Resource centre for ZX Spectrum games
using Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy game engines
Brief history of MM and JSW games development
Manic Miner, written by Matthew Smith and released by Bug-Byte in 1983, became a landmark title for the ZX Spectrum. Guiding Miner Willy through 20 caverns, avoiding the nasties and collecting flashing objects before the oxygen supply runs out became a favourite challenge for multitudes of players. The next game by Matthew Smith, Jet Set Willy, released by Software Projects in 1984 and featuring a 60-screen mansion which could be explored at leisure, was even more popular, becoming a milestone in the development of the platform games genre. Both games were subsequently ported to many other computer platforms.
The unencrypted room format used by Matthew Smith in both games allowed their relatively easy editing in order to create new rooms. Manic Miner 2 was released by Schultze probably as early as 1985, while the first JSW game edit, created by Mark Jeffries, was published by Spectrum Computing in 1984, while Jet Set Willy III by Michael Blanke and Arno Gitz appeared in 1985. Several editors were also made available commercially or semi-commercially in mid-1980s, allowing anyone interested to create new versions of both games.
The advent of ZX Spectrum emulators for later-generation computers in mid-1990s triggered a renewed interest in old games. The internet, in turn, made it possible for people still interested in the ZX Spectrum to communicate, share and collaborate on new projects (comp.sys.sinclair USENET newsgroup played a particularly important role in those early years). The games Join the Jet-Set! and Jet-Set Willy in Space by Richard Hallas, created back in 1985 (the latter one finished shortly before the release in the late 90s), were put online and had a very good reception; their author also uploaded three 1985 games by Adam Britton (The Continuing Adventures, The Deadly Mission and Willy's Holiday) as well as JetSet Editor by Paul Rhodes, which was the tool used to create all those games. As other people started making their own versions of the original classic, Jet Set Willy revival really got under way.
John Elliott created JSWED, a PC-based editor for JSW and MM games. It introduced a new, extended game engine for the 128K Spectrum (JSW128). The editor was gradually developed over the years, adding the ability to edit Henry's Hoard, Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy II games. JSW128 game engine was also gradually improved and another much-extended game engine, JSW64, was introduced by John Elliott in 2005. Today JSWED with its "latest stable version" 2.2.9 and "latest unstable version" 2.3.7 is the standard, easy-to-use tool for editing MM and JSW games.
A number of websites devoted to the JSW scene were created. In December 1999 Dr. Andrew Broad founded a Yahoo! Group for Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy, including a message board, picture galleries and file hosting, which for some years was the focal point for the MM/JSW community, with over 7200 messages posted to date (as of July 2019).
A virtual explosion of MM/JSW games took place in 2000. 12 new JSW and 2 MM games were gamma-released that year alone and 34 games in total between 2000 and 2002. The new games were very varied, some allowing for an easy exploration of the gameplay area, others extremely difficult, requiring pixel-perfect jumps or making a deliberate use of various quirky features and unintended loopholes in the game engine in order face the player with special challenges (this sub-genre was pioneered by Dr. Andrew Broad). While the original Jet Set Willy is usually considered to be very British because of its weird, Pythonesque humour, the MM/JSW scene became very international, with authors from all over Europe contributing to its development alongside the Brits.
The intense creative activity continued in the following years. Most of the new games made after 2005 used the JSW64 game engine. The number of releases decreased visibly after 2007. However, the launch of JetSet Willy & Manic Miner Community in August 2014 gave a new momentum to the development of the scene, with a number of new games and versions of the original MM and JSW released by the people active on this forum, and over 11,000 posts published over there (as of July 2019).
Please refer to Chronology for a detailed timelime of the most important events in the development of MM and JSW games.
With some 120 games released so far and new ones in the pipeline, the phenomenon of the creation of MM and JSW games for the ZX Spectrum is alive and well. If you are interested in joining it, please grab your free copy of JSWED and delve into the magic of creating new rooms and caverns!