Upload Policy

Last updated: December 11th, 2023

The Museum of ZZT operates with the goal of collecting and sharing as complete a copy of all worlds produced with ZZT and related to ZZT as possible. In order to accomplish this visitors are encouraged to upload their own works as well as the works of others which are currently missing from the Museum.

Acceptable Files

All files uploaded via the upload form must be compressed and in the ZIP archive format.

Uploaded files must contain at least one of the following:

To prevent abuse, a maximum file size of two megabytes per ZIP file is enforced for non-registered users. If this is insufficient, contact Dr. Dos to either have your upload limit increased or have the upload performed by staff.

Other media, such as articles, walkthroughs, or historical documents should be submitted via E-Mail.

Acceptable Content

Prior archives such as z2 had rules in place requiring all uploaded ZZT worlds to have a minimum file size and make use of extended Super Tool Kit colors. The Museum has no such restrictions on quality filters. Any worlds which can be reasonably believed to have been made in good faith are welcome.

The ZZT community, in darker times, had its share of worlds created to harass other community members. These sort of titles are frowned upon today. Whether or not uploaded material, be it historical or newly created, should be published it ultimately the staff's decision.

If you are unsure if a world you have should be uploaded simply ask.

Metadata

When uploading files, some data such as the title of the upload and authors who have worked on it are requested by the site to be filled out by the user. Other information is automatically parsed by the Museum site.

If you are uploading files of your own, you are free to modify them for upload to the Museum as you see fit. When uploading data created by someone else, please refrain from making any changes to the content. Include as much of the original content available (high scores, text files) without modification. If there is additional information that needs to be provided, please create a text file of your own to insert into the ZIP file and identify it as not being part of the original release.

Incomplete Worlds

Worlds which haven't been completed are acceptable to upload, but should be clearly noted as such in the title. These may be demos that have intentional end points or worlds which had simply been abandoned and end abruptly rather than having been packaged for release. If you have many incomplete worlds you wish to upload (such as sharing the entire contents of your old ZZT projects folder) it is preferred to bundle them together and publish them as such as seen in Gingermuffins' Abandoned Games collection.

World Variants

Prior archives such as z2 had inconsistently enforced rules where upon receiving an upload of a completed world, the demo would be removed. A similar policy existed for worlds which received updates which in some way made an older version "obsolete". The Museum has no such restriction and welcomes all revisions of worlds so that the changes may be compared between original release and update or demo and final release.

Currently the Museum has no official way to track these versions of the same title. When uploading, version information should be included in the title. If the versioning has an official name such as "1.1", "v2" or "Gold Edition" use that to unique identify the file compared to other versions. If no official versioning exists, using the date in some form is preferred. This also applies if multiple revisions of a file exist that share an official version number (ex: "Cool Game v3" and "Cool Game v3 (Mar 2002)". Staff will handle additional title renaming if necessary.

Modified Files

If you have a world which you believe to have been modified by somebody other than the original author and no un-modified file is unavailable, you are encouraged to upload it. Please identify the file as being suspected of modification in the title and/or an accompanying text file.