This article originally ran under a different banner/website in July of 2019 and is now being here re-uploaded for purposes of convenience and consolidation. Please enjoy.
HEAR YE!!! HEAR YE!!! LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!!! I, THE VIDEO GAME DOOMSAYER, need a break. I have been relentlessly chasing the new release schedule since the start of the year. I have been constantly trying to keep current with the latest game release. I do tend to cherry-pick the titles I review, staying away from the current half-baked live services infesting the games industry, but I still try to stay current. While I do enjoy standing on my soapbox, yelling about the latest game, it can grow tiring. Some days, I just want to play an older game that many have sung the praises of. Like Wolfenstein: The New Order. I never got to experience this epic tale during its initial release. I remember everyone praised it for reinvigorating the franchise with its tale of a tired BJ Blazkowicz. With Wolfenstein: Youngblood on the horizon, now might be the best time to give it a try. The Sinking City can surely wait, I thought. I believe what I need right now to get me back on track is to kills some boot-stepping Nazis.
Our story begins with William J Blazkowicz leading a group of American soldiers in a siege against the Nazi doom fortress. Unfortunately, the plan goes south, BJ and his team are captured by the cartoonishly evil antagonist Dr. Wilhelm “Deathshead” Strasse. We are able to escape, but BJ gets some shrapnel lodged in his head causing him to enter a comatose state. He ends up in a Polish mental hospital for fourteen years. During that time, BJ sits there trapped in his unmoving body, as the Nazis eventually win the war and rewrite history to their whims. BJ is only able to wake up when the Nazis come to the hospital and attempt to kill everyone. Nazis murdering being the equivalent of the prince kissing the sleeping princess, BJ awakes, slaughters all the Nazis, rescues his young nurse, and ventures to reinvigorate the Nazi resistance. BJ being the exact puzzle piece the Resistance needs to stick it to the Nazi and kick starts a plan to take down the Nazis.
BJ’s adventure takes him to various alternate history locations throughout the world including a Research Facility in London, Nazi Enslavement Camp, and a Nazi Moonbase. Each level is also really well designed including alternate paths. These paths allow you to not only sneak up on Nazi Commanders but find collectibles that provide some context on how the Nazi changed the world. My favorite collectibles were the records including German parody versions of popular 60s songs including The House of the Rising Sun, Surfing USA, and Summertime Blues. You also might be able to overhear the Nazis saying how they love eating puppies for breakfast to remind us that even when the Nazis won, they still love being bastards. All of this blends together to make the world fleshed out and the story well-paced.
Another strength of Wolfenstein: The New Order is the characters themselves. It is not just the Nazis that are dripping with character. Every member of the Resistance came off as tragic as they are all doing their best to just survive the brutal and hostile world the Nazis had crafted from stone and steel. Even characters that I assume would sell us out to the Nazis ended up sacrificing themselves for the cause. What I initially took as a character distancing themselves so I didn’t catch on to their betrayal, turned out to them distancing themselves so to make their suicide mission easier to pull off. From that point I often found myself drifting around headquarters hoping these characters would show me a glimpse into their pained lives.
So with excellent storytelling, world-building, characters, and level design, you are probably assuming I am gearing up to give Wolfenstein: The New Order a glowing endorsement. Unfortunately, I am not, because I actually don’t think it is that fun to kill Nazis in this game. Now don’t get me wrong. Wolfenstein: The New Order does a great job making the Nazis so unlikable that you want to mow them down by the hundreds. Initially, I enjoyed ripping through the ranks of Nazi soldiers with ease. I thought the overheal mechanic, where you use a health pack while at full health to gain a temporary boost to your health, was an awesome way to allow you to mindlessly jump into firefights. The ability to dual wield assault rifles and shotguns just allowed you to unload an insane amount of lead onto unsuspecting Nazis. It reminds me of being an unstoppable killing machine in 2016’s Doom.
Unfortunately, this novelty wore off fast as I raced to the later levels. You are soon introduced to a variety of enemies that are complete bullet sponges. Robots that you can only shoot from behind. Fully armored Nazis equipped with shotguns. Robots equipped with railguns. All of these enemies that too take too long to kill down and can take you down even with the overheal. It utterly kills the pace of the game when I am trying to get through the tight halls of a Nazi U-boat and these two armor guards with shotguns just mow me down with ease. This is all more of a shame when Wolfenstein pulls out some of its crazier boss fights. The London Monitor is a really well-designed boss fight that makes me wonder why I am fighting legions of boring armored Nazis and robots.
The load times are the biggest pace killer off them all. Those two armor guards take you down, and you will be sitting in the load screen for minutes waiting for the game to reload the levels. What are you doing Wolfenstein? Are you repaving over the bullet holes from the last fight? I don’t mind hard games, but if you make me wait to get back in the action my temper starts to boil over. Take a page from Cuphead and let me jump back into the action.
Some may say Wolfenstein: The New Order wants you to be stealthy. It does give you a silenced pistol and the location of Commanders who can call in reinforcements. Unfortunately, this feels less fleshed out than your ability to run and gun. If I have to learn about the ability to lean past corners in the options menu, then you shouldn’t be asking us to be stealthy. Same goes for if you do not provide us visual cues that wandering guards have spotted us. Simply having a guard say “uhh” when he thinks he spots me is not enough information to tell me if I messed up the stealth or not. I also begin to wonder why I even try stealth, when a random guard spots me and immediately alerts everyone. Now I am just surrounded by the enemy with nowhere to go. Of course, half the time stealth isn’t an option. Like when I fought those two armored guards in the U-boat. There was no way I could sneak past them, so you might as well go in guns blazing all the time.
Honestly, my time with Wolfenstein: The New Order could be showcased with a moment I had on the Gibraltar Bridge. I was pinned down by a dozen Nazis soldiers when one of the giant robots popped out from one of the train cars. After emptying out all of my guns into this brute while avoiding fire from the Nazis, I could not find a way to get past the bridges. Nazis just keep spawning while a mounted turret would rip me to shreds. Every time I died, I would have to fight that robot again only to have the Nazis kill me trying to cross the bridge. I eventually said no. I hopped onto a beam on the side of the bridge. The Nazis were unable to see me, left me alone shoot me. I reached the end of the bridge, ran onto the next sections, and never looked back. Frankly, there seems to be something wrong with your first-person shooter when the player actively avoids shooting the enemy.
Now a game can get by with a lackluster story and amazing gameplay. Doom (2016) is a perfect example of this. It doesn’t really work out the other way. When you have a brilliant story, but it is dragged down by gameplay, then it becomes a chore. I shouldn’t feel the need to sprint through a room of Nazis just to see if BJ makes the daring last-minute escape. I really can’t recommend Wolfenstein: The New Order if you have played more engaging shooters like Doom (2016) or Titanfall 2. Even as I speak, I am considering installing Doom in preparation for Doom Eternal. Fortunately for the Wolfenstein series, it is easy to make an adjustment to gameplay than add a story into games that don’t focus on narrative. Everyone would probably riot if Doom Eternal interrupted demon-slaying with cutscenes. If Wolfenstein replaces some of its generic enemies with something more outlandish and maybe borrows some gameplay mechanics from Titanfall 2, Wolfenstein could easily grow into a series that captures my imagination like some of the best video games. I truly hope Wolfenstein: Youngblood is able to learn from these mistakes.
Note from the Present: Youngblood learned nothing.