TruthScape.com  9  The Truth About RuneScape's Community and Its Impact on Children       9  Specific Dangers and Behavioral Concerns in the RuneScape Community

Specific Dangers and Behavioral Concerns in the RuneScape Community Rudeness, Verbal Abuse and Language

RuneScape is nominally a role-playing game, so a player is supposed to take on the role of an adventurer and play as that character. However, unlike many other role-playing games, there is not much incentive to actually take on the role of a character and, well, role-play it. Instead, the game is much more about obtaining items, wealth and character capabilities. This emphasis on practicalities also means that children playing the game are not taught much of anything about morality, beyond doing whatever is selfishly beneficial.

I’ll admit up front that many people don’t consider this an important issue, and in the case of older kids perhaps it is not. However, with kids as young as 5 playing this game, it can become a serious matter.

Much of the game is oriented around killing monsters, which is done both for experience to raise combat levels, and for the items that you get from them (called “drops”). However, there is virtually no differentiation between evil monsters and good monsters, or even between monsters and humans. There are no consequences for walking into a town, for example, and just slaughtering every townsperson you find; in most places cutting down a guard in front of another guard won't even cause the second to take notice! For the Slayer skill, in which you train on specific monsters you are assigned, a player may be told to kill dragons or demons, but also possibly elves and dwarves (peaceful, human-like creatures.)

Some consolation can be found in the fact that after a creature is killed, it will reappear (“respawn”) a few moments later, which some players use to assuage their guilt. But does this just cheapen the concept of death further?

The situation is no better when it comes to quests. It is true that in most cases the player does take on the role of the “good guy” trying to right an evil, but not always. The quests are also very linear, meaning that there is usually only one to complete the quest and get the rewards, and while quests are optional, some are effectively mandatory as they unlock essential game content. As just one example, to access the best method for raising the Runecrafting skill, you have to help out an evil mage.

There are some monsters whose drops are actually required for certain skills. For example, to make anti-poison potions you must use unicorn horns, which are of course obtained by killing unicorns—low level, non-aggressive creatures. So players will camp out where the unicorns are and just kill them by the dozens or hundreds without giving a second thought as to whether this is right or not. Contrast this to the way killing a unicorn is treated in the first Harry Potter book or movie. (Interestingly, I have run across a few rare players, mostly old-timers, who actually do role-play and refuse to kill unicorns.)

Some kids are so desensitized to all the killing that they don't notice it. I had a very eye-opening experience when Jagex released the Hunter skill into RuneScape, which lets players catch and trap in-game animals like birds and small creatures called “kebbits”. I was stunned to find very angry players protesting this because they objected to “mistreatment of animals” and felt Jagex was setting a bad example with this new skill. But apparently they didn't have a problem with killing humans in game—even when this contradiction was pointed out to them!

Another skill in the game is Thieving, which pretty much speaks for itself. In addition the “usual” methods like pick pocketing and stealing items from market stalls, an advanced method involves hitting townsfolk over the head with a stick to knock them out before robbing them. Nice, huh?

Does it really matter if kids kill imaginary unicorns or rob pretend people? Again, perhaps not, but it's behavior that many parents don't want their kids to take lightly, especially at a tender age.

Specific Dangers and Behavioral Concerns in the RuneScape Community Rudeness, Verbal Abuse and Language