On RuneScape's forgotten continent of Ashenfall, dragons have awoken. Gather, build, skill and craft in this co-operative survival adventure. Only by mastering survival and uncovering ancient secrets can you hope to face the ferocious Dragon Queen.
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Jagex didn't exactly give players time to get hyped. Dragonwilds went from official announcement to a surprise Early Access launch in just 15 days, which is unusually fast for a spin-off carrying this much weight on its shoulders.
Before anyone outside Jagex knew the name Dragonwilds, the project was running around internally under the placeholder codename 'Aqua Coyote' during its closed Alpha tests.
Dragonwilds wasn't thrown together to chase the survival-crafting trend overnight. According to a Jagex developer answering community questions on Discord, work on the game actually began in 2022, years before players ever heard about it.
One of the earliest pitches for the game had the entire adventure set inside the Abyss rather than on a brand new continent. Jagex's Mod Rook confirmed the idea in a community Q&A, though it was dropped so the team could focus the story on Ashenfall instead.
After decades of RuneScape's click-and-wait combat, Dragonwilds ditches the turn-based system entirely. Players, NPCs and monsters can all swing at the same time, with stamina governing how much attacking and blocking you can actually pull off.
Longtime players who keep their headphones on will catch it: Dragonwilds' track 'Harmony' is a direct musical nod to the original RuneScape song of the same name, and Jagex has said more callbacks to both RuneScape and Old School RuneScape's music are planned.
Dragonwilds wasn't a solo Jagex effort. Co-development studio Virtuos worked alongside the team to build out the game's UI architecture, including the crafting menus, compass, health and stamina readouts, and the interactive map.
In a franchise that's been running for 25 years, Dragonwilds is the very first RuneScape game to make it onto console hardware, landing on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch 2.
When Dragonwilds hit consoles, it didn't make players pay full price to try it out. It arrived as a Day 1 title on Xbox Game Pass (Premium and Ultimate tiers) and on PlayStation Plus Extra and Premium.
Jagex CEO Jon Bellamy revealed that Dragonwilds sold more than 600,000 copies in its very first week on Steam, a huge number for a spin-off gambling on a genre already crowded with survival-crafting games.
