A few weeks ago, Terraria creator Andrew "Redigit" Spinks announced his return to classic MMO Old School RuneScape, joking that he hadn't played in a while and wanted to see if the "old meta" of asking for items still worked. I didn't think anything of it at the time – game dev plays game, woohoo – but Spinks' rapid descent into the bowels of OSRS has officially cleared the bar of 'something to see' in my eyes. As someone who's lost a lot of time to both of these games, I've certainly found it entertaining.
My ears perked up when Spinks posted a picture a week later showing him – at least, I assume it's him, with the photo taken by someone else or just another camera – playing OSRS mobile at a Slipknot concert, dutifully fishing away in the town of Catherby to ensure no XP was wasted. At this point, the official Old School RuneScape account became aware of Spinks' adventures, which is largely what put this on my radar.
Hey @slipknot you guys slayed it tonight! pic.twitter.com/PBYQaUqLZSSeptember 27, 2024
Someone from Jagex asked Spinks about his fishing level, and in response the dev was quick to agree to any sort of collaboration between the two games: "I’m just saying if 'Add Terra Blade' or something shows up on one of your polls someday I’m good with it." OSRS has certainly referenced more obscure things than Terraria, which officially surpassed the sales of the original Super Mario Bros. earlier this year.
The purely for-funsies idea was picked up by Terraria legend ChippyGaming, prompting additional comments from Spinks. "My WoW auctioneer alt was named Itams Plex because [of] how effective begging was in RuneScape," he said in another tweet. "I funded half my guild's level 60 mounts because I was a good scammer."
The line between Terraria and OSRS truly begins to blur in Spinks' latest update, featuring a growing collection of severed unicorn heads. "I now have six unicorn heads… soon my plans will be complete..." he writes. I can think of several reasons you'd want to farm unicorns in OSRS and Terraria, and there's even a legitimate Prayer-training use for their heads in the former, but I'm not sure what Spinks is cooking here. Perhaps a summoning circle.
The OSRS community is an ocean of video journal progress updates that I find irresistible, and given the freewheeling sandbox DNA at the core of this MMO and Terraria – which helped inspire the Terraria RuneScape mod Terrascape – it's genuinely interesting to see Spinks' take on the game and his journey through it, meme-y or otherwise.
