The Runescape Closet

Several friends have written me asking why my little Avatar Lava is dressed as a medieval princess pulling a sword from the stone here, so I am coming out of the closet today. Mom...I'm gay. Oh sorry...wrong closet (LOL) OK :::deep breath::: I've been playing Runescape.
For years I have been a SIMS devotee. Something about that electronic dollhouse was fun to me, and I crawled all over the net finding amazing furnishings and clothing for my little SIMS people. I even set up entire neighborhoods of my actual friends. I have made the statement to several closest to me that when I die, let my SIMS game be played at my wake so everyone could find themselves in the game and enjoy my little obsession. That was until Runescape.
It started out easy enough. But any description I could write here would not do this online game justice. It is set in medieval times, and populated by actual online users 24 hours a day on 200+ servers around the globe. Twenty three different skill areas to master, unlimited items to buy and sell in auction-like stores. Rewards for mastery, it fosters goal setting and critical math skills. GOD help me, right up my alley. My friends Risley and Brooke played online with me, and I made an internal goal (very early on) to reach 50 in every discipline (that is 1/2 way...the best is 99 in each) on the game. Above is my Runescape scorecard, and as everyone can see I only have five more areas to bring up to 50. After several months of intense playing. Scary but true. I thought this would bring me up to a level that it would be fun playing in, middle of the pack. Enough knowledge to not get killed by every giant spider or tree frog walking around on the game. I have since learned that I am ranked in the top 1000 players of this game with these scores. There are over 500,000 players at any one time, and the developer Jagex states there are well over one million users. Yikes!
So what happens at 50+ you may ask? Well, since I know how this works...I am already starting to limit my time and not play as hard at it. No internal promises to go for 99 in each area within a certain time frame, as I would think my only reward there would be a straight jacket. So I am reclaiming my head space for what it was intended for. But it has been fun, and I have learned a lot about how I think and what my strengths are in life by playing this game. So if anybody is wanting to develop an online game, give me a call...(LOL) I have a few ideas after playing this one. :)