RuneScape: Dragonwilds

RuneScape: Dragonwilds is a cooperative open-world survival-crafting game from Jagex, announced in 2025 and released in Early Access on Steam on 15 April 2025. It takes place on Ashenfall, a previously unexplored continent in the RuneScape universe, where dragons have awakened and a Dragon Queen threatens the land. Players create adventurers and can explore alone or with as many as three companions, gathering resources, building shelters, crafting equipment, and preparing to confront that threat. Instead of reproducing RuneScape’s click-driven MMORPG format, Dragonwilds combines familiar Gielinor imagery with survival-game systems. Wood, stone, ore, food, and other materials support construction and progression; players can make bases, workstations, weapons, armour, and supplies. Jagex has described Ashenfall as a wilderness of forests, valleys, mountains, and ruins, with environmental hazards that make a defended camp valuable. Exploration brings players into contact with RuneScape-associated creatures, including goblins, trolls, and dragons. The game is built in Unreal Engine 5, a technological shift from the original RuneScape’s long-established browser roots. Magic is central to Dragonwilds. Players discover runes and use Anima, which Jagex describes as a natural magical force, to cast spells. These powers are not confined to battle: Jagex has shown spells for chopping trees efficiently, repairing equipment, and moving or manipulating objects. This gives the game a specifically RuneScape-flavoured approach to routine survival labour, while combat still demands crafted gear and magical abilities against dangerous creatures. Players may use magic to alter how they traverse and develop the landscape, rather than treating it solely as an attack system. Dragonwilds also draws on skills recognisable to RuneScape players. Jagex has highlighted woodcutting, mining, fishing, cooking, and crafting, but frames advancement around enduring Ashenfall and becoming able to challenge dragons. Its stated long-term objective is to defeat the Dragon Queen, making dragon hunting more than background decoration. The Early Access release means the game is still in development, and Jagex has said it intends to expand content with player feedback. Dragonwilds is therefore not a new MMORPG expansion; it is a separate survival adventure that uses RuneScape’s setting, monsters, skills, and magic in a different genre. At release, Dragonwilds offered solo and four-player online cooperative play. Jagex positioned Early Access as a chance to refine systems, add new regions, quests, enemies, and gear, and respond to community feedback during development. Its roadmap also promised further story content, gameplay improvements, and additional challenges for players in future updates.