Eye of Judgement to go Offline

Sony has announced that its PS3 trading card game Eye of Judgement (EoJ) is to close its online service on 30th September 2010. Offline play vs the AI will still be available. The official announcement reads:

We at SCEE sincerely thank you for your continued support of THE EYE OF JUDGMENT™. The online battle service for this product will terminate on 30 September 2010. Offline play will remain available even after the conclusion of online service.

We hope you will continue to enjoy both THE EYE OF JUDGMENT™, and the latest addition to the series, THE EYE OF JUDGMENT™: LEGENDS, available exclusively for the PSP™ (PlayStation®Portable).

Eye of Judgement was an attempt to combine trading card games (TCG) with augmented reality. Players placed cards on the board and the PS3 Eye camera read their position without the need to input any commands. To improve your deck you had to buy real cards in traditional TCG fashion.

This will be a great disappointment to loyal Eye of Judgement players – especially those who’ve spent large amounts of money on extra cards. Unfortunately whilst the game had plenty of potential it never really took off, perhaps because Sony’s commitment to it never seemed more than half-hearted. Updates were infrequent and expensive – the kiss of death to a TGC.

Combining TGCs with augmented reality is a field I think has great potential. Unfortunately there’s a real danger that as well as upsetting EoJ players this closure could undermine the whole idea of augmented TCGs in general.