I am running Ubuntu server 14.04 on vmware player. I have been using this server for a few weeks but I have never been ale to properly shutdown the virtual machine from the terminal. I used the following command but it does not work.

sudo shutdown now

This is an image showing the output when I run the command.

This is not the only way it appears. sometimes it shows the Ubuntu splash screen that usualy comes when you shutdowwn the system but it does not change from that screen. Instead it shows root@ubuntu-server:~# after a while. I used Ctrl+AltF1. to see the terminal again and it showed the same errot as in the picture.

I have to force shutdown the virtual machine through close button on the title bar and vmware always gives warnings that it is is risky to shut down on that way. I am hoping that someone will be able to give a working solution so that I can switch off the virtual machine from the terminal.