RuneScape’s rarest and most valuable item returns to crown the living game’s 20th anniversary year
The race is on – The Golden Party Hat Hunt begins today & players have until January 3rd to earn one. Plus: the finale of RuneScape’s 20th anniversary questline, Once Upon a Time, launches in-game
November 22nd 2021, Cambridge, UK – After being unavailable to earn in-game for 20 years, RuneScape’s rarest and most valuable of item – the Party Hat – returns to the game today in The Golden Party Hat Hunt.
A special event as celebrations for RuneScape’s 20th anniversary year comes to a close, The Golden Party Hat Hunt gives players the one-off opportunity to earn an all-new gold edition of the elusive, precious item. Golden Party Hats are only available in this time-limited event and players have until January 3rd 2022 to claim their crown. After the cut-off date, they will never be available to earn again!
The original Party Hats were exclusively available to players two decades ago in RuneScape’s 2001 Christmas event. The hats were introduced as a festive novelty cosmetic item and intended to be worthless and disposable as they didn’t provide the wearer any benefits or stat bonuses, leading to many players immediately discarding them.
However, those that held onto their Party Hats of the years became the elite few and the hats themselves became an investment. The rarity of the item, coupled with the significance of owning a Party Hat as a status symbol for players who had been with the game since the beginning, saw demand soar.
Over the years, Party Hats were changing hands between players for millions of gold pieces and, in 2015, they hit 2.1billion gold – the maximum value tradable in a single transaction on RuneScape’s Grand Exchange. The hats now play a pivotal role in the RuneScape economy as investments, cash placements, staked items, and collectables.
After the 2001 event, Party Hats were never made available again – until now. Today’s in-game launch of The Golden Party Hat Hunt once again gives RuneScape members the chance to earn what could become a tradable rare item.
To become the proud owner of a Golden Party Hat, players need to complete various objectives to earn golden shards. Once eight shards have been collected, players then work their milliner’s magic to combine the shards into a Golden Party Hat. The event is not only time-limited to the end of the year, but Golden Party Hats are also limited to one per player, making these new adornments a worthy investment. Furthermore, to recognise such a momentous occasion, the Grand Exchange will be transformed into a Golden Party Hat winter wonderland.
Phil Mansell, CEO, Jagex, said:
“RuneScape’s 20th anniversary year has been an absolute cracker for content – we’ve had the multi-part anniversary quest, the epic Elder God Wars series, the game’s mobile debut, and now it’s absolutely magical and very ‘RuneScapey’ to bring back the Party Hat as a nod to our very first Christmas event in 2001. For what was intended to be such a throw-away in-game item, the original Party Hats are now the stuff of legend for players – both in status and value. Today, the original hats are so rare that they’re RuneScape’s most valuable items and are hardly ever available for in-game player trading. The Golden Party Hat Hunt is everyone’s chance to play for one all over again and earn an exclusive item that tells the rest of Gielinor that they were part of RuneScape’s epic 20th year.”
Also live today: the conclusion of RuneScape’s multi-part 20th anniversary quest
Also launching in RuneScape today is the fourth and final part of the anniversary quest, Once Upon a Time, which has run across the celebratory year.
Once Upon a Time: Finale is the conclusion of the adventure that explores RuneScape’s past, present, and future and brings the story arc to a close for Relomia, the quest’s antagonist. In Finale, players will visit three locations that present a potential glimpse of the future, including the Black Knight’s Fortress, the World Gate, and the island of Kami-Shima as they help Relomia discover her true self and make a difference to the world.
Completing Finale rewards players with earn four Quest points, a new T5 magical dice, the penultimate reward track unlock from May’s Quest Point Caravan, a medium XP lamp, Relomia’s Shadow Rip Home Teleport cosmetic override, two Treasure Hunter keys and there’s one further surprise to be discovered.
