I haven't played Runescape for three whole months and I don't miss it, yet. Life has been throwing too many balls into the air for me to juggle with. Runescape is a ball I just can't keep in the air all the time without risking dropping all of the others. Though that's not quite what I'm aiming to convey with this here article. In attempt to not completely lose my foothold on the Runescape soil, I've been reading the Behind The Scenes articles, as well as the miscellaneous articles posted on the Runescape website. What a waste of time that was.

It's been a mere three months since my last proper throw at playing this game, yet I already feel completely out of the loop on current affairs. I might as well be reading Chinese or Mandarin instead of these Behind The Scenes articles; I'd probably have a better gist of things that way.

This leads me to consider how fast this thing evolves. The game is incredibly fast-pace, which is an attribute you can only fully notice and appreciate when you're "out" of the game for a while. I guess the only way you could understand what I'm saying is if you have ever taken a break from this game or if you were forced to deal with other, more important issues than the development of your virtual persona. Well, maybe that's not entirely true, as I'm sure there are people who realized these things way before I ever bent my mind around it.

It kind of feels like a door shutting closed in your face. Behind the door you can hear all kinds of animate sounds, loud noises, cheerful singing and vivid discussions, but you're on the other side and you lack the will, the ability to open that door. If you want to discuss "fault", then I guess I'm at fault for not keeping up with the game and being inactive. Obviously I can't expect things to remain status quo just because I decide to take a wee break. I'm not that self-centered, yet. But should it really be this hard to once again submerge into the Runescape experience? Am I doomed to dwell on the other side forever?

Upon further exploration of this subject, I conclude that it's incredibly hard for me to cope with my Zybez work and keep up with discussions in my favorite boards. This comes as no surprise. Coming up with an interesting topic for a blog was harder now than it ever has been. Hosting events is totally out of the question, purely because I haven't logged in and because I don't want to, for the time being. In this fashion, taking this break from Runescape has severely strained the cords between me and my responsibility towards a lot of people, between me and my friends (with whom I used to discuss Runescape affairs with). One could say that when you don't keep up with current affairs, you risk losing a lot of friends, duties and relevance to others. This, only when you're affiliated to some kind of fan club obviously. If you're a lone wolf and you decide to pull the plug, nobody will notice the empty seat.

Fortunately or unfortunately (I can't decide which), I did have a lot of friends with whom I only discussed the game and a lot of responsibilities that involve actual gameplay. It goes without saying that I lost a lot of social contact by being inactive. Which is regretful because I believe that one of this game's many aspirations is to bring people together and create networks of friends. Now I realize that there's a catch: you can't have the best of both worlds. You can't have all of your Runescape friends and all of your interest in current affairs, as well as having retired from the game. It's possible to keep up appearances for a while and kid yourself into thinking you can keep your social network even if you quit the game, though that doesn't last forever.

It's a mirage.