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UltraTears

UltraTears builds a native version of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (version 1.4.3) for Windows, Linux and the Steam Deck from your own copy of the game. It is not an emulator: the game's code is translated to native code ahead of time, and its shaders and textures are prepared when the game is built, not while you play.

Important

No game files are included. You need your own copy of the game with update 1.4.3, dumped from your own console as plain exefs and romfs folders. This project provides no game files, keys, firmware or dumping tools, and UltraTears decrypts nothing. Everything made from the game is made on your PC, for your own use: do not share it.

UltraTears is not affiliated with or endorsed by Nintendo. The Legend of Zelda and Tears of the Kingdom are trademarks of Nintendo.

Report problems on Issues with ultratears.log from the game folder.

Installing

You need: Windows 10/11 or Linux (kernel 6.7+, glibc 2.34+; SteamOS 3 has both), a graphics card with a current Vulkan 1.3 driver, 16 GB of RAM, 4 GB of video memory, about 40 GB free, and your dump:

dump\
├── exefs\   main, subsdk0, sdk, main.npdm, ...
└── romfs\   about 304,000 files, 16 GB

Windows

1. Download UltraTears-<version>-windows-x86_64.zip from Releases and extract it into its own folder.
2. Start UltraTears Launcher.exe. If SmartScreen warns about it, choose More info → Run anyway.
3. Choose the folder with exefs and romfs and click Prepare the game. It builds the game once, about 30 minutes.
4. Click Play.

To play on a Steam Deck, choose For Linux (Steam Deck) or Both platforms next to Prepare the game: you get UltraTears-SteamDeck.tar (about 28 GB), which you extract on the Deck and start as below, from step 4.

Linux and Steam Deck

1. Download UltraTears.AppImage from Releases. On a Steam Deck, do this in Desktop Mode.
2. In the file's Properties, on the Permissions tab, turn on Allow executing file as program, then start it.
3. Choose the folder with exefs and romfs and click Prepare the game.
4. When the game is prepared, add UltraTears.AppImage from the game folder to Steam as a non-Steam game. With --play in its launch options it starts the game directly, without the launcher. Start the game from Gaming Mode.

The launcher finds new versions itself and rebuilds only what changed; saves in userdata are kept. On Linux you can also put a newer UltraTears.AppImage into the game folder in place of the old one: the launcher then offers the update.

Controls

The controller's button layout follows the Switch (A is the right button).

Keyboard: WASD move, arrow keys camera, J = A, K / Space = B, I = X, U = Y, Q / E = L / R, Alt / Shift = ZL / ZR, Enter = +, Tab / Esc = − (map), T F G H = d-pad, Z / C = stick buttons, F11 or Alt+Enter full screen. Mouse support is planned.

Building from source

Install Git and Python 3, then:

git clone https://github.com/kuraeow/ultratears.git
cd ultratears
python tools/setup.py --dump D:\path\to\dump

The setup downloads the tools it lacks and makes the complete game folder in build\, launcher included, as in a release. Start build\UltraTears Launcher.exe. Without --dump it takes the dump from dump\ in the repository. Options, Linux and how it works: BUILDING.md. Contributing: CONTRIBUTING.md.

Legal

• Nothing of the game is in this repository or in a release: no code (also none translated from it), assets, shaders, textures, fonts, keys or firmware. All of that is made from your dump, on your PC.
• No Nintendo SDK code or headers are used: the system and graphics layers are UltraTears' own.
• The source holds only the facts needed to run the game: addresses, hashes, short instruction replacements.
• The name, emblem, icon and cover are the author's own work and are not under the GPL: assets/BRANDING.md. Third-party code: third_party/README.md.