Hello there
Gobin kind of already gave the answer, but I'll give it as well so we can be as definitive as possible:
Guthix will never die in Old School.
The gods will never return in Old School.
The player character will never become the World Guardian, or any other type of chosen one, in Old School.
While the above worked well for RuneScape, it doesn't fit the Old School style of storytelling. It's never even been a consideration for us.
As for Secrets of the North and Desert Treasure II, the Mahjarrat storyline is one of the oldest in game, with large parts of it being written by Paul Gower himself. It's pretty much as Old School as it gets when it comes to storytelling. As we continue it, our goal is to stay as true as possible to the original vision while ensuring it develops in a way so that none of the above points will ever come to pass.
Read moreAll seems very mysterious to me...
I'm super excited about it!
It's not very often I check Reddit and get surprised with something I didn't even know was happening, but I trust OP and can't wait to see what Jagex do for this one. Crazy that even when working here, stuff like this can still surprise you!
Edit: imagine my further surprise when I asked around and nobody knew what I was talking about. OP has made a fool of me this day :(
I am also very excited for this!
I know for a fact that this has to be a thing because my dad works at Jagex.
It is a bit weird that they'll change old content to fit in with new quests. Some dialogue isnt a big deal I suppose but Im still bothered every time I see I see how they massacred the old elf npcs to fit the artstyle of the new priff ones
Given what happened with Song of the Elves, the concern is totally understandable, but we’re not trying to do anything like that again. These changes weren’t about retconning things to make our new quest work. The story of Temple of the Eye works totally fine both with and without these changes. Instead, this was some separate work to rectify some unfortunate plot holes and poorly worded dialogue that existed in Rune Mysteries. It only launched alongside Temple of the Eye and Guardians of the Rift because it made sense to release all the wizard focused things at once.
Is this restricted to map areas or does it apply to lore changes as well? For example the Mahjarrat storyline (and related quests) were building up to the end of the Fifth Age and I don't think anyone wants that in Old School.
It would definitely include lore if needed. We have no plans to ever bring the gods back in Old School.
I personally love the idea of backporting quests into this game since there were a bunch of great quests from RS2 that fit the game well. That being said, I'd prefer if there were some adjustments made to fit the lore of OSRS better, rather than a complete 1:1, especially for some of the bigger quest lines (Like the Mahjarrat questline, or how the Path of Glouphrie has some inconsistencies with Monkey Madness 2).
My first thoughts with The Path of Glouphrie is where the sewer would fit, since the area on the map where it would go has already been mapped out with Zulrah being added. If King of the Dwarves were to be backported, would the Lava flow mines be looked into as well?
If we went ahead with any of these, we’d make changes to ensure they fit Old School.
One thing I'm noticing in the conceptual art for the Beneath Cursed Sands cave is that all the floors appear to be flat. This has been a common issue with new content, unlike, say, the Lumbridge caves, which have rolling terrain (though you still travel over them as though they were flat). Is this something that will be addressed in the final version?
The cave is artificial rather than natural so the flat floors are intentional.
I dislike the idea of recreating some rs3 quests. Particularly those that lead to the more "high fantasy" part of rs3 (gods among us etc). Dragon slayer 2 is an example of a new quest that fit perfectly into osrs, I don't think quests with nomad or guthix do personally.
We have no plans to ever directly introduce the gods into Old School. The quests we’ve selected for consideration take that into account. We’d also make changes where needed to ensure they fit Old School.
can we get some original, never seen before content instead of porting stuff from 2008-2012 all day long?
Why not both?
I'm not super keen on the idea of porting a bunch of old quests to OSRS. The lore going in a different direction was something I liked a lot about this version the game. WGS gets into some pretty strange lore (the gods all essentially being aliens instead of mysterious divine beings) and in it's conclusion, some atheist edgelord reptile kills Guthux.
Still, it does make sense that we'd wrap up those questlines, and if this is the only way, that's fine.
You’re thinking of The World Wakes rather than While Guthix Sleeps. It was a great quest, but we have no plans to backport it or take the Old School story in that sort of direction.
Thanks for all the feedback so far. We’re thinking about including a survey on quest porting in one of the upcoming Gielinor Gazettes so keep an eye out for that.
So I’m going to be biased here as I’m the one responsible for killing most of these characters (sorry about that), but with the exception of Nieve, I don’t think we killed any of these characters for the sake of it.
I 100% agree that death for the sake of something like shock value is poor writing and is never something we’d intentionally go for. For most of the characters you’ve listed, their deaths have very specific purposes in the stories we’re telling. Admittedly, these purposes may not be clear for all of them right now as most of those deaths are actually setting up sequels we’ve not yet released. For example, the death at the end of A Kingdom Divided is going to have huge impacts on the future of that storyline, even if the impact on A Kingdom Divided itself is more limited.
One thing I will admit is that even if the deaths themselves do have purpose, I do wish a couple of them had played out better. For example, Bob was originally meant to sacrifice himself to save the play...
Read moreInteresting... But maybe he's just talking rubbish?
How very interesting...
Oddly enough I have some plans involving an icy prison to the far north myself, but for a quest rather than a raid. No spoilers though...
You're awesome. Please give the miniquest the love it deserves. We're starved for quests, the miniquest is the most exciting part of this update.
I don't want to oversell it (especially after A Night at the Theatre). It is just a miniquest, so don't expect anything on the level of a proper quest. We do have some exciting plans for quests in 2022 though, so hang in there.
You're awesome. Please give the miniquest the love it deserves. We're starved for quests, the miniquest is the most exciting part of this update.
I don't want to oversell it (especially after A Night at the Theatre). It is just a miniquest, so don't expect anything on the level of a proper quest. We do have some exciting plans for quests in 2022 though, so hang in there.