Former Old School RuneScape developer sentenced to 150 hours community service

Crime is crime, even if it happens in an MMORPG, and it’s just as prosecutable as any other crime. This is the lesson that former Jagex developer Andrew Lakeman learned this month as UK courts sentenced him to 150 hours of community service, 25 days of rehabilitation, and a suspended three-year prison sentence for stealing nearly $500,000 from RuneScape players.

Lakeman’s crimes were revealed in 2018, exposing a multi-year effort to leverage his position as a dev to steal in-game gold and items. He then turned around and laundered those virtual goods into real-world money. An investigation and trial ensued, after which he was found guilty of theft.

The detective on the case commented, “Lakeman was well aware what he was doing was wrong. The hundreds of thousands of pounds he gained from selling the in-game items is no different to any other theft. Just because it’s virtual, doesn’t mean he shouldn’t face the full force of the law.”

In other news, RuneScape is running a beta for Vulkan rendering engine support: “Moving to Vulkan will help reduce CPU overhead, improve support for modern multi-core processors, and gives us access to newer graphics technologies that aren’t available through older rendering systems.”

Source: Kotaku, RuneScape