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It seems to be a banner year for Mac massively multiplayer online role-playing games. Some recent digging has uncovered development of PlaneShift, a free, open-source MMORPG currently in the works for several platforms, including the Mac. While more information concerning this has yet to be unveiled, a post in the PlaneShift forums indicates that, while not public yet due to some speed issues, a Mac version is definitely in the works.

PlaneShift is an effort to create a quality MMORPG with free access to all:

The objective of the PlaneShift Team is to create a virtual fantasy world in which a player can start as a peasant in search of fame and become an hero. We will focus our efforts in the reproduction of a real world with politics, economy, many non-player-characters controlled by the server that will bring to life our world even without players connected!

Update: Since we ran our story, the person porting the game to the Mac left a comment seeking help from others in the Mac gaming community regarding performance issues. Here's what programmer Gregory Lightyear had to say:

I'm the Mac PlaneShift porter, and I'm the one working on the port of PlaneShift to MacOS/X.

I've updated the thread linked to by this article with further information on what the current state of PlaneShift on the Mac is.

Currently, I need more help from the community in solving performance problems under MacOS/X of the CrystalSpace rendering engine that PlaneShift uses for its client; if anyone would like to assist in this development effort, and has experience using Apple's GL implementation on NVidia and ATI hardware, please contact me at gblock@ctoforaday.com.

PlaneShift Forums - Mac?

PlaneShift (add to watch list)

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