/ Cory Doctorow / 11:34 pm Fri Jul 31, 2009

Matrix Online goes out with a party, not a whimper

Sony Online's multiplayer game The Matrix Online is now dead, as of yesterday. But rather than simply announcing that they were pulling the plug and then watching the players dwindle away as D-day approached, Sony decided to work the shutdown into the storyline of the game, changing the game's graphics so that they decayed and crumbled. The last weeks of The Matrix Online were a party, with all players -- past and present -- invited along.

It's a rare institution that contemplates its own orderly demise. Think of all the clubs and mailing lists and communities you've been a part of that have gone out with a whimper, bleeding out by drips, until there's nothing left. Kudos to Sony for giving a proper send-off to a place that so many people had loved and played in.


This week is the last week for The Matrix Online and all former subscribers are welcomed to come back to play one final time before the machines pull the plug for good. The Matrix crashes on July 31st, so be sure to be logged in on that day to be assaulted by pretty much everyone and everything until everyone's RSI is smashed into a tiny, tiny ball.
Reminder: Check out The Matrix Online before it decompiles (via Wonderland)

11

  1. Sometimes I wish this is what they did with Continuum/Supspace, a true multiplayer legend. That game was just too damned good to fizzle into obscurity like its current state. It was just barely worth playing the last time I logged on to hack around, about 18 months ago, which is a shame as it was one of the simplest game engines ever, yet delivered so much variety, gameplay and excitement.

  3. Subspace was awesome.

    I wanted to do this with Meridian59 years ago, but sadly all funding to my department had been cut a full year prior and I had been directed to not expend energy on the game. Special art or items for the day were out of the question. I did manage to convince 3D0 to allow free play for all in the final months and unbanned all accounts (save one) so everyone could come back and say their goodbyes.

    On the day the skies went dark, many of the game’s designers logged on to join the farewells and thank the players for their appreciation. I had worked out a small script for the day, but I’m sure nobody noticed as the messages were lost in the chatstorm.

    In the final moments I sent a kill message to every character in the game that had ever existed, then shut down the server. I’m pretty sure I am one of the Internet’s first virtual mass murderers, as the towns and the forests were littered with thousands upon thousands of avatar corpses just before the arrival of sudden dark…

  5. Didn’t all that ash stuff exist in previous in-game story events? Pretty sure they just ran through past events as the game wound down since they didn’t have the manpower to build anything new. The players got to say their goodbyes, but I think you’re giving SOE a little undue credit.

  7. @3 you want to be careful with that! My wee brain can start to construct an argument about the damage to society and potential illegality of avatar murder – along the lines of is not an avatar an extension or even more desirable expression of our lives? Its extinction, with or without consent, could be … well, prosecutable.

  8. This was done about 10 years ago with the game Asheron’s Call… although in that case it was not the end of the game, but the end of their Beta. It was an MMORPG and instead of just flipping a switch for the end of beta, they had an elaborate story where some kind of comet was rapidly approaching the world. People would log in to find their home town had been obliterated by a meteor, monsters were invading the peaceful lands, volcanoes erupting from what used to be peaceful mountains, and even massive giants attacking cities (I’d say at least 20 times bigger than the avatars) that required dozens, if not hundreds, to take down.

    For people who played the games in the years afterwards, nothing really compared to the events at the end of the Beta. It was an amazing time, and I’m not sure if there were any games out there at the time that could be modified on the fly to create a story like that.

    Ravlen

  10. @Quiet Noises, actually there still private Subspace zones alive with a consistent population. Try Extreme Games. SS does not seem to die…

Comments are closed.