The WonderSwan deserved a great Mac app. SwanSong turns your collection into a beautiful, private library, then gets out of the way when it is time to play. It is fast, focused, keyboard-friendly, controller-ready, and built around the handheld's wonderfully unusual personality.
No account. No ads. No telemetry. No BIOS scavenger hunt. Just your games and a really nice place to play them.
Download SwanSong 0.9 · See what’s new · Explore the wiki · Get help
Add a game and SwanSong gives it a proper home: artwork, favorites, recent play, compatibility notes, visual save states, and a clear path back to your last session. The original file can move; SwanSong keeps a validated private copy in its managed library.
Start playing and the library melts away. Horizontal and vertical games fit their native shape, the pixels stay crisp, and the controls you need remain close without crowding the screen.
- Rewind the last 30 seconds. Time Ribbon lets you preview a recent moment and jump back in without creating a pile of save files.
- Find the right save at a glance. Every save state carries its own screenshot-backed place in the timeline.
- Choose the screen you remember. Keep the image razor-sharp with Pure Pixels or add a little LCD motion and character.
- Play your way. Use the keyboard or map a controller to the WonderSwan's two direction clusters, A, B, and Start.
- Move saves between setups. Import and export SwanSong Pocket
.savfiles without turning your whole library inside out.
SwanSong includes SwanSong Open IPL, an independently written startup system. You do not need to find, import, or configure an original console BIOS.
- Download the universal Mac ZIP, open it, and move SwanSong to Applications.
- Add an authorized
.ws,.wsc,.pc2,.pcv2, or supported one-game ZIP. - Press Play.
SwanSong requires macOS 14 or newer and runs natively on Apple silicon and Intel Macs. Games are not included; use only files you own or are authorized to use.
SwanSong also gives translators, homebrew makers, and preservation-minded players a serious workspace without making the everyday player feel like a developer tool.
Turn a trusted, source-free translation release into a ready-to-play library
game without modifying your original. Choose its release.json, choose the
exact original game it asks for, and SwanSong verifies the IPS, source
revision, finished release fingerprint, and cartridge checksum. The English
build receives its own private library entry, badge, and save history.
Turn “this screen looks wrong” into evidence you can replay. Record a route, compare Original and Patched at the same frame, find the first visual change, and keep the private proof beside the project that made it. Translation Surface Suites can also run a whole matrix of case-specific viewer ROMs, capture several named checkpoints per replay, queue exact native-1× review, resume validated work, and produce one immutable final certificate.
Take a WonderSwan project from New to Release in one native workspace. Build assets, run the game, inspect frames and audio, replay failures, and package only after the evidence is ready. SwanSong includes the complete, content-verified SwanSong SDK 0.5.0 toolset: Utility Apps, traced builds, scenarios, semantic outcomes, budget history, project migration, and a deeper release lane. Doctor clearly shows the few development tools that still need to be installed on the Mac. Turn on Show developer tools in Settings when you want Studio; it stays out of the everyday library by default.
Browse a small, signed shelf of original WonderSwan homebrew whose publishers have allowed SwanSong to share it. Bundled title screens and a compact native inspector make the shelf visual without loosening its trust rules. The catalog stays offline until you ask, and each game is checked before it reaches your library.
The Analogue Pocket workflow is built to add a verified SwanSong Core without formatting the card or disturbing games, saves, Memories, settings, Presets, or unrelated cores. It stays safely locked until the separate Core project publishes an authorized stable release.
Take a light novel from the first idea to a finished EPUB or PDF without letting a score pretend to be an editor. Map the story, draft with live scene context, inspect Narrative Pulse, preserve revisions, work with unprimed readers and live reaction bookmarks, audition ImageGen art and music, then hand a source-mapped adaptation to SwanSong Studio and prove its delivery with the visual Story Ribbon.
Put the real handheld back in the loop. With a WonderSwan Color or SwanCrystal, Yokoi Boot, and a 3.3 V ExtFriend-compatible USB adapter, Cartridge Tools can inspect an inserted cartridge, make checksum-verified ROM and save backups, and restore an exact-size save only after confirmation on both the Mac and the console. The original monochrome WonderSwan cannot use this Yokoi Boot workflow.
SwanSong can also prepare the verified Yokoi Boot installer for a compatible SD-based flash cartridge. The Cartridge Lab guide explains the first-time bootstrap and recovery requirements before you connect anything. Retail game ROM remains read-only.
Your library stays on your Mac. SwanSong has no accounts, advertising, analytics, telemetry, crash-reporting service, or system profiling.
App updates, Homebrew Catalog access, and Analogue Pocket release checks are three separate actions with separate trust rules. None runs simply because you opened SwanSong. Automatic app-update checks and automatic installation remain choices you control.
Official downloads are universal, Developer ID signed, notarized by Apple, and published with matching checksums, a release manifest, and corresponding source.
The current stable release is 0.9.3. It keeps long translation proof moving: deterministic Original and Patched captures retain their final 30 emulated frames of audio during the same replay, and an authenticated Patched capture can become separate private LOAD and CONTINUE persistence clones. It retains the calm Start Here guide and Translation Shelf:
- verify the package, exact original revision, finished release hash, WonderSwan structure, cartridge checksum, and save contract;
- patch entirely in memory without changing the selected original;
- keep translated saves, states, artwork, favorite, and play history separate;
- adopt an existing exact finished build instead of duplicating it; and
- rebuild a missing or changed managed copy without losing its library history.
The 0.7 safety foundation remains: the engine runs in its own locked-down service, local automation authenticates its caller, Safe Mode can rescue a launch, Support Bundles exclude private material, and every release carries exact source, checksums, an SPDX SBOM, and attestations.
Read the 0.9.3 release notes, use the 0.9 release checklist, or see the changelog for the complete history.
The SwanSong Wiki keeps the deeper guides out of your way until you need them:
- Play, organize, rewind, and manage saves
- Install a trusted source-free translation release
- Build deterministic translation evidence
- Make games in SwanSong Studio
- Write and publish novels with Story Forge
- Work with real cartridges in Cartridge Tools
- Prepare an Analogue Pocket SD card safely
- Understand local automation and privacy
- Build, test, sign, and release SwanSong
You can also read the installation guide, frequently asked questions, privacy policy, and 0.9.3 release notes.
SwanSong is free software licensed under GPL-2.0-only. Official releases include the license, third-party notices, and exact corresponding source.
SwanSong is an independent, unofficial project. Product names and trademarks belong to their respective owners. No games or original system firmware are included.