MZX "Virus"

An MZX "Virus" is essentially any game or .MZX file that causes MegaZeux to behave in a malicious or generally unfriendly manner. To date, there have never been any such games that were actual viruses, falling instead under the category of malicious software in general. The typical delivery method for MZX "viruses" takes advantage of file access to overwrite important MZX files with junk (such as deleting the main executable or default character sets). The effectiveness of this is limited, however, because MZX prevents running games from accessing parent directories. The "virus" would have to be played from the root MZX installation directory to have any effect. Other MZX "viruses" take advantage of exploits and bugs in MZX itself to force it to crash or hang.

Spectere's 9.MZX

During the Summer 2006 DsDoZ, Spectere attempted to create his submission using only a hex editor and the MZX file format. After little success he grew tired of the idea, and simply zeroed out the majority of the data sector of his game, except for one piece of robot code about Lesbian Space Pirates at the end. The resulting file caused MZX to irrecoverably hang and monopolize the CPU, a result that Spectere was so pleased with that he proudly submitted his game anyway.

Commander Pancake and Asiekierka's MZX Virus

Following the DoZ, Commander Pancake and asiekierka were inspired by Spectere's entry and collaborated to produce a file access based "MZX virus" (Pancake's description, which is where the term originated). SmartRutter quickly followed with a submission of his own. This met with general disdain from the community, which considered the idea to be neither new nor particularly clever (the potential for such an exploit had been pointed out by MZX beta testers already). Despite this, Commander Pancake continued to press the issue and released more versions of his "virus" until he was forced to stop by the DigitalMZX administration.

External Links

The original MZX Virus thread

See Also

• MZX exploits