Attribute Wars is available from: https://github.com/dtz-labs/attribute-wars/releases
Attribute Wars is a twin-joystick shooter for Timex and ZX Spectrum computers. Twin-joystick shooters became popular in the Xbox 360 / PlayStation 3 era: one stick moves the player, while the other stick chooses the direction of fire. It asks your brain to coordinate two independent streams of movement at once, which is exactly where the magic happens.
Binary releases are published on the GitHub Releases page. Download the latest TAP bundle from that page. Each release ZIP contains these TAP files:
aw-*-zx48k.tap- ZX Spectrum 48K buildaw-*-zx128k.tap- ZX Spectrum 128K / +2 buildaw-*-timex.tap- Timex TC2048 / TC2068 / TS2068 build
Load the TAP file that matches your machine or emulator.
▶ Play the latest build in your browser —
every push to main deploys the current ZX Spectrum 128K TAP to GitHub Pages,
where it runs in the embedded
JSSpeccy 3 emulator with the PT3
soundtrack and AY effects. Click the emulator display once to give it the
keyboard and let the browser start the sound.
Use aw-*-timex.tap in a Timex-capable emulator such as ZEsarUX.
Running the Timex build in ZEsarUX: pick a Timex machine (TC2048 or TC2068) and enable Timex video, otherwise ZEsarUX pops a repeated "setting video mode" on-screen message every time the game flips its SCLD display. On the command line that switch is
--enabletimexvideo, e.g.zesarux --machine TC2048 --enabletimexvideo aw-1.2.0-timex.tap; in the GUI it lives under Settings → Video. Themake run-tc2048/make run-tc2068targets already pass it, which is why you don't see the message there.
make all
make testFull build and emulator notes are in docs/build.md.
| Computer | Video | Sound | Joysticks |
|---|---|---|---|
| Timex TC2048 | Timex SCLD double buffering | beeper; AY if an expansion is selected by the player | keyboard / Kempston-style schemes |
| Timex TC2068 / TS2068 | Timex SCLD double buffering | AY-3-8910 music + FX | two native Timex joystick ports |
| ZX Spectrum 128K / +2 | 128K shadow-screen double buffering | AY-3-8910 music + FX (PT3 tune banked into a spare RAM page) | Sinclair 1/2 joystick ports on +2 |
| ZX Spectrum 48K | single-buffered display | beeper | keyboard / Sinclair-style schemes |
The ZX Spectrum 128K / +2 build now runs at full parity with the Timex
build: the same PT3 music and AY sound effects (the ~10 KB tune is parked in a
spare RAM bank and paged in for each 50 Hz player tick, so it coexists with the
shadow-screen page flip), plus the same enemy variety and difficulty. Choose
MUSIC+FX, FX, or BEEPER from the title screen.
The ZX Spectrum 48K version flickers like crazy. That is expected: the machine does not have a second hardware display page for true double buffering.
The game was fully created by AI tools, Claude Code and OpenAI Codex, from the original idea and direction of Michał Pasternak, @mpasternak79.
Music: Pator, @paatorr.
The bundled PT3 tune is Spectrumizer by Pator. Pator granted a personal, exclusive license to use this tune in this single game. The tune is not licensed under MIT and is not reusable outside Attribute Wars without separate permission from the composer.
- Build and run instructions: docs/build.md
- Architecture and hardware notes: docs/architecture.md
- Project brief and constraints: docs/project-brief.md
The source code is MIT licensed © 2026 Michał Pasternak.