Meridian 59, probably best known as the first true MMORPG, has continued to run as a commercial venture even with newer competitors releasing all the time... until the end of 2009. In a blog post [thanks Gamasutra] Near Death Studios' Brian Green talked about the closing of the Meridian 59 management company.
“As I've wrote before, the company has had an interesting past. We started the company with three co-founders, two in California and one across the country. Early in the company's history the other Californian founder dropped out right before we got the opportunity to buy M59. We had hoped that M59 would be the springboard to other successes,” wrote Green. “Unfortunately, M59 never really grew. We were lucky that we got a lot of attention for keeping an old game alive from the press. We also had a small and dedicated group of fans willing to keep the game alive. But, the press didn't really care about our attempts to improve the game, and the fans weren't interested in trying to attract new players. So, we were in a purgatory where we had enough money to keep moving forward, even spend some on things like advertising, but not enough to really grow like we needed. “
Green went on to indicate that an attempt to update the 3D hardware doomed their ambitions, since World of Warcraft launched only a few months later, adding that the past five years “the company has just been on life support.” Near Death's true curtain call came when they lost their billing provider to process credit card subscriptions, leaving the company with few options other than shuttering.
“On the bright side, it's kind of cool to have kept a business running for almost 9 years despite all the ups and downs. I've gained a lot of business, game design, and game administration experience. I've met a lot of great people over the years,” Green noted. “So, this has been bittersweet for me. It's been a long time coming.”
Meridian 59 will continue to operate, but there will no longer be subscription fees or content updates.
