RuneScape player pulls off a personal Shawshank Redemption: Grinds his way out of one-zone house arrest by grinding a raid 2,000 times over 10,000 hours: 'It was all worth it'

Since time immemorial, one question has hounded the games industry and all who sail in her: Are RuneScape players okay?

They are not. As spotted by GamesRadar, the latest evidence for that assertion is the tale of Agile Tom, an Old School RuneScape (OSRS) player who—in the heady days of spring 2023—signed himself up for a challenge that would take him two years and two months to complete.

Tom completed his heroic(?) quest just a few days ago, on June 13. His goal was to start a new character, limit it to a single 'chunk' (a relatively tiny square of OSRS' overall map), and never leave it until he did everything there was to do inside it: quests, achievements, and every speck of loot there was to be had, even the stuff that has absurd odds of dropping on OSRS' loot tables.

Which is unpleasant. That's an unpleasant thing for a person to do to themselves, but Agile Tom took it a step further. He restricted himself exclusively to chunk 4,919: Mount Quidamortem, home to the Chambers of Xeric raid, also known as the CoX Chunk. Want to get everything from the Chambers of Xeric raid? Enjoy grinding it out at least 2,000 times—that's what you'll need to do to get the coveted Xeric's champion cape.

The received wisdom is that players should want 90+ combat stats, high herb stats, and some equally skilled compatriots to tackle the Chambers of Xeric (though soloing is of course possible if you're beefy enough). It is not generally recommended for entirely new characters adhering to a ludicrous set of self-imposed challenges, and running in OSRS' Ironman mode that severely restricts you from interacting with other players. That's a suboptimal set of circumstances.

Eventually, he did the raid 2,000 times, obtaining the Xeric's champion cape and completing his haul of gear, abilities, cheevos and loot from his hellish trials in chunk 4,919. Two years and 10,000 hours of play behind him, he had finally done it. Well, bar another month of grinding Fletching.

You can see the triumphant 2,000th raid in the video below, where Tom is aided by a pair of hardy fellow compatriots who were also restricted to "CoX Chunk" gear—that is, gear that Tom would also have access to under his own restrictions.

"It was all worth it, because we did it: 2,000 Chambers of Xeric on an extreme one-chunk Ironman," said Tom, relieved. "Setting a long-term goal and sticking to it is one of the most difficult things in life, but also one of the most rewarding. Whether it's in your real life or in RuneScape, these moments prove that we're truly capable of anything we set our minds to… I know that whatever comes next, you guys will have my back."

Anyway, he's off to a new chunk now. In a recent stream, Agile Tom rolled the dice anew. His next home: chunk 5,175—The Lizardman Settlement. He's already been grinding. Godspeed, soldier.