Wolfenstein 3D for the Apple IIgs

The original Wolfenstein 3D was released May 5th, 1992. In the time since, it's been ported and released on several computing and gaming systems. Some of these were the Super Nintendo, the Atari Jaguar, and the Apple Macintosh.

Some time ago, there was a port of Wolfenstein 3D for the Apple IIgs system started, but (I thought) abandoned. I found out this weekend that it wasn't completely abandoned. The project is still alive out there. Here's some text I wrote on the matter for the Apogee FAQ...

In the fall of 1994, it was revealed that Vitesse was working on a version of Wolfenstein 3D for the Apple IIgs. This version was being written by none other than "Burger" Bill Heinemann, as the original Castle Wolfenstein was written for the Apple //e. My knowledge of WolfGS ended at the plan to sell WolfGS by Vitesse. Jay Wilbur (then of id Software) told me that this was against a licensing agreement, and as such, distribution was stopped before it was released. That was it I thought. Until now. On August 2, 1998, I received an Email from a user saying this..

I wanted to let you know, in case you hadn't heard, that Wolfenstein 3D for the Apple IIgs was finally released this year, on Valentine's Day, as freeware.

This was news to me. Well, I wrote to John Carmack at id Software about this issue (saying what happened, relaying what I just said above), and this is what I was told by him..

The contract negotiations had dragged on for a long time for very little potential money, so we finally just said that it could be released as freeware. At the time, they still wanted to try to make some money off of it and didn't release it, but we never specifically rescinded the offer, so I guess they finally took us up on it.

So, it would appear that Wolfenstein 3D for the Apple IIgs was finally released on Feb 14, 1998. I have had a copy of it since it was first written almost 4 years ago (from the author), but it's been changed a bit since Burger Bill was working on it. Here are some links about WolfGS:

http://www.logicware.com/Products/Wolfenstein3D/wolf3d_gs.html
http://www.sheppyware.ml.org/software/wolf3d_gs/index.html

Posted by Joe Siegler on August 4, 1998 at 1:00 PM | Permalink
News Categories: The Classic Games