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Constant Tedder, Managing Director of Jagex Ltd, stated 'We're thrilled to be launching the new version of RuneScape which brings all the fun and excitement of adventuring in a massive multi-player fully 3D online world to anyone with a PC and an internet connection. No other game is as easy to start playing and offers so much exciting gameplay.'
Andrew Gower, RuneScape's inventor and co-founder of Jagex Ltd, adds 'We're very excited that we've managed to get a high detail 3d engine and a massive world running within the limitations of a normal web-browser. The whole team has worked really hard to prove that a standard web-browser with no extra plugins, can be made to do far more than anyone thought possible.'
RuneScape has a free and a subscription-based members version. The free version is not a time limited trial. The members' version costs just $5 per month and gives unlimited access to twice as big a map, three times as many quests, lots of new skills such as dueling, and a whole host of other special features.
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Jagex's proprietary graphics compression technologies mean the whole game, which has hundreds of hours of gameplay, can fit onto a single floppy disk. So downloading is quick even on a dial-up internet connection and because it is Java there is no installation hassles - it all happens automatically; RuneScape is simply played through the browser.
'Everyone single person in the company can be incredibly proud of what has been achieved over the last year and a half.' comments Tedder, 'The new version of RuneScape has been completely re-written to take advantage of the power of the new engine; because it is such a big game - that took a little longer than we would have liked. But now the really exciting bit can start – creating new great content that we simply couldn't do before. RuneScape is now the best choice for anyone looking for fun and challenging online gaming experience.'
RuneScape was first launched in January 2001 as a free game. A subscription based members version was launched in February 2002 and instantly attracted 5000 subscribers. Since that time subscribers have grown steadily and entirely organically standing currently at over 64,000. Today the game as a whole, including free players, has over 660,000 active players making RuneScape one of the largest MMORPGs in the world.