Runescape is a worldwide known game. This game is extremely famous and usually played by children from between 8 year olds to 14 year olds, despite the 13+ limit. Runescape is owned by a company called Jagex. Runescape has become the most popular Java based game.
Jagex is a very large company with over 400 staff members spread throughout the world. Jagex owns two main websites - Runescape and Funorb. Runescape, however is played much more widely than Funorb. Jagex is estimated to be worth about 32 million dollars!
Runescape has more than 150 servers through out the world. In which 4 of these servers are completely changed to German. 3 of these are non members and 1 is members. Each server is able to take up to 2000 people making the total amount of people simultaneously logged on more than 300,000 people!
Runescape was first published in 1998 and it was known as "DeviusMUD" which in fact was never released to the public. Runescape was made from Isometric graphics here. Runescape was created by a man named Andrew Gower. Then in 1999 he then decided to rewrite Runescape completely and it was released as "beta" and then it was withdrawn from the public again one week later.
Andrew Gower then got his brother - Paul Gower to help him in making a completely new Runescape. Now the Gowers decided to ditch the isometric graphics and instead use a mixture of 3D and 2D shapes. This version of Runescape was released in 2001. Now it was renamed RuneScape instead of "Devious MUD". In the same year, the Gower brothers and Constant Tedder decided to join together to form a new corporation called Jagex. This stands for "Java Game Experts".
In year 2002 Runescape added the new Member version where you could pay to play for more items, quests and a larger map. As Runescape started getting more members, it started making some major improvements. Runescape completely rewrote the game again and it was released as Runescape 2 - the one we currently play. In late 2003 the members version was released and it was completed early 2004. Once the game was released, it changed it's name to RuneScape and the original one was changed to RuneScape Classic.
Runescape's game engine was improved in 2006 for the game not to be slowed when the added the new areas and items. The game engine was again improved in 2007 for the future graphic improvements on the game.
So here are the main bits of the history and info about Runescape. I might have missed some bits, and if I did then please feel free to add in the comments section.
