history of being the model community-first studio, has also fallen foul of modern gaming vices. Monetization has, historically, proved a major schism point between OSRS, which operates without microtransactions (Bonds aside), and its successor, Runescape 3, which has a system called Treasure Hunter that is perceived by some as a legalized form of real-world trading.

At the start of the year, players began boycotting OSRS after a player survey floated new membership tiers that would introduce ads and other nastiness unless you paid the premium. Fortunately, Jagex got the message loud and clear, and enshittification appears to have halted for now. If anything, the fierce response is a testament to just how much the community cares about the game; it's this passion that has allowed Runescape to stand the test of time and continue to achieve the kind of player counts we've seen in recent days and weeks.

Despite its dated graphics and tick-based gameplay, OSRS oozes charm from every pore. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that it's the perfect modern MMO. As the liveservice games of today continue to jostle for your precious few gaming hours, utilizing every FOMO trick in the book to keep you playing, OSRS' respectful design philosophy is a breath of fresh air. Jagex's patient gamecraft is paying dividends, to the extent that OSRS doesn't need to resort to such methods - players will keep coming back because the game is just that good. It's been a long time coming, but Gielinor has more than earned its time in the spotlight.