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TLDR; Lore and world building related details should exist in every update.

I understand that this might not affect most players, but I still wanted to share my thoughts. One of the biggest problems with short term events is a lack of lore and world building.

I'd like to take the example of the new Yak track event. There are questions that this event raises without offering any answers.

Example 1: The yak... He says his master is now married and lives with his wife and children. Who is the master? Is it the same dude from the Tuska comes event? Is it the master of the observatory near castle wars? There's no hints at all! Where did this yak come from?

Example 2: The new armor is apparently Dioscuri battlemage robes. Well, there's no prior mention of Dioscuri in RS lore at all. Are they a group of warriors? Maybe some ancient clan? Are they magical beings from another plane? These types of questions could be very easily answered with some simple letters/books/journals you could find near the event.

As someone who loves details and story elements, this yak track throws in new things purely for the sake of an event. And the larger problem is that this seems to be a running theme with all of the cosmetic items. There's no lore based reason for them to exist in the game and as such they feel like out of place objects. Note, I'm not making a point about ruining immersion or anything either. I'm trying to say that over the years, Jagex has added cosmetics that are out of place and turn away players because there is no story/logic behind their existence. I believe that if you start adding things with fancy names but provide no extra details, it screams sloppy design and becomes a source of inconsistency that turns players away from the game.

I think one of the best examples of what I'm talking about is the kethsi robes. The kethsi robes are a purely cosmetic set has a connection to the story elements of the game. Every player who has followed the quests understands what Kethsi is. Therefore, even if Jagex were to release a solomon's outfit with the kethsi name, players might feel more of a connection to it than something they've never heard of before.

Note, I am also not saying that cosmetics should be removed (some players will disagree). I think that there can be a balance between cosmetics and storytelling that both Jagex and players can approve of. I also don't think that this is a complicated task. Coming up with a simple piece of lore for Dioscuri robes should be easy. Maybe the hard part would be localizing it for the different languages.

Does anyone else feel this way?

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over 4 years ago - /u/JagexWarden - Direct link

Hi Nosi, I agree with your perspective. One of the missions I gave our team this year is to connect lore and story to everything that we can. Things like Yak Track, cosmetics and even for how game is monetized are no exception. We want it to feel more natural to other aspects of our game and feel less disconnected.

Throughout this year you will see a lot more of of how we build canon into all things and should see these changes on the next Yak Track. This will be in both in game and out of game efforts.

It takes a bit of time to re-work, re-wire, how we do things and change course with our team but we are already well underway with this effort for 2020 :)

over 4 years ago - /u/JagexWarden - Direct link

Originally posted by nosi40

Hi Warden,

Thanks for the response. I understand that events and updates are planned out ahead of time and that future updates might have the changes you're talking about.

I believe that even simple things like a graphical rework can be tied into the story. A few years ago, catherby was updated graphically. And more recently, burthrope. But there is no in game story behind those changes. Some may feel there doesn't have to be. And to some extent I agree.

But, wouldn't it be nice to get an update that is actually connected to the story. Maybe there was a natural disasters that destroyed that town and you need to use construction to help rebuild it. And that could take maybe 5 minutes from the players perspective but once the rebuilding is done, the area becomes graphically updated.

It's things like this that will go a long way.

make sense as well. I have shared this post with the design team. I know they love story and narrative as much as you do, will nudge them to chime in :)