♦ Livestream Contents
“24 Hours of ZZT Summer 1999 [Space]” by Misteroo, Various (1999) [https://museumofzzt.com/file/view/24hoz-sum1999/]
(3:14) “Oriax space and other assorted shit” by C_A
(25:35) “The Cold Side of the Universe” by AKYoshi
(38:33) “Spaze Invaders” by Koopo
(1:07:00) “Infinite Space” by Dark FLR
(1:22:19) “Space The New Odyssey” by jeff conroy
(1:46:40) Personal Rankings
We start... on the wrong board! After a quick resave, Oriax can be played as intended. C_A, the game's author and protagonist, is a ginger ale addicted teenager who has been chosen by the military to defeat the evil Dr. McMichael and destroy his base on Jupiter. McMichael is an old rival of yours, so they thought you'd be the man for the job. Jupiter, though far away, has its weapons aimed at Earth and the planet will be destroyed if you don't stop him.
Of course, before they send a kid into the stars, there's the latest in high tech training: a Space Invaders arcade machine. The ZZT adaptation of the game bends the rules plenty, with just a single ship to shoot down, though it's a reasonable enough mini-game.
Alas, passage errors and an incomplete entry mean seeing the rest of the game is difficult and not very rewarding. You get launched in a boob-shaped (round) ship, float around outside a space station of sorts, and then enter a passage to a standard "I ran out of time. You win the end." screen of white text.
Mediocre, though inoffensive. Feels rather rushed.
"The Cold Side of the Universe" does not fare much better. What it does have though, is personality. The story is told as a wall of ZZT text, grabbing planets from Star Wars while also pulling from Star Fox (which oddly has its serial numbers filed off). We got "Star Hawk", murdered parents, "The Light Hawk" ship, a brief detour to Earth and back to make the protagonist raised as a normal human, and then starting a life as a smuggler. It's fun in its earnestness, coming off as if the author has been imagining scenarios in this universe for awhile, that then had to be communicated to players with no background on them with only 24 hours to do so.
A menu screen has sections for credits, time management, and special thanks, all of which only state "Nothing to say" when touched.
The game itself has some decent artwork, with some nice looking fighter ships and a wide view of the Light Hawk's bridge. A sudden invasion has you running out to fight off the invaders in a second Space Invaders engine for the stream. This one is much more of a pain as your ship only stops moving when you fire, making it hard to spread your shots in order to reliably hit the targets. You have limited shields and are up against a lot of firepower, and to make matters worse, the Light Hawk will explode from the barrage if a time limit expires. It's not particularly fun, though the effort is clearly there.
Upon beating the battle you are told that you win and deliver your latest cargo successfully. The End. Out of time.
Better looking, and not without its charm thanks to the bombastic backstory, but a much weaker Invaders engine make this one another average rushed 24HoZZT game.
"Spaze Invaders" though, is the contest winner by Koopo and one I was a tad worried about. Yes. It too has a Space Invaders engine. Koopo, however, was well known for his top-tier programming of the era, and has many tricks up his sleeve to make this game so much more than another Space Invaders game. The backstory is goofy, with aliens discovering the Earth arcade game "Spaze Invaders" and sending a fleet of ships to Earth as thanks, only to discover how primitive the rest of the planet is, so they decide to use the ships to destroy it! You pilot a lone ship to stop the fleet. Oh joy.
The initial engine is more authentic, with multiple ships, and the little shields on the ground. Koopo isn't here to play copycat though. You have a power meter for your laser which fills over time. Depending on how full it is, your ship fires anywhere from 1-3 bullets when attacking. There's also a "stun bomb" that clears the screen and makes enemies vulnerable for a moment allowing you to move into position, throw a bomb, and then start blasting with far greater odds of hitting your foe. Or at least, you would do that if the stun bomb didn't cause the screen to flash solid white for a bit. Fortunately your ship's shields are generous enough for it to not be necessary.
A neat twist, but not exactly contest winning material.
But ah, there's so so much more. The second level sends you through an asteroid belt, dodging obstacles as you zip your way to the main fleet. This isn't the usual dodging a hail of bullets, this is a more Game and Watch-esque engine with asteroids moving in from three columns that your ship steers around, with some nice curvature! It looks really cool and plays pretty well!
The third level has you blasting enemy missiles targeting your ship before they can reach you. Again, there are three spots to aim with distinct graphics appearing and disappearing as needed for incoming missles, way too close missiles, and exploding missiles. The presentation is great. The difficulty, less so. I wound up having to cheat my way past it as the reaction times are incredibly tight as is, but it seems to be impossible to move the reticle across the screen fast enough to still have time to blow up a missile.
Level 4 is more Space Invaders, against a giant mass of slime.
Just when you think Koopo is out of time/ideas, level five is an RPG battle against an alien with three attacks to choose from, all of which have very elaborate attack animations! Not exactly tactical, but very pretty, and really high quality presentation for a jam entry.
Finally, a sixth level sees you flying back home, dodging bits of slime. It's a more traditional format for a "dodge stuff" engine, but it too uses objects rather than bullets, allowing Koopo to actually create an obstacle course.
Overall, fantastic work. Easily one of the best 24HoZZT games I've seen. I completely get why this one won back in the day. It has so much variety and its engines are almost entirely well-executed.
Then poor Dark FLR has to follow up Koopo's game with "Infinite Space". A traditional Dark FLR experience where you wake up and have to figoure out who you are and what's going on. There's not a ton to the game, although it's got some nice looking muted colors going for it as well as some sense of mystery. Just don't get your hopes up for a big reveal at the end as the game actually stops abruptly. An ending board exists, and I cannot tell you what it means.
It does have a neat puzzle where you build a "3" out of objects with line wall characters. That seemed impressive when I was playing it.
Lastly, The New Odyssey captures that anything-goes attitude towards these contests that often lead to the most unique (if not the most well made) experiences. Little Billy is bored of his mundane life, and gets his wish when he's abducted by aliens. A bit of property damage later and his captors reveals themselves to be evolved sentient carrots! There's a courtroom scene! You kill all the carrots, spilling carrot juice so deep into the ship that the engine is going to explode! You mop up all the carrot juice! You discover another captive who thinks you're his captor! You wrestle! You become friends! You then begin a new life together flying around on your newly acquired carrot-ship!
It's goofy, but it's a lot of fun and full of surprises. A real crowd pleaser.
Finally, I rate 'em. And have to decide deep in my heart whether Spaze Invaders or Empty Spaces is the winner to me.
This set of games really bumps up the average entry quality. There was some appeal to every submission here, with some earnest efforts, which may or may not have had all the time they need. Hopefully the next set can keep pace!
♦ Play these worlds in your browser
https://museumofzzt.com/file/play/24hoz-sum1999/
♦ Streamed Feb 22nd, 2026
