Fans ofBlack Mirrorgathered around their television screens yesterday to see what the hullabaloo over this newBandersnatchinteractive moviewas. Through Netflix, viewers were able to choose between branching paths in a story that followed a video game programmer (Fionn Whitehead) working for a company called Tuckersoft in 1984 England. One of these “Tuckersoft games,“Nohzdyve, has emerged as an actual, playable ZX Spectrum game.
In a bit of viral marketing,a real website for the fictional Tuckersoftwas found byBlack Mirrorfans. Not only does the website detail the “history” of the developer, comprising of several game titles that act as winks and nods to previousBlack Mirrorepisodes, butthe page forNohzdyve, a game created by the character of Colin Ritman (Will Poulter), contains a real video game, playable through the help of any ZX Spectrum emulator.
The objective ofNohzdyveis to control the player character, who is falling down headfirst between two tall buildings, and collect floating eyeballs while avoiding a variety of harmful obstacles. It’s simple, but back in the day (according to theBlack Mirrorlore), it was enough to earn the game a five-star rating.
Millennials such as myself will certainly not be familiar with an older computing system like the ZX Spectrum, especially as it predates the Nintendo Entertainment System by a few years. It’s a deep cut thatBlack Mirrorcreator and writer ofBandersnatchtook in an attempt to make the interactive film’s story sound as authentic as possible. In fact, one of the endings of the film had a series of eerie noises, that when loaded into a ZX Spectrum takes you to the Tuckersoft website.
Emulators likeFuseandSpeccycan perhaps help those interested to try outNohzdyvefor themselves. In the meanwhile, we can keep having a pointless, philosophical debate on whether or notBandersnatchis a film or a game.
