Page 1 of 1

ZZT

Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2006 7:29 am
by Rockford4ever
I just foind an old but fun Dos-game: ZZT.
It may look a bit primitive, but there are utilities for it with which you can do great stuff. There is also an editor with it, and some games to play.
There is an element the "object", and it kinda looks like a CE becuase you can program it to do stuff ;) Only it's a program code (the only one that I understand!). An example: ( ' is a comment )

Code: Select all

@Guy 'That's his name.
#end 'wait for something to happen.
:touch 'here comes all the stuff that happens when you touch him.
/n/n/s 'move north twice, then south
#end 'wait again.
Like that ;)

Donload: http://zzt.the-underdogs.org/zgames/z/zzt.zip
It's kinda addicting, since this game is the reason I haven't been on the forum much lately :lol:
Maybe I could pick a ZZT game and convert it to R'n'D...:roll: ;)

Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2006 8:31 am
by Francesco
Nice, it remembers me the first text-based RPGs I played when I was young...

by the way, it tells that it is a registered copy, and that you should not redistribute it... maybe you could find a not-registered one to link here - the licence tells that you can distribute it, but tells also that it is not freeware...
[Edit: Wrong. Now it's really freeware, even if it shows the warning. Thanks to Asiekierka for the note below./Edit]

...

Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2006 2:26 pm
by asiekierka
I use it sometime and i can do COOOOOOOL objects (like bullet mirrors)...
and on zzt.the-underdogs.org is a version 3.2a (recommneded), which is final because author lose its source code, and it's distributed as freeware, althougth there is that message.

and not some, you can download MANY MORE!

I found ZZT some months ago...

EDIT: And franesco, really only 3.2a is freeware... (the latest version). But better use v4.0, it have some bugs repaired by hex edit. END of EDIT.

Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2006 11:12 pm
by Holger
> But better use v4.0, it have some bugs repaired by hex edit.

If you are able to fix bugs in machine code with a hex editor, why not then create a commented disassembly from it and release it for further development? That's how the new Supaplex engine will find it's way into R'n'D 3.3.0 or 3.4.0 btw! (But that disassembly was not done by me, but by Frank Schindler.)

...

Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 8:11 am
by asiekierka
Not me.
But using NDISASM you can disassemble it (but it's illegal)...
The hexedit is not as that illegal like a disassemble (i think)...
Maybe Holger made the better RND text support with using ascii chars...

But the original author, Tim Sweeney, not care about ZZT, so...

Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 12:20 pm
by Holger
> But using NDISASM you can disassemble it (but it's illegal)...

Disassembling software you own is as illegal as disassembling a car you own -- it's NOT illegal. Don't care about what software vendors try to make you believe in the EULA (end user license agreement) -- even if you click on that funny "Yes, I agree to all this bullshit I never read" button, you are not automatically bound to this, because it does not have a legal base at all in most countries. So just ignore it! :-)

(Using a disassembler to crack a copy protection of your software might be illegal, but this is a whole different story.)

> The hexedit is not as that illegal like a disassemble (i think)...

Using a hex editor is perfectly legal, just as using a disassembler is!

...

Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 3:06 pm
by asiekierka
Ah, i don't know.

So Holger, in RND the asciichar support will be cool (255 graphics).

Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 6:02 pm
by Holger
> So Holger, in RND the asciichar support will be cool (255 graphics).

The what?

...

Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 8:29 pm
by asiekierka
The graphics for own objects in ZZT. They are ASCII chars.

Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 11:39 pm
by Holger
Ah, OK, now I understand!

But you can already use the existing character graphics, or design your own... :-)

...

Posted: Sun Feb 26, 2006 7:22 am
by asiekierka
There are some, but not all default 256!

...

Posted: Tue Jun 27, 2006 7:13 am
by asiekierka
I found pretty cool ZZT clone, if it can be called "a clone".
It's MegaZeux!
digitalmzx.net :D
But it lacks network multiplayer support (one for making a graphical chats :D). I would like when somebody makes that to MZX.
I can for that guy which do it create nice levelset. (in R'n'D, of course)

Posted: Sun May 27, 2007 2:21 pm
by jezebelus
Yeah I remember this ZZT game I've played it long, long time ago. Very interesting