IT was billed as a new form of online entertainment, one that would broaden the base of people who play games on the Internet. Majestic, an online suspense thriller introduced last year with great fanfare by Electronic Arts, was episodic and interactive, offering additions to the story line each month and reaching outside the computer to infiltrate players' lives with e-mail, faxes and even telephone calls that advanced the plot. The game's slogan was ''It plays you.'' But that turned out to be precisely the problem.

''Players want to play at their own speed,'' said Jeff Brown, director of corporate communications for Electronic Arts, based in Redwood City, Calif. The company plans to discontinue Majestic on April 30 after disappointing sales.

''Majestic made you play at the speed of the game,'' he explained. ''A lot of people who wanted to play were forced to wait for e-mails and phone calls.''

Majestic was an effort to bridge the online divide between the relatively small numbers of paying, hard-core players who immerse themselves for 20 hours or more a week in role-playing games and the millions of casual gamers who may indulge in a quick (and generally free) game of checkers or Tetris while taking a break at work or home.