In the MMORPG Runescape gold party hats have now appeared, which need to be farmed in a relatively elaborate way. These hats are actually completely useless, but they could become valuable in the future. Because 20 years ago, there were already such hats, which are now worth billions of gold.
What kind of hats are these?
- The “gold party hats” in Runescape are cosmetic headgear distributed to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Runescape. The hats are only available until January 3.
- To obtain a party hat, players need 8 shards: To get these shards, players need mainly luck and time. The shards can be obtained by leveling combat, art, or gathering skills and in many other ways: One shard can be bought for about 30 million gold.
- The item is useless in itself, but is seen as an exciting investment for the future, because such hats were already in the game in 2001. They are now worth billions of gold.
In 2001, many simply threw away their party hat – Today it would be worth billions of gold
What is the story behind the old hats? In 2001, party hats were already introduced in the game, which were distributed during a Christmas event.
As the developer Jagex explains, the hats were supposed to be “worthless and disposable”. There was no advantage to wearing such a hat. Many players destroyed their hats after the event. But since Jagex stopped giving out hats in 2002 and never did so again after that, the hats became coveted collectibles: They showed that someone had been playing Runescape for years.
Over the last 20 years, the hats have become rarer because people quit the MMORPG and took their hats with them to the digital grave. Currently, these hats are worth 2.1 billion gold and play a “crucial role in the economy of Runescape,” as Jagex says.
How many hours do players farm for the new hats? The players of Runescape are currently investing a lot of time in acquiring the individual shards. The time investment varies widely when reading the forum:
- One says he has been picking locks for 2 hours and still hasn’t found a shard.
- Another says he has already killed 2000 demons and found nothing.
- A third reports that after 6 hours he got his “combat shard”. It seems it was worth it.
What’s behind it: It is quite unlikely that the new hats will actually become valuable because everyone expects it. The original hats are so valuable because only a few people thought that such items could become valuable and stored the hats somewhere. Today, it is known that such limited event items increase in value, so many will keep their hats – and they will then remain relatively worthless.
However, Jagex should be congratulated: The party hats are a good idea to keep players engaged with “old content that is already in the game” for hours.
How intensely Runescape is for its players is shown by such stories:
Twitch streamer loses €12,700 in gold in MMORPG, freaks out in front of family
