Family
not a replacement
Named in the public announcement Still open
RS4 is not a replacement. It sits alongside RuneScape, Old School RuneScape, and RuneScape: Dragonwilds as an independent experience. Each of those three keeps a dedicated team. The new project has a team of its own, separate from the three. You can look at one row or all four. The split is the same either way: three living games, and one new game beside them.
Dragonwilds carries one extra fact the others do not. Ashenfall, where the new game begins, was first explored there. That fact is about a map, not about a shutdown. The three living games continue. The new one starts beside them. One studio, Jagex Ltd, is describing four projects. The four projects do not collapse into a single launcher.
RuneScape
A dedicated team continues on RuneScape.
The new project does not replace RuneScape.
Old School RuneScape
A dedicated team continues on Old School RuneScape.
The new project is not a replacement for Old School RuneScape either.
RuneScape: Dragonwilds
A dedicated team continues on RuneScape: Dragonwilds.
Dragonwilds is not replaced, and Ashenfall was first explored there.
RS4
The RS4 team is separate from the three existing teams.
RS4 is a new independent experience beside the three living games.
Dedicated teams
A dedicated team is the staffing fact for each game that already exists. The people making RuneScape are still making RuneScape. The people making Old School RuneScape are still making that game. The people making Dragonwilds are still making Dragonwilds. Each of those games also keeps a roadmap and continued investment. That is the opposite of a sunset.
Separate is the matching fact for the new project. The RS4 team is not described as a rotation borrowed from the other three. An independent experience and a separate team are how a fourth MMO stays a fourth game, rather than a wind-down of the others. Later hiring news can be later news. In October 2026 the line is clean: three continuing teams, one new team beside them.
Staffing is the part of the family news you can repeat without guessing a feature. The three current teams continue. The new team is new. Roadmaps for the living games continue with them. No combat rule, skill, or membership price for RS4 is hiding inside that team chart.
Independent experience
Independent experience is the product fact, and it is stronger than a shared login would be. The new game is not a server inside RuneScape, a league inside Old School, or a co-op mode inside Dragonwilds. It sits alongside them. Alongside is a position. You can see all four at once. You are not told to pick a survivor.
The company mark belongs with that fact because the confusion is organisational. One company, Jagex Ltd, can run four games without those games becoming one game. The mark is the studio's own plate, shown whole. It is not a dragon from the film and it is not the flaming numeral. The games stay distinct. The publisher is shared.
Alongside is a seating plan, not a merge. Four names stay printable on one line, and none of them is a mode of another. If you already pay for one of the living games, that payment is for that game. Nothing in the family split says it becomes a ticket for RS4.
Ashenfall's first map
Dragonwilds is the exception that needs its own paragraph, because the setting overlaps. Ashenfall was first explored there. RS4 begins in Ashenfall years later, after Kuldra, in a land that has changed. First explored is a historical credit. It is not a claim that the survival game's servers become the MMO's servers, or that a survival character appears in the new world.
RuneScape and Old School RuneScape do not get that land credit. They are the franchise's older homes in Gielinor. They are not the place Ashenfall was scouted. Dragonwilds still says two things at once: the team continues, and the land was seen there first. RuneScape and Old School keep the continuing team without that land sentence.
Give Dragonwilds both the land credit and the continuing team. Leave the land credit off RuneScape and Old School when you retell the split. Sharing a publisher is not the same as sharing a map, and sharing a map with Dragonwilds is not the same as sharing a save.
Four rows, one table
Four rows carry the same split in short form, so you can scan team and relation together. RuneScape: dedicated team, not replaced. Old School RuneScape: dedicated team, not replaced. Dragonwilds: dedicated team, not replaced, with Ashenfall first explored there. RS4: separate team, independent experience. The short row and the longer sentence above it describe one fact each.
Nothing in the rows is a score. There is no player count, no release year, and no recommendation. The four projects were placed, not ranked. Use the relation column when a friend thinks the new project erases an old one. The answer is the same for the three living games: not a replacement. The new row is the only one that says independent.
Dragonwilds is the only living game whose row also names a place. That place is Ashenfall, and the credit is 'first explored', not 'replaced by'. RS4's row is the only one whose team is separate. If you remember four words, remember dedicated, dedicated, dedicated, separate.
| Project | Team | Relation |
|---|---|---|
| RuneScape | Dedicated | Not replaced |
| Old School | Dedicated | Not replaced |
| Dragonwilds | Dedicated | First Ashenfall |
| RS4 | Separate | Independent |
Still in development
All four lines fit a new game that is still early. RS4 is a few years from a login. The three others are current games with teams that continue, roadmaps that continue, and investment that continues. Work on the new one does not pause the old ones. News about the old ones does not fill in the new one's blank systems. Platforms, accounts, membership, combat, and skills for RS4 remain open even while the team chart is settled.
The chart is the part you can act on. If you play RuneScape, Old School RuneScape, or Dragonwilds, those games are staying, with their own people. If you are curious about the fourth, the interest form is the invitation, and the three principles are the only design language offered so far. Alongside means you do not have to abandon a character to pay attention. It also means paying attention does not move that character anywhere.
Attention does not cost a character, and it does not transfer one. The living games keep their teams. The new game keeps its own team, its working title, and a wait measured in years. That is the whole family picture in October 2026.