Today, on July 31st, 2009, thousands (perhaps tens of thousands) of players will be 'jacking in' for the last time ever; once in, they will be bidding adieu to their fellow 'red pills' and perhaps throwing their last party while they're at it. If you didn't get any of those inside references, then chances are fairly high that you have not paid much attention to The Matrix and its MMO continuation, The Matrix Online. Chances are also very high that you would not know (or care) that MxO will be shutting down their servers forever tonight.

If you think about it, it's actually quite rare to see a subscription-based MMORPG go down the tubes, although that certainly doesn't mean that it doesn't happen. This year alone we've witnessed the sad demise of Tabula Rasa and saw the gates of Hellgate: London closing forever (I blame it entirely on the lack of LAN play!). The shutdown of The Matrix Online actually does come as an odd sort of surprise to me, as this is will be the first MMO that SOE has shut down, despite the fact that SOE publishes a lot of MMOs, and some of them aren't exactly the pinnacle of popularity (Vanguard, Planetside and Everquest Adventures come to mind).

A couple months ago we reported that SOE was pulling the plug on The Matrix Online on July 31, 2009. With just four more days to go until the MMO "fades to black" forever, this is your last chance to jump back in the game and check out the end-of-game events that are still taking place until this Friday. Here's a reminder, from the official release:

"During the last two weeks that MxO will be available, we intend to initiate a world-ending event and invite our active MxO subscribers with accounts in good standing to participate in bringing Mega City down together.  We will go out with the same level of dramatic in-game event that has kept this game exciting over the years.  Get ready to jack in and become part of the final chapter of the story!"

Don't forget; everyone who had a subscription to The Matrix Online in the past can get back online and play for free. Check out this prior announcement for more details. If you enjoyed the MMO, you might want to be there this Friday when the Matrix "de-rezzes" permanently, if only for nostalgia's sake.

SOE has some middle of the night downtime planned.  According to a post on the Station.com forums:

From 4:00 AM PDT until 6:00 AM PDT on Thursday, June 11, 2009, we will be conducting back-end maintenance that will affect the in-game chat and mail systems for SWG, EQ2, and possibly EQ.  SWG and MXO worlds will be offline entirely for the 2-hour duration.

 

We apologize for this interruption and will resume all affected services as soon as the maintenance is completed.

Here's a handy time converter to help you plan!

Sony Online Entertainment has announced that it will be ending service of The Matrix Online on July 31. Commercial services will be suspended on June 1, which means there will no longer be any customer support or game updates, but you'll still be able to play until the game is shut down.

Active Matrix Online subscribers in good standing will be able to play Free Realms, EverQuest, EverQuest II, and Star Wars Galaxies for free from June 1 to July 31 using their Station Launcher account. While SOE hopes MxO players will switch over to one of their other games, they still plan on taking the Matrix out with a bang:

"During the last two weeks that MxO will be available, we intend to initiate a world-ending event and invite our active MxO subscribers with accounts in good standing to participate in bringing Mega City down together.  We will go out with the same level of dramatic in-game event that has kept this game exciting over the years.  Get ready to jack in and become part of the final chapter of the story!"

You can read the full announcement after the jump.

Hey everyone. It's been a long time since I've put "fingers to keyboard" to talk to The Matrix Online community-not that Raijinn hasn't been bugging me about that. I suppose it shouldn't be a surprise that I've been neck-deep in The Agency since I started working on it in April-there's a lot to be done. And since the guys on MxO are pros at keeping the game going, I don't feel the need to constantly oversee what they're doing. However, I'm way overdue for sending out an update from my perspective.

Most of what "keeping the game going" means is moving the storyline along. This has always been the most important post-launch element for The Matrix Online and continues to be the case. While we've occasionally made some larger changes, such as the combat revision, most of development has been about the storyline. Every six weeks there are new missions for each Organization and daily events that carry on the plot. With few exceptions, we've been on that schedule for about a year-and-a-half now.