Sony has announced that long-suffering MMO The Matrix Online will finally go out of business on July 31, 2009, when all game servers will be permanently turned off. The Matrix MMO, based on the popular movie series, will have been running for about four years on that fateful date.
With only a month to go, there isn't a lot of fanfare planned for the passing of the game into its permanent offline state, but developers on a community post for The Matrix Online did promise some world-ending events to reward their loyal players. Sony has a number of MMO games at their Station.com portal, so nobody is expected to lose their jobs when The Matrix dies.
Sony Online Entertainment's Daniel "Walrus" Myers had this to say about the game and its passing in the forum post: Now 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.
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?