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Hot on the heels of last week’s announcement that Richard Garriott was leaving NCSoft comes the news that Tabula Rasa will shut down in February of 2009. The sci-fi-themed MMO launched one year ago this month, promising a blend of action and roleplaying in a futuristic setting that was unique to the space. From the official website:

Last November we launched what we hoped would be a ground breaking sci-fi MMO. In many ways, we think we’ve achieved that goal. Tabula Rasa has some unique features that make it fun and very different from every other MMO out there. Unfortunately, the fact is that the game hasn’t performed as expected. The development team has worked hard to improve the game since launch, but the game never achieved the player population we hoped for.

So it is with regret that we must announce that Tabula Rasa will end live service on February 28, 2009.

Before we end the service, we’ll make Tabula Rasa servers free to play starting on January 10, 2009.

Current subscribers will receive complimentary three-month accounts for City of Heroes and Lineage II as well as early beta access to the company’s next big MMO franchise, Aion. Pre-paid subscriptions beyond January 10th will also be refunded.

Reactions from GameSpy and the Community

Despite Garriott’s recent departure, the community was still caught by surprise by the announcement. Tabula Rasa had huge content patches in the works, including content depicting a much-awaited return to Earth.

“This feels like a 12-gauge shotgun to the chest,” one commenter wrote on the PlanetTR fansite. Others are calling for NCSoft to release the game as open source, which is very unlikely.

Here at GameSpy, we enjoyed the action-oriented gameplay that Tabula Rasa brought to the table. Last year we gave the game a four-star review at launch, commenting that “adrenaline junkies finally have their MMO.” We also pointed out some missing features and issues, some of which were fixed right away (no auction house at launch!?) and some of which dragged on for months.

Ultimately, the game never caught on and apparently never reached the subscription goals NCSoft deemed necessary to keep the servers live. Here at GameSpy we’re disappointed to see it go: It offered a great alternative to the fantasy hack-and-slash options out there and had a unique combat model and character-class model we were hoping other games may someday emulate. Farewell, Tabula Rasa.

If you’d like to check out the game, Stick around for January 10th when all the servers will switch to free play.

GameSpy: Tabula Rasa to Shut Down