Jagex celebrated the 10th anniversary of their free-to-play MMORPG, RuneScape, at this weekend’s RuneFest annual event. The celebration was topped of when Jagex unveiled a new giant RuneScape birthday cake that was commissioned from world-renowned bakers, Charm City Cakes. The weighed in at over 80lb and depicted a floating Citadel, fog, lights and various other RuneScape features.

We would like to wish RuneScape a Happy Birthday and many more years of operation. Check out the official press release after the break along with a video embed of the epic cake that was in fact not a lie.

RUNESCAPE 10TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION AT RUNEFEST TOPPED WITH GIANT CAKE

JAGEX GAMES STUDIO COMMISION WORLD-REnowned BAKERS Charm City Cakes TO CREATE A SPECTACULAR BIRTHDAY CAKE AT RUNEFEST

Monday 31st October 2011, Cambridge, UK - Jagex Games Studio marked RuneScape’s 10th anniversary yesterday by throwing a celebratory party for their loyal fans at RuneFest, RuneScape’s annual community event. The highlight of the party was the unveiling of a giant RuneScape-inspired birthday cake, created by the world famous Charm City Cakes.

The giant cake, which was a metre squared and stood a metre tall and weighted over 80 lbs, depicted a floating Citadel incorporating various features of the RuneScape world. This included Castle Wars, a Clan Camp and Citadel Keep, the Poison Arrow Pub, the Blue Fairy house, and most notably, Daemonheim’s Castle with actual Dungeoneering rooms recessed into the earth at the base of the cake.

The castle cake was further enhanced with custom, dramatic LED lighting and real fog from a hidden, food safe fog machine. The surrounding environment was also inhabited by ten, highly detailed characters from the game, including the popular NPC’s including Blasidar, Grim Reaper, and the Fairy Queen. Once cut the cake served all 500 loyal fans and the Jagex staff.

Charm City Cakes, the bakery commissioned to make the cake, was founded in 2000 by Chef Duff Goldman and is based in Baltimore, Maryland. The company was propelled into the limelight when it starred in the American reality television show, Ace of Cakes which aired for ten seasons between 2006 and 2011. During the bakery’s long history, Charm City Cakes has worked on a number of high profile projects including a Hogwarts cake for the premier of the 5th instalment of the Harry Potter films and a commemorative cake for the 100th episode of Lost.

Speaking from RuneFest, Mark Gerhard, Jagex CEO, commented, “The RuneScape cake looks absolutely fantastic and is a perfect tribute to the games birthday celebrations. We wanted the cake to represent all aspects of RuneScape but, in particular, we wanted to incorporate elements of the floating citadels from this year’s hugely popular clan update. With this in mind we turned to the world-renowned bakers at Charm City Cakes and commissioned them to turn our vision into a reality. Their creation really does the game justice and crowned a perfect end to RuneFest 2011.”

Speaking after the event, Graham Coreil-Allen, Operations Manager at Charm City Cakes, commented, “Charm City Cakes was truly thrilled and honoured to make the 10 year anniversary RuneScape cake. Jagex has given us an unprecedented opportunity to make an awesome cake featuring an assortment of notable features and characters from the RuneScape world. Our entire team have spent more than 240 hours making and decorating the cake with three of our chefs, Geof Manthorne, Katie Rose and Elena Fox, travelling over 3000 miles to London to finish the cake.”

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About RuneFest 2011

RuneScape's second annual gaming convention, RuneFest 2011, took place at the Old Billingsgate in London, England on Saturday 29th and Sunday 30th October. RuneFest offers players from around the world the opportunity to meet with the Jagex development team and the wider community to celebrate the success of the world’s most popular free-to-play MMO.

For further information, photos and videos of the 2011 event please visit www.RuneFest.com.

About RuneScape

RuneScape is the world’s most popular free-to-play MMO (as recognised by Guinness World Records), from multiple award-winning independent British development studio Jagex. Set in a richly detailed, medieval fantasy world, RuneScape proudly draws its inspiration from classic role-playing games. RuneScape delivers a contemporary, innovative and original experience for millions of players across the globe every day. RuneScape offers a fully featured free-to-play game, with a popular subscription option of even greater scale and ambition, both running directly within almost any computer’s browser.

Thanks to its character-class-free skill system and elective gameplay, there are no limits to the hero players can become, no quest you cannot complete and no requirement to collaborate with others or face them in player-versus-player combat unless you so choose. RuneScape’s distinctive role-playing style rewards players who think strategically and play smartly. Its witty, intelligent tone, finely balanced gameplay, epic questing and myriad in-world diversions combine to create a game that has earned its place as the most popular free-to-play massively multiplayer online game of all time and continues to push the boundaries of online role-playing as it enters its glorious tenth year.

About Jagex – Just About the Game Experience:

Jagex Games Studio is a multi-award winning games developer and publisher based in Cambridge, England. Jagex specialises in the development of high quality browser-based games and is the largest independent games developer and publisher in the UK.

Jagex has developed and self-published over 40 online titles, including the world's most popular free multiplayer online game, RuneScape.com. In addition to RuneScape, Jagex self-publishes games on its games portal Jagex.com, and has released a series of successful iPhone games. Jagex also acts as a third-party publisher for likeminded developers, publishing titles such as the Herotopia, War of Legends, and the iPhone title Undercroft. The studio’s in-house team is currently developing a number of games including 8Realms, which is currently in closed beta, and two new MMO’s, Stellar Dawn and TRANSFORMERS UNIVERSE.

About Charm City Cakes

Charm City Cakes is a boutique Baltimore cake shop which shot to fame in 2006 as the setting for Food Network's Ace of Cakes. The shop's owner and creative mastermind, Chef Duff Goldman, has been creating over-the-top and jaw-dropping cakes (on and off the air) since 2001. Ace of Cakes, which ran for ten seasons, was one of the highest rated shows in Food Network's history and is now airing in the UK, South America, Australia, and beyond – making Duff and his team international cake superstars.

Chef Duff and his team recently opened a second shop – Charm City Cakes West - in Los Angeles, California to service the West Coast with the world's most extraordinary cakes. The flagship studio in Baltimore continues to work tirelessly on cakes that are beautiful, challenging, and as out-of-the-ordinary as possible.