Rune Jade is brought back online thanks to Dreamcast Live

 

Goodness, that’s five for five with Dreamcast Live this year. Give me some room to breathe in between articles here.

Rune Jade has now been brought back online thanks to Dreamcast Live. This obscure Japan-exclusive online RPG got its internet multiplayer features restored by Sh- wait, wait. Nope. It was just flyinghead who got the new servers on this game up and running by himself this time. Anyway, the game is finally about to fulfill your online multiplayer dungeon crawling itch once again since its servers were shutdown 25 years ago.

Chances are many of you might not be familiar with Rune Jade. You’d be surprised that this game beat Phantasy Star Online to market by a couple of months, making this the first MMORPG on Dreamcast instead of PSO, but its online servers didn’t last as long as PSO’s did. You can find out more right after the break.

Rune Jade was an MMORPG released on Dreamcast in 2000 by Hudson Soft. The game only released in Japan and its official online servers only lasted about one year before they were shut down. The game is actually quite similar to Phantasy Star Online in that you you pick from a few classes of pre-made characters and explore dungeons, fighting enemies and collecting items and increasingly powerful weapons and armor to equip yourself with. You also find “Runes” which you use to upgrade your many armaments with. Unlike Phantasy Star Online, the game is played from an overhead perspective with its graphics made up of pre-rendered sprites, much like the ever-popular Diablo series of games, which is, itself, also cited as an inspiration for PSO.

Rune Jade can be played offline in single player, but you could also go online and team up with other players. All the dungeons you explore online have randomly generated layouts, so you’re unlikely to see the same dungeon twice. Should you get disconnected, you’ll be taken instantly into the single player mode and retain any items you pick up. You’re also allowed to instantly connect online from within the single player mode and be matched with up to three other players.

PCWIZRD, who is demonstrating the game in the above video, actually began his own translation of the game’s text years ago, but never finished his translation. He has since added more translations for some extra areas that he hadn’t finished before into a new patch that also allows the game to connect to the Dreamcast Live servers. This way, you should be able to navigate the online menus and most of the in-game shops and menus in English, though there are a few less critical parts of the game still only in Japanese. A pre-patched version of Rune Jade is already available to download from Dreamcast Live’s Downloads page, along with other necessary files, like the most up-to-date DreamPi software.

You’ll have to update your DreamPi to the latest firmware to take Rune Jade and most other Dreamcast Live compatible games online. Rune Jade does not work with the Broadband Adaptor, meaning you have no choice but to use a DreamPi with your Dreamcast’s built-in modem to connect online. The game is compatible with the Dreamcast Keyboard, allowing you to type messages to other players with ease, just like with many other online-compatible Dreamcast games. For more info on how to get online with Dreamcast Live, be sure to consult their Connection Guide as well as check out their full game list of all games currently compatible in some way with Dreamcast Live. There are now 52 games running online with Dreamcast Live, so chances are your favorite game might already be there.

Are you familiar with Rune Jade? Were you waiting for your chance to play this game online. Were you somehow living in Japan in the later half of 2000 and in 2001 playing this game while its original servers were still operational? Are you already playing any other games through Dreamcast Live? What other Dreamcast games are you hoping to see brought back online through Dreamcast Live? Give us a shout in the comments below.