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RetroBIOS

ECWolf

ECWolf emulates Wolfenstein 3D. It reads 1 file, 1 of them required: without a required file it does not start games.

About this profile
Detail Value
Type standalone + libretro
Classification Game engine
Source https://github.com/libretro/ecwolf
Upstream https://bitbucket.org/ecwolf/ecwolf
Version 1.3.99999, stated in src/libretro/versiondefs.h
Revision libretro/ecwolf@0cccd9a85d7f
Profiled 2026-03-23
Profile YAML, JSON
Cores ecwolf
Systems Wolfenstein 3D
Install this emulator's files

For ECWolf inside RetroArch, RetroBat or another setup. The installer finds your setup and its BIOS folder, then downloads only the files this emulator reads there and checks each one.

Open the Start menu. Type PowerShell and open it. Paste the line. Press Enter.

PowerShell
&([scriptblock]::Create((irm https://abdess.github.io/retrobios/i.ps1))) --emulator ecwolf
Technical notes

Wolfenstein 3D source port by Braden Obrzut. Plays Wolf3D (wl6/wl1), Spear of Destiny (sod/sdm), Super 3D Noah's Ark (n3d), and community pk3 mods. Blake Stone and Rise of the Triad support flagged as Preview in upstream.

Requires ecwolf.pk3, the engine data package built from wadsrc/static/. Contains IWADINFO (game detection rules), palettes, sprites, map configs, DECORATE actor definitions, MAPINFO, SNDINFO, fonts, and localization strings. Without this file: "Could not open ecwolf.pk3!" fatal error.

Libretro no longer reads ecwolf.pk3 from disk: it is compiled into the core as a byte array and opened through a MemoryReader, with a fatal error naming it "embedded" when that fails. The system directory is still passed to SelectGame, but for the game data search, not for the engine package. ref: src/libretro/ecwolf_pk3_data.c, src/wl_iwad.cpp:664-672, src/libretro/libretro.cpp:1009-1011

Standalone: ecwolf.pk3 searched in progdir (binary directory). ref: src/libretro/wl_main.cpp:1247 (progdir passed to SelectGame) Also: INSTALL_PREFIX/share/ecwolf/ on Linux (src/wl_iwad.cpp:648)

Game data files (vswap, gamemaps, vgagraph, audiot) loaded from content directory, not system directory. Auto-detects game variant by scanning lump contents against IWADINFO MustContain rules.

Libretro fork based on ECWolf 1.3.99999-dev (forked 2020-02-23). Upstream head at 1.5.0pre with broader game support.

Files

Section titled “Files”

1 file: 1 required, 0 optional.

In this collection: 1 in repo and 0 missing.

Required

Section titled “Required”

ecwolf.pk3 required in repo standalone installed with the standalone emulator

ECWolf engine data package

  • Built from wadsrc/static/ via zipdir. Contains IWADINFO (game detection rules), palettes (wolfpal, spearpal, blakepal, noahpal), map lump remappers (wl6map, sodmap, etc.), DECORATE actor definitions, MAPINFO, SNDINFO, SNDSEQ, textures, sprites, fonts, and localization strings. md5 from .info, not validated by code. Shipped beside the executable in the Windows zip and in /usr/share/ecwolf by the .deb.
Hashes and source

Next steps

Section titled “Next steps”
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Maintained by Abdess on GitHub. Report a problem.

Packs from release v2026.10.10, .

MIT for the tooling and metadata. BIOS and firmware files are third-party system software, preserved for personal backup, archival and interoperability.