Last week saw a pretty significant shakeup for RuneScape and Old School RuneScape fans when Jagex CEO Phil Mansell announced he stepped down as the studio’s new CEO Jon Bellamy aka Mod North would take the reins. Naturally this brought on plenty of player reactions and questions, some of which were addressed in a promised follow-up Q&A video.
The opening of the video starts with a few softball questions to get fans to know more about Bellamy, but he still outlines his understanding of the legacy of the MMORPGs he’s leading. “I’m deeply aware of the responsibility to our players,” he said. “This is very very precious ground. This is hallowed earth.”
Bellamy makes no qualms about his games industry background, noting his time not only at Jagex but as an investor for other studios and as an employee for the (in his words) “very monetization oriented” mobile games company HugeGames. That last point was identified later as an “elephant in the room” to be addressed about whether or not his time at an MTX-hungry company was going to bleed into his decision-making for the RuneScape games, to which Bellamy drew a very clear line in the sand.
“There will never be microtransactions in Old School RuneScape, and RuneScape 3 needs to be less aggressive on monetization in order to build sustainability for the next 25 years. It’s as clear as I can be. I’ve seen firsthand what these hyper-monetizing games on mobile look like; that is not what our games are and it is not what they need. It’s totally incompatible.”
Microtransactions were a frequent topic throughout the Q&A, with Bellamy admitting that the conjoint survey about subscription benefits that infuriated players was a “misstep” and also openly saying that RuneScape is not in a sustainable position in terms of its monetization strategy now. He further elaborated on RuneScape MTX change, noting a desire to ease things back but also pointing out how changes have to be gradual owing to 20 years’ worth of design specifically hooked into MTX. “It won’t be a mic drop moment where everything gets sort of switched off and we move forwards,” he says. “It’ll be turning the tanker. […] I think the quick way to answer it is, we know there’s a problem there. […] It’s gonna happen.”
Other answers of note include Bellamy’s overall hands-off approach to managing Jagex’s dev teams with acknowledgment that his role is to support devs, affirmation that the conjoint survey is not what caused Bellamy to take over for Mansell, and some effusive words about the survival title within the MMO’s universe that we’ve been reporting on since 2022.
In other RuneScape news, fans of RuneScape are being asked to fill out a survey to share their thoughts on the updates revealed during RuneFest, so if you’ve got opinions on what’s coming down the pike, here is your opportunity.
