![]() It also opened up future careers in the game industry. The ease at which people could jump into making a game without any thought of intensive programming (or even needing to create graphics) spawned a loyal community of ZZT game makers that continues to this day. As a child, being able to tell your friends ‘I make video games’ is incredibly powerful.” You had to be an adult and go to college and learn how to program. As a kid, I’d constantly be doodling stages for Mario World and Mega Man sequels that I wanted to make, and just always assumed that actually creating games was something kids couldn’t do. “ ZZT let me feel like an adult computer programmer. Dos, who runs the Museum of ZZT website, recalls how it felt. The ZZT Editor interface, including an example of the ZZT-OOP scripting language.īack in the early 1990s when easy game creation tools were rare, ZZT’s world editor empowered a new generation of upcoming game designers. And thanks to a built-in scripting language called ZZT-OOP, creators can even stretch the game engine in novel ways to produce games in unexpected genres, from turn-based text adventures to space shoot-’em-ups. With ZZT’s in-game editor, anyone with a copy of ZZT can create their own ZZT-like adventure games. While ZZT only sold about 4.000-5,000 copies total, Sweeney’s unassuming ASCII adventure has had a massive stealth influence on the game industry due to its innovative design-and the lessons Sweeney himself learned from ZZT’s success. In fact, ZZT doesn’t stand for anything-it was Sweeney’s clever way of always appearing at the very bottom of alphabetical file listings on dial-up BBSes back in the day. The shareware element is key to understanding the nature of ZZT. RELATED: Remember BBSes? Here's How You Can Visit One Today The first issue of “ZZT Newsletter” from 1991. After people began ordering several copies of the game per day, Sweeney realized he had a bankable business on his hands. If they liked it, players could send money to Sweeney to buy more levels to play. Since it was a shareware title, players could get ZZT and one world called Town of ZZT for free-usually by downloading it through dial-up bulletin board systems or CompuServe at the time. (Epic dropped the “Mega” in 1999 after the success of Unreal.) He changed the name to “Epic MegaGames” in October 1991 to make it sound like a big, successful company. Benj Edwards / How-To GeekĪt the time of ZZT’s initial release, Sweeney called his one-man business “Potomac Computer Systems” after his home town of Potomac, Maryland. Accordingly, in ZZT, you typically control a generic, smiley-faced protagonist who must navigate a world of traps, puzzles, and peril while collecting keys, torches, and gems along the way. Like a text editor, ZZT only uses text-mode characters-a zero might represent the segment of a centipede, and a small circular degree symbol might become a bullet.
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