Old School RuneScape says no more Mr Nice Guy, it's time for permabans and confiscations if you're caught buying black market gold

A pirate from Old School Runescape looks despondently out the window.

(Image credit: Jagex / ScreteMonge on YouTube)

Old School RuneScape (OSRS) has a cancer, and that cancer is crime. Or, well, it's repeated violations of Jagex's terms of service, anyway. The game is beset by perfidious players who buy in-game gold and items off black market sellers using real-world money, a process called Real World Trading (RWT).

Okay, yes, some version of that happens in a lot of MMOs, but it's a particular thorn in the side for Jagex and its players, leading as it does to legions of bots infesting the game in order to vacuum up gold to sell later on. Now, Jagex has decided it's no more Mr Nice Guy time: the punishments for buying gold are getting harsher.

"Buying gold off a real world trader is already very clearly against the rules, but historically we've treated the buyers more leniently than the sellers when issuing penalties for real world trading," said Jagex in a post earlier today. But no longer: "As part of our clamp-down on those gold-farming bots and the harm they do to Old School RuneScape, we're now taking a harsher line against players caught buying gold from them."

In other words, don't expect to get away with a slap on the wrist just because you were only buying gold or an in-game item from some shadowy guy in a trenchcoat. That's no longer an excuse, and Jagex says you can expect anything up to a permanent ban for blowing your real-world cash on RWT. "Our agents will issue bans, temporary or permanent depending on the situation, even for first offenses, as well as confiscating items from the offenders."

A forester from Old School Runescape, contemplating life next to his pheasant friend on a green field. — (Image credit: Jagex Game Studios)

There is a degree of negative sentiment, though, not because anyone's upset about RWT buyers getting the book thrown at them, but because some players don't trust Jagex to do it. Some note that Jagex has made similar pronouncements before. In 2021, the studio announced a growing team meant it could "begin to clamp down on buyers," which clearly didn't make much of a dent. In 2007, Jagex wrote that "We really do mean it when we say that buying gold for real-world money = a permanent ban."

So I forgive people for taking a 'wait and see' approach to see if Jagex makes good on this one. But if it does, then the OSRS Bernie Madoffs of the world can expect a long stay in the slammer.

One of Josh's first memories is of playing Quake 2 on the family computer when he was much too young to be doing that, and he's been irreparably game-brained ever since. His writing has been featured in Vice, Fanbyte, and the Financial Times. He'll play pretty much anything, and has written far too much on everything from visual novels to Assassin's Creed. His most profound loves are for CRPGs, immersive sims, and any game whose ambition outstrips its budget. He thinks you're all far too mean about Deus Ex: Invisible War.

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