Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Planeshift Enters Open Testing

Posted by timothy on from the does-it-have-balloon-mode dept.

josePhoenix writes "You may have heard about Planeshift in this article, but now they have finished their period of closed testing and everyone can play/test features! This version of the open source (except the art license) mmorpg includes combat, a much bigger world than the previous version, and many other features that bring it closer to the level of commercial games. The project leader, Luca 'Talad' Pancallo has posted some interesting statistics on the making of Planeshift Crystal Blue on their main page, including that they have 'a virtual team made of about 40 people distributed in 25 countries.' Read the good news and other info about the project, and download the client from this page."

7 of 164 comments (clear)

  1. I said it before by eSavior · · Score: 4, Interesting

    and I will say it again, MMOs are one of the few genres I could see open source taking hold in. Unlike other genres such as fighting games and racing games they arent a quick consume product. They require constant updates and new content, and frequency of updates is definatly one of OS's strong points.

    1. Re:I said it before by Zangief · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Yeah, except that new content would be difficult to produce. Namely, graphics are the problem. Graphical designers aren't too hot on the open source way of doing things.

  2. Windows only? by Quixote · · Score: 4, Interesting
    I checked the download page, and it appears to be Windows only.

    Not being 733t enough to port it to Linux in one of my spare evenings, I have to ask: is anyone working on a Linux port? Is the game engineered to allow such an endeavor?

    On a broader note: are there any MMORPGs for Linux? Not that I would play one; but a decent OpenSource MMORPG kernel could be used as a learning/information delivery platform in interesting ways.

    --
    Who's buying what... ;-)

    1. Re:Windows only? by andrew.craig · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Actaully PlaneShift has about 60-70% of its development done in a linux environment. I do all of my work in Gentoo now ( was using Redhat 9 before ) and it'a pretty seemless working with the others that are using MSVC. I am currently working on an install script that will download and build everything for that players system. If I was smart enough I'd create an ebuild as well :)

    2. Re:Windows only? by thelexx · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I see no client source code anywhere and it doesn't look like the server code is ever intended to be released. There are no files on the Planeshift.it pages themselves or on the SourceForge pages linked to from that site under the 'How to download source' section of the 'Sources' page. More ominously, one glance at their licensing page reveals that this is absolutely NOT a true open source project and anybody expecting to derive another project from it can forget it.

      --
      "Gold still represents the ultimate form of payment in the world." - Alan Greenspan, 1999
  3. Re:Proof that a group by Monkelectric · · Score: 3, Interesting
    No kidding. I can see this just from their licensing arrangements.

    A couple of friends and I offered our services to them, and granted were not professionals, but frankly we blow them away. They gave us a *terrible* time. One very nice guy "got" me (name started with a V perhaps?) and he was nice and encouraging. But the organization wasn't there... I was given directions like, "write a song that has a lot of tableu and flutes" -- not enough info to write a song about. And there was ALOT of pretension. Oddly enough, the writers were the worst. They thought they were gods gift because they were writing background for the characters...

    Long story short -- we both gave up on trying to work for free for them, they made it too difficult. Also I told them, that I *don't* relicense my music, ever. They could have a license to use it for their game, but the ownership remain entirely with me. That us unacceptable to them, which makes me think they had secret plans to sell the game in the future.

    --

    Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley

  4. Re:Proof that a group by Vengeance2001 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is the 'top-notch programmer from Houston' here. :-) Thanks for the compliments.

    I don't think any of the PS team expects 100% of people to like our licenses or be willing to abide by our contribution rules. It is very ok if you want to retain your own music, etc. Judging by how many projects are out there with sucky art, I'm sure MANY other projects would be eager to accept your contribution terms.

    The point is, not everyone has to contribute to PlaneShift. Contribute to something, though! There are a ton of talented people out there--coders and artists--who aren't working together and a lot of stuff is getting totally wasted because of lack of teamwork and pride of "being the guy who started" something.

    I've been working for >3 yrs on this project and as a coder, 100% of my stuff is GPL and out there for the public to see (including server code). That is not going to change. If you don't like PS licensing, please contribute to something else.

    Keith Fulton
    aka "Vengeance"
    Server Team Leader
    PlaneShift