Tabula Rasa Offline
NCsoft has just announced that they will be closing down Tabula Rasa at the end of February.
Originally I had high hopes for Tabula Rasa, but that was back during development when they were talking about an entirely different game than the one they eventually released. The game never caught hold, and like other recent MMOs it had gameplay elements that banked on high populations to create the right atmosphere.
The game still has Richard Garriott's name attached to it, although he officially left NCsoft a few weeks ago. I hope good old Lord British sticks around in the videogame industry, but he understandably has a variety of other interests, having recently returned back to planet Earth.
You can read NCSoft's related press releases here and here. I'll quote the subscriber-related one in its entirety (since I doubt their website will be around much after Feb):
On February 28, 2009, Tabula Rasa will be shutting down its servers, and as of January 10, 2009, the game will be free to play.
To thank our loyal Tabula Rasa fans we've prepared a little closing down gift. Any active paying player as of 10:00 AM Pacific Time on November 21st, 2008 will be eligible for all of the following:
* 3 free months of City of Heroes including digital client
* 3 free months of Lineage II including digital client
* Aion beta access (coming soon)
* Aion pre-order access (available in 2009)
* 1 free month of Aion including digital client (available in 2009)
These offers are limited to active paying players. Subscribers who join or reactivate canceled accounts after 10:00 AM Pacific Time on November 21st, 2008 will not be eligible.
If you are an eligible Tabula Rasa player, you'll be receiving notification directly from NCsoft in the near future with information on how to collect these thank you gifts.
If you are a player that has pre-paid for Tabula Rasa subscription time beyond January 10, 2009, you will be refunded for that pre-paid time by February 28, 2009.
Should you have further questions please don't hesitate to contact our customer support team at http://www.plaync.com/us/help/.
From everyone at NCsoft, we'd like to thank you for the support and enthusiasm you've dedicated to Tabula Rasa over the last year.
I have mixed feelings over this one. On principle, I think every NMORPG should be given as full of a chance to continue as long as possible, it's important for players to have faith in the persistence of online worlds. On the other hand, I'm aware that as far as these games go, Tabula Rasa was an expensive game to develop and maintain (not to mention using some of the same resources NCSoft could use elsewhere). NCsoft hasn't released hard numbers on the game, but speculation is widespread that subscribers have been very low.
Tabula Rasa launched just over one year ago.
