RuneScape was my favorite game of all time when I was a kid. I'd play it for at least 8 hours a day every day, and never get bored. Now, RuneScape is RuneScape 3, terribly infested gambling microtransaction mess that looks like a really bad early access game, or Oldschool RuneScape, which is really fun, but is infested with bots. It's honestly so bad. I tried to play it and it feels so... good, but also low effort. The worst part, however, is the corporate greed. Jagex, the company that developes Runescape, has been sold numerous times. This time, it's owned by some Venture Capital or investment firm, the kind that kills games off to gain their IP and then sell them for huge amounts of money (CVC Capital Partners and Haveli Investments). The first thing they've done is raise the subscription of Runescape to nearly $15, which is truly nuts. This game used to be like $8 a month previously, some are still paying that much....

It's sad to see corporate greed kill such a great game. Idk what to even play now....

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[–] ICastFist@programming.dev 1 points 1 month ago

Albion Online has a fully player-driven economy (or at least had last time I played it, back in 2022, prolly still does)

You can play it almost entirely as a gatherer, crafter or merchant (auction houses/markets are local to the cities they're in), avoiding combat nearly everywhere. It does put a lot of emphasis on PVP tho, but at least the areas/maps where that can happen are clearly marked. Higher level materials are only found in these pvp maps, though it can take quite a while until you can even start gathering them.

AFAIK, all gear that drops from dungeons can be crafted as well. Nothing is character bound and being on red or black maps means that you lose all your stuff being carried on death.