Steam and RuneScape Growth - A Message From Mod Warden (Executive Producer, RuneScape)
We've wanted to scream this from the rooftops for a long time, and today is the day we can finally say it... RuneScape is coming to Steam!
As you read this, we’ve just hit the publish button on our Steam Page, making it official. We can also confirm our launch date: October 14th, 2020 (oh the emotions!).
RuneScape is a game like no other - a deep and engaging living world that is welcoming and accessible, filled with the many beating hearts of our incredible players. You are the citizens who bring Gielinor to life.
To many, RuneScape is more than just a game or an escape. It is a place to form friendships and relationships (marriages, even!) or be part of something bigger, like the buzz of a Lumby Crater event. RuneScape, in so many ways, is defined by the experiences we have with one other as we share our adventures, quests, years of boundless mastery and achievements together. We believe this is a world with so much more to give, and with many years ahead of it yet to unfold.
As we look to the future, we are not just committed to improving the world of RuneScape but also to making sure that beating heart of the game - the presence of players - is as prevalent as ever. To do that, we're setting out on a new mission; bring RuneScape to new places, find new adventurers from new locations, and make RuneScape a more accessible, more cross-platform MMORPG that you can enjoy anywhere.
That journey begins with our arrival on Steam. It brings RuneScape, one of the world’s largest MMORPGs, to one of the world’s ultimate gaming destinations. It connects us to a huge new community of PC gamers that we can appeal to for the very first time. Together, we can welcome them and show them just what RuneScape and its community have to offer.
We won’t stop here either - we will continue to work with our partners to bring RuneScape everywhere we can, and to make it more accessible than ever. You will see us integrate with alternative account services, on new platforms and become available in different stores. This is all about offering new ways to access RuneScape and appeal to new communities of players.
We also know that reaching new audiences makes modernising RuneScape, scaling our operations and improving accessibility are even more important than ever before. I am asking the team to double down and focus on these areas to better support the influx of new players we'll be welcoming together over the years ahead.
Our mobile launch is likely our next big step on this journey. While we have many testers today, before we unleash RuneScape fully into the greater world, we want to make sure we take the essence of RuneScape and allow it to sing as best it can on smaller devices.
This means improving the early game experience, onboarding and readability, and optimising our UI – from refining text, content, interaction and hitbox sizes, to engine improvements and stability that support flexibility across the widest array of possible display sizes. While some of this work will be focused on making the mobile experience the best it can be in these areas, much will improve the experience on whatever platform you choose to play on.
This work will set us up for a stronger launch on mobile that keeps more players around and provides a better experience for everyone. While we were on track to deliver this in 2020, this additional work pushes our mobile launch to 2021. We know so many of you are super excited for the full Android and iOS release, and we hope you will understand this additional wait to make sure we kick this off from a much sturdier starting point.
After that, our mission to keep bringing in new adventurers and deliver on the cross-platform MMO vision that will continue to unfold. We can't wait to tell you more about it all... in time.
On behalf of the entire RuneScape Team, thank you for joining us on this journey so far. We hope you’re as excited about the future of RuneScape as we are, and we can’t wait to launch on Steam.
Tell your friends, and let's give those new adventurers a warm welcome on October 14th! See you in Gielinor.
Mod Warden