A very happy New Year to you all! We hope that you are filling your boots with good cheer and Party Pete-like celebrations.

During the first half of 2009 we learnt a whole lot from our community and focused mostly on improving our underlying technology and switching back to weekly updates. While this was possibly less exciting to some, it was very necessary to set the stage to make possible the updates we had planned for the second half of the year. Looking back at 2009, there have been some pretty big updates. A few highlights include:

• Finishing the goblin storyline with The Chosen Commander.
• High-level training updates for several skills with the Living Rock Caverns, the Agility extensions and the Woodcutting sawmill.
• New rewards for skills, like the ancient curses, the extreme potions and the dragon pickaxe.
• The Evil Tree.
• Cool quests like Curse of Arrav, Blood Runs Deep, Hunt for Red Raktuber and The Temple at Senntisten.
• The Objective and Advisor systems.
• And let’s not forget about new support for resizing the game window (even in Standard Detail mode) - no more playing in a tiny window!

So, what is the new year going to bring? For one, we want to continue producing quests at the rate and quality that we have been, which means expanding the most popular storylines and bringing a couple to dramatic conclusions. We’ll also be casting a critical eye over our existing skills, searching for holes, and filling them with new training activities and rewards. That’s before we even mention the new skill that is coming in 2010! And yes, there will be new combat equipment as well, and also a new Grandmaster quest – but more on that closer to release.

Of course, we haven’t planned every single update yet because we want to take on board your ideas for RuneScape content as well, and naturally give ourselves the spare resources to make it happen. RuneScape’s success over the last decade wouldn’t have been possible without your passionate input, and we promise to continue to solicit and take on board your feedback. So, go to the forums and get your ideas seen, heard, then - in some cases – even played in 2010!

We hope you have a great one!

Andrew, Mark Gerhard and Mod Fetzki