Retro OS — Introduction

Retro OS is a data-driven, Windows 95-style operating system you drop into any Unity project. It isn't a real OS emulator — it's a desktop shell, window manager, and a set of in-universe "apps" (terminal, file explorer, mail, CCTV, browser…) driven entirely by ScriptableObject data, so you can wire an in-game computer into your story without writing a new UI system for it.

Built from ScriptableObject profiles

Every app, every file in the virtual file system, and every rule that reacts to what the player does is an asset you author in the Editor — not hardcoded scenes or C# per app.

What ships in the package

Unity	2021.3 or newer
Dependencies	None
Built-in apps	10 — File Explorer, Terminal, Photo Gallery, Notepad, Image Viewer, Media Player, CD Player, CCTV, Mail, The Internet
Terminal commands	8 — help, ls, cd, cat, open, pwd, clear, decrypt
Game-event IDs	17
Rule action kinds	10 — set/clear flag, reveal/hide/unlock node, deliver mail, open app, show alert, play sound, raise event
UI sounds	9, all synthesized at runtime — zero audio assets
Desktop icons	13, drawn procedurally at 32×32 — zero image assets

Highlights

• Full desktop shell — draggable/resizable windows, a taskbar, Start menu and login screen, themed with the same raised/sunken Windows 95 bevel palette used across Deepwave's other products.
• Working terminal & virtual file system — a real command interpreter over a file tree you build entirely as assets, including a decrypt command for puzzle content.
• CCTV with in-engine DVR — camera apps can show a live feed of the actual scene camera (pan/zoom), a pre-recorded VideoClip, or rewind a 48-frame / 6 fps ring buffer that lets any live channel be scrubbed back in time with zero pre-authored footage.
• Story-carrying apps — Mail, CCTV and The Internet each hold their own content list directly on their app definition asset, and every interaction can raise a game event that your own rules react to (reveal a node, unlock a file, deliver a new mail, play a sound…).
• Nothing to import — all UI sounds are synthesized sine/square waves and all desktop icons are drawn from ASCII character maps at runtime, so the package ships with no audio or image assets to license.

Where to go next

• Tools overview — see Retro OS alongside Deepwave's other Unity packages
• The package's own QuickGuide.html (included with the .unitypackage / Package Manager install) covers the full Getting Started walkthrough and every app in detail.