Newsflash: The world is ending...
At least if your personal world is Sony Online Entertainment's The Matrix Online. The movie-based MMO has been running for almost four years, but its last day in existence will be on July 31st, 2009.
Matrix Online community lead Daniel Meyer posted the announcement on the game's official site:
"We've seen how far the rabbit hole goes and it’s time to wake up from that dream (or go back to sleep, depending how you look at it). On July 31, 2009, we will be jacking out for the last time. It’s a bittersweet moment for everyone involved with the game; as a player or as a developer.
It has been a good run. Where many games have fizzled out before or shortly after launch, by August we will have lived on in our home at SOE for more than 4 years. To this day, I have never worked with a community as dedicated as The Matrix Online community."
While the MMO received mainly guardedly positive reviews, it never really caught on beyond its loyal fanbase. This is a shame because any MMO that isn't based on elves and magical spells is a welcome addiction to the video game world, but on the other hand, the death of The Matrix Online is totally understandable, because, let's face it, except for the first one, the Matrix movies really, really suck. In any case, sign up now so you can witness the end of the world. According to Meyer, the development team has four years of tricks up its sleeve and one last chance to pull them out, so expect fireworks.
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Canid117
I thought this game had closed down a long time ago
tentaro
It will be sad to see it go. I beta tested it and actually thought it was good a change from the normal everyday MMO.
Sylvanio
I kept seeing boxes for this on the bargain rack when I went into stores. I figured that they couldn't be doing to well and it looks like they weren't. But besides from visually seeing this in stores, I had never heard anything about this game.
Jonsted
The game was about the story and sense that one person could change it on a massive scale, and it was such a disappointment that the mainstream never saw that side of it, never gave it a chance, and never thought twice about it. In a world of MMO clones, this was a real step beyond and a great experiment. I only wish that it would have received adequate funding. That a big company would fund it and let it become what it was meant to be, rather than slowly dying over four years.
RIP MxO, I feel so lucky to have known you, and I wish others experienced it the same way as I was fortunate enough to.
Jonsted
The game provided quests like any other MMO, but the real enticing factor in the game was the community that was encouraged to work together and solve mysteries in this futuristic, film noir setting.
When the live team was laid off, essentially the improvisational actors who played each role, the remaining developers took it in turn to play the same roles for the benefit of the community, and despite lack of funding and limited toolsets, pulled off remarkable stories throughout that four year span.
Jonsted
It acted as a mystery game, where players were given clues by characters in the game played by real people, like digital actors, and acted in unison with a guild to discover and solve these mysteries. The reward would be meeting with movie characters and having a bigger hand in the ongoing shape of the universe. Originally planned was a player magazine, highlighting events in the game and top players, with interviews, story tidbits, and so on. The revenue did not come in, however, and this was shortly canned. Those who did receive an issue are considered very lucky among the community.
Because the players could influence the story in such a personal way, that is, by interacting directly with the story-makers and changing the arcs based on player behaviour on each server, the game was a new and refreshing experience.
Jonsted
What ended up happening was that crucial design elements of the game had to be let go, and all of the subscriber fees went into stabilizing the game and paying for bandwidth, essentially. No new assets to the game were approved, no additions or heavy patches, and so on and so on. The game went through several major revisions in order to revitalize interest in the game, but the effort did not pay off since the subscriber count was still far too low. It became a niche game with something of a cult following, the Rocky Horror Picture show of MMOs.
What gave it such a loyal fanbase and is often overlooked by review websites is the style of entertainment provided.
Jonsted
As a quick bit of catch up for people who haven't played the game, I'll just post my thoughts on it so you can get a feel for it.
The game had a lot of potential, with a lot of ideas that were outside of the box. It had the potential to radically change what was possible with the MMO style of gameplay, and fell short of it's aspirations due to strictly monetary reasons. The game did not sell as well as they had planned, and the subscriber count was not strong enough to provide enough incentive to continue development on the game. Beta and the first few months after the game were released were incredible, and after the numbers failed to add up, Monolith had to sell the game to SOE to cover their assets.
CPRxChris
Wow. I never even knew this game existed.
deviousconkerer
I own the game, but never wanted to pay the subscription price that was way too high for a game like this. They had an awesome concept, but completely wrecked it. They just messed up somewhere along the line. Like thinking it was ready to be released.
Truzen
I'm not going to run around and say that I saw this coming, but to a certain extent I did. I had my brief moment of Matrix fan boyism after the first movie, like a lot of people did, but it just didn't have staying power with a larger audience. I'm glad the same isn't true of LOTR. *waits for it*
The only movie franchise that seems to have real longevity is Star Wars, though I expect that to wane in about 2 or 3 generations. Famous last words.
digitalmutation
dude, the comments about the matrix movies sucking.....it's very sad when society as a whole is so empty mentally. I mean yeah, the first was good, but the last 2 explored the world of the matrix as the real world is...with contradictins, complications, revelations, emotional sadness and a whole spectrum of different shots of philosophy, just like life...they are beautiful, well thought of, complicated movies..the first one only deals with good (humans) and evil (machines), simple for uncomplicated minds i guess......
Asrugan
Common, the second movie wasn't that bad (I actualy thought the action was great) but I do agree the third one blew hard.
Jonsted
Wow....hearing the news really shocked me. Times are tough but I never expected the game to close. When SOE acquired it from Monolith I assumed it would be carried forever like Star Wars Galaxies or Everquest...true it had a small player base but so do a lot of other SOE MMOS.
I played in beta and on and off for four years myself. It feels like losing an old friend. :(
cryfordawn
Wait your telling me this game is still being played and open? I thought they closed this POS years ago.
ZetaCrossfire
wah there was a matrix mmo??????? damnit i would of joined
EPICAC
I concur with Raverenz. The movies weren't as bad as everyone makes them out to be. I've never been into mmo's but this is one mmo that makes sense givin the story. Too bad it never caught on.
Tzimizie
@ Vferg
Its not advertising that ruined this game it was the fact that you had to LOVE the matrix to play it and not only that it was extreamly complicated to figure out the whole abilitys scheme. It wasent easy like wow is you actually had to take some time to figure out how everything worked and more than just an hour it took me 2 weeks to figure it out then I was just irritated.
Raverenz51
The Matrix were AMAZING movies. The first one was the best, but the 2nd and 3rd were still REALLY good.
Thundercracker
uh steve
i really really enjoyed the freeway scene in the second one, but other than that, yeah they sucked
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