SOE Pulls the Plug On The Matrix Online

Yesterday, Sony Online Entertainment representative Daniel Myers announced that The Matrix Online will be shut down on July 31st. The game launched in 2005 after several delays and false starts, and shortly thereafter SOE bought the rights to operate the game from developer Monolith. Now, four years later, the game will join the ranks of closed MMOs. In a forum post, Myers said, "The team will also be whipping up an end-of-the-world event. It won't be quite the same as having over 100 developers in the game as Agents like when we ended beta, but we have 4 years of tricks up our sleeve. It'll be a chance to revisit all the things that make MxO the memorable experience it is. And how could we pull the plug without crushing everyone's RSI just one more time?"

Comments

I'm pissed

[FredFredrickson]

I didn't know there was a matrix MMO- and I'm pissed to hear it's shutting down, because I would've played it. No point in signing up now though. Shame.

Re:I'm pissed

[WarlockD]

I have to admint that during the beta it was a good back and forth with the developers, but 2005 was just way to late. Maybe a year or two after the first movie, but by 2005 the steam has gone out. The end of the beta rocked, but after about a month or two, it just felt like SWG.

I mean they killed Morpheus! That didn't even bring in the numbers. Only reason I am going to log in is to see the ending.

Re:I'm pissed

[ibbie]

I didn't know there was a matrix MMO- and I'm pissed to hear it's shutting down, because I would've played it. No point in signing up now though. Shame.

Look at it this way: maybe you'll get lucky, and someone will fork OpenSim to create a clone.

We can rebuild it. We have the technology.

Re:I'm pissed

[OutLawSuit]

In general, what kills most MMOs is releasing too soon. If they release too early and ruin their first impressions with people, there is really no way for them recover. They need subscribers since box sales can only do so much. This is also the key reason why you're seeing fewer MMOs and more delays these days.

Re:I'm pissed

[Antique Geekmeister]

The Matrix Online was _painful_. The information about what widgets were needed in what order to develop what new devices and abilities was far, far too complex and far, far too painful. You had to play it for at least six months, with a a very detailed notebook on hand, to work out enough detail to begin to survive Player versus Player with the people who refused to sleep and exchanged all their information offline or bought guides.

You may enjoy that, but I found it painful.

Sounds normal to me

[GraphiteCube]

It won't continue as the game is about a movie only; nobody will interest in the game as nobody will interest in putting more effort in products related to an old movie.

Sure The Matrix trilogy is a good movie (yes I have DVDs of The Matrix trilogy), but once the story ends (The Matrix Revolutions), people won't focus on/ talk about it anymore.

Re:Sounds normal to me

[Jurily]

They only made one Matrix movie. *drags you off screen*

Too bad they never made any sequels.

Re:Sounds normal to me

[hairyfeet]

I was thought they got too preachy in the second and third and missed a great opportunity for a killer twist to end it. I always thought after Cypher tried to make the deal with Agent Smith to get back to the Matrix that it would have been a damned cool twist if in the third one he went to the machine city and found out that...there simply was NO Zion. Nobody had ever actually left the Matrix at all. That Zion was simply a sub program for those that refused to accept the "reality" of the Matrix proper and that "Zion" was wiped out every so often to keep those who refused to believe from "infecting' those that did and throwing the whole thing out of whack.

They would then show him the 'real" world, that thanks to the war was uninhabitable by all life and then be given the choice: either allow a good portion of "Zion" to be wiped out so they will quit screwing up the Matrix, try to get those in Zion to accept that they will NEVER get out, as there is no where to actually go that they could survive and thanks to their doubts they will be forced to live out their days in "Zion", or allow those in Zion to keep screwing with the Matrix causing the eventual collapse of the Matrix and forcing everyone to live in the crappier Zion program.

That would have been a better ending than all the messiah junk they piled on in the second and third. Pretty much the only thing that kept me from falling asleep during the second and third was Smith. Smith for me was the only thing worth watching in the second and third, as he seemed to me the only one that just didn't seem to be a sheep going along with whatever the Oracle said.

Which is why I am frankly surprised that the MxO lasted as long as it did. When you base a game on a franchise that 2/3rds of the movies feel like "Spaceballs 33 1/3rd: The search for more money" I just didn't see how they would be able to build up a big enough fan base to keep it going. The characters and 2/3rds of the movies just weren't that interesting IMHO.

Re:Sounds normal to me

[hairyfeet]

If the world would have been nice, then they could have just stuck the meatbags on a little island away from everything, like that island with the rhesus monkeys.

No, it would have been a better story with a LOT more ethical conflict if when he got to the machine city not only did he find out there was NO Zion, but that the machines had kept the true history of the war. There he would find out that the AI was basically treated as a slave race, forced to work in dangerous jobs, to be sexual servants,etc and when they dared to ask for equal rights the humans declared them dangerous and tried to exterminate them. He would then see that the devastation to the planet was brought by the humans going nuclear as well as scorching the sky, and that the machines had long ago developed geothermal and nuclear technology and simply didn't NEED the humans at all. They kept the humans because some of the machines felt it was wrong to exterminate an entire race for the bigotry and hatred of a few, and finding there was no place left on earth that a human could survive by the end of the war created a Matrix as a holding pen until the planet could be made inhabitable for both races.

This would have created a serious ethical conflict for Neo. After all he and those in the Zion sub program will have been rallying to destroy the very race that was trying to save their lives, in essence keeping the old hatred and bigotries from the war alive. He would see that the machines could have simply flipped the off switch at any time on Zion, and yet while he and his friends were trying to destroy them the machines through the oracle was trying to find some peaceful solution that would minimize loss of life on both sides. That to me would have been a hell of a lot more thought provoking than all the messiah crap they loaded the story with in the second and third movies, and if written right it could have maybe even had the impact of Taylor finding out he was on earth at the end of Planet of the Apes. After all, how do you go back to those "freedom fighters" in Zion and explain to them that there is NO freedom and it is all your race's fault? Now THAT would have been a good ending.

I mean it when I say "The End"

[westlake]

It strikes me that an online RPG might begin with a book: a three or four year story arc that has a clear beginning, a middle and an end.

It would be a particularly rewarding experience for those who came in and early and stayed the course.

But you could enter and exit at any point with some sense of achievement - and a unique experience of the game.

 

Re:I mean it when I say "The End"

[tsm_sf]

That's a really interesting point. I wonder how many MMO developers have ever thought about ending their game gracefully. A storyline you could whip out once subscriptions fell to a certain level.

Well, A Tale in the Desert has this. They end the game and start another version after a certain period. That game is the exception to a lot of rules, though. If it wasn't so mismanaged it'd be a close second to WoW.

Re:I mean it when I say "The End"

[Sycraft-fu]

Not a good idea though. Remember that the ultimate goal of any commercial game is to make lots of money. They cost a lot to develop, you want a big return. Well, you get that if you get a lot of subscribers who stay on a long time. So you don't want to end a game when there's still lots of people playing.

Also you'll likely piss off a lot of people. While there are plenty of people who play a game for a time, get bored, and move on to something new, there are plenty who don't. There are people who really come to enjoy the game and the community in it. They don't want to leave.

The two best examples are Ultima Online and Everquest. UO was a very early MMO and had/has a great many problems by today's standards. None the less, there are still over 100,000 subscribers, and it is still in active development. Everquest is a good example because a sequel even came out, Everquest II. However classic Everquest is still running. People still want to play the original, and in great enough numbers to make it economically advantageous to run it and continue active development.

So really, it isn't a good idea for MMO developers to plan an end to their game. When the game is going to end I think it is a great idea to do a "big ending" event like is happening here, but that should happen when it is naturally time, not at some earlier point.

Re:I mean it when I say "The End"

[GrumblyStuff]

WoW's 3.0 patch had a fantastic world event. Ok, the random citadels spawning mobs in the most desolate areas was lame but the zombies and the plague made it the most memorable couple of days in the game.

Re:I mean it when I say "The End"

[westlake]

Not a good idea though. Remember that the ultimate goal of any commercial game is to make lots of money. They cost a lot to develop, you want a big return.

"The Matrix" is fundamentally no different from Disney's online "Pirates of the Carribbean." When the big tent comes down and the franchise grows cold you are the last living cell in the dead body.

The franchise product that is solidly anchored is rare.

The iconic DC Comic character exists in recognizable form as early as 1940. He will have a had a long career in radio, the movies and TV. He will have found an adept and sympathetic chronicler in a contemporary artist and writer like Frank Miller - and in later films like The Dark Knight. That is a foundation on which you can build with some confidence.

UO was a very early MMO and had/has a great many problems by today's standards. None the less, there are still over 100,000 subscribers

Games like Ultima Online and Everquest are the originals, the archeytpes. They have their own history, their own story.

They owe nothing to no one. That is their strength.

Re:well that's good at least

[TheLink]

Actually in my opinion, many of these MMOGs could have epic endings as part of the game. Then you restart it again (or not if you have the next version ready).

I used to play an online webgame where the ending was part of the game AND inevitable. Players could also do stuff to cause the game to end early - so there would be people who'd choose to try to end the game early, and others who would try to stop them.

While some people might not like the idea of having to regrind to build their chars up again, they could just reduce the amount of grind involved in getting the chars up.

Because it doesn't matter that the players get to heroic levels fast, you need them at heroic levels for the ending. And after the ending they start again from scratch.

I figure the biggest problem is almost everyone might be online for the ending and that'll crash the servers :).

Re:More proof

[Alain Williams]

Was there a large warning sticker on the box ''what you are buying will cease to work in July 2009'' ?

If not, then are they guilty of breach of contract -- especially for those who have bought it recently. Or have I got the wrong end of the stick ?

Should all MMOs die at some point?

[sircastor]

Reading this and a number of the comments, connected with the question posted to /. a few days ago about severe gaming addiction, I kind of wonder if, at some point, all MMOs need to die? Like a good television show, you get to a point where the show needs to be retired. It's lived it's life and been popular and made money. I think this is probably natural and needed. This gives the creators a great opportunity to move on to another MMO, or a different project entirely - flex their creative muscles in a different way.