Wolfenstein Single Player Review

Given my love, adoration, and manly crush on all previous Wolfenstein iterations, the review of the newest Wolfenstein will come in two parts, one for single player and another for multiplayer. What this really means is that I'm older and damn busy with real life stuff so I'll get to the multiplayer when I have more time to play it.

If you're looking for a quick review of the single player and trust an internet stranger using very few words or you have ADD then here's the review: goddamn awesome, go buy it. Okay? Bye.

Now that those fools are gone let's get down to the proper review. The Wolfenstein single player is fucktastically goddamn awesome and is worth your hard earned currency regardless of the multiplayer component.

Understandably though you, the reader, would probably appreciate some form of reasoning or argument as to why I feel this way. Very well let's do this by first looking at what I personally want in a shooter full of Nazis.

1. Truly Evil Nazis.

Now, some might argue that all Nazis are evil and of course they have a point but when I say evil I'm thinking the type with the grandiose plans of world domination, big super weapons, and lots of sci-fi craziness.

In essence I want Raiders of the Lost Ark Nazis and not Saving Private Ryan Nazis. Both iterations are of course vile and despicable vermin who should be curb stomped in the face forever under a GI boot or the barefooted heel of a Russian peasant soldier but Truly Evil Nazis garner a special level of Hell where they get sodomized by Stalin every hour on the hour for a lot of the shit they tried to pulled or dreamed up in their hopes for a master race or whatever their bullshit philosophy was under Hitler.

Wolfenstein embraces this first necessity of Truly Evil Nazis with both hands wrapped around their Oktoberfest necks and then keeps trying to squeeze like it's a pinata full of candy bars. Oh sure it starts off mellow enough, like something out of Band of Brothers where you're up against normal German Army troops. Those poor saps are conscripts but they're associated with Nazis and they have guns in their hands so as far as I'm concerned they're fair game even if they mostly serve as cannon fodder for my tried and true MP40. Hey I won't cry any tears if they're in my way and neither should you.

But then the SS show up in their black helmets and red armbands. These were the real hardcore Hitler lovers with their 'Mien Kampf' this and starting-killing-people-they didn't-like that so they get special attention in the ways of dispensing justice. While I'll talk about the weapons some more later in another point, let me just say that being able to stop time and engage SS troops in melee combat with an axe not only saves ammo but really helps work on the back lats and shoulder muscles. SS troops deserve your total contempt. Don't let them intimidate you when they pull out the armored troops with fancy weapons either.

Then we get to the super soldier types. We get to see nine foot tall armored walkers, Nazi ninjas who slash you like Wolverine, and the return of the Nazi vixens wearing black leather cat suits who like to show their cleavage because if you're going to slaughter civilians you should at least be a cock tease about it.

2. Secret stashes of loot or areas

All right where's all my fellow Wolfenstein players who played the first id iteration of this game? Do you recall all the hidden rooms, hidden gold, and hidden weapons? If you're like me you also recall clicking against every single goddamn wall panel in the game in the hopes of one of them moving aside to give you that precious bounty. As Wolfenstein proved and the History channel seems to talk about every 15 minutes, Nazis loved hiding stuff everywhere. Gold, food, paintings, Goerrings underwear, if it had any sort of value they were going to stash it away somewhere safe. These guys would laugh and call Enron's or AIG's attempts to hide money pure amateur hour. Hell they hid so much stuff they forgot about most of it as they got their asses pounded back to Berlin allowing American GI soldiers to take a lot of it home.

In this new Wolfenstein we are given THREE different types of Nazi loot to pilfer along with documents for add-ons and additions to our weapons. In this case, Wolfenstein handily beats Call of Duty or other shooters who seem to miss the historical accuracy of Nazis hiding shit. The very first secret room behind a fireplace I found in Call of Duty 1? Not a stitch of gold or jewelry in it. Just complete lack of historical accuracy.

However, since this new version of Wolfenstein takes place after the first two, the Nazis appear to be getting a little sloppy as a lot of the gold is just sitting in bags on the floor. Walk into a house, gold in the corner. Open a closet, gold on the floor. You would think they'd hide that stuff a bit better but I guess we crashed their party. 'Hey Hans, where we hiding the gold tonight?' 'How the hell should I know, stupid, the major wants us to go find that American. It's just one guy we'll take care of it when we get back.' How wrong you are Fritz.

I dare not spoil thing by going into details about the secret areas but there are secret areas, caves, hideouts, labs, and other things which are truly awesome and showed that Raven has undoubtedly created the most historically accurate World War II shooter on the market today. Kudos gentlemen for the secrets you show us at the Dutch farmhouse.

3. Super crazy weapons

No game of killing Truly Evil Nazis would be complete without some crazy weapons! Oh sure History Channel might not have talked about them except in regards to the Nazis jets or whatever but who cares about that crap. Chuck Yeager figured out how to shoot down Nazi jets: wait till they start landing and are out of gas, then shoot them down, anyone could figure that out and use it.

No, what I mean is super weapons that make one man into a one man Nazi murdering machine. For me all I need is my fists, some boxer shorts, and a video of Salma Hayek from 'Desperado' but I'm looking out for you lesser mortals.

I'd get my war on for that.

The first Wolfenstein gave us a chain gun, RtCW gave us a BIGGER chain gun along with a flamethrower and some fancy weapons and the new Wolfenstein even tops THAT with a more badass flamethrower, a panzerfaust bazooka that you can upgrade to auto reload, and some energy weapons that turn Nazis into ash or toss them across the room. However, docking points for no chaingun. Come on Raven, gimme back my Venom canon!

Discussion of super weapons also requires discussing the Veil Power. At the start of the game you find out about some sort of amulet that lets you shift to another dimension and seriously fuck the Nazis up by slowing down time, piercing energy shields, or throwing up a shield to stop their bullets. At one time or another you'll use them all, often in unison but in the end the best one is the stopping of time as it will allow you to get up close and personal with Nazis and pummel them to death and hear their cries of pain in slow-mo.

To satisfy the obsessive compulsive crowd, Raven also included the ability to upgrade weapons so if you search every nook and cranny in the game you can eventually upgrade your weapons to fire faster, carry more ammo, etc. etc., the usual routine in games like this nowadays so the hardcore gamers can compare their e-penis in game forums.

4. Someplace to kill Nazis with super weapons and find secret loot.

So our first three requirements also need a venue to either be evil, have stuff hidden, or shoot stuff. Now personally as a true Nazi murder machine I'd be content with a floor grid from Tron and then Nazis sprinkled throughout but I suppose more uppity gamers want extravagances like cities, doors, and walls. I guess Raven kowtowed to this demand and ended up giving gamers some truly fantastic killing fields to dispense justice against the Nazi horde.

First up is the main city of Eisenstadt which serves as your own personal butcher block and there's a Reichsmark per pound sale on Nazi meat. From here you can upgrade your gear, meet new people, and of course shoot some Nazis. The great thing about Eisenstadt comes from the fact that the city is crawling with Nazis at all times. If you clear out an area and then come back a few minutest later, hey more Nazis! It took me quite a while to get out of Eisenstadt because doing boom headshots on Nazis in city-to-city fighting was just too much fun.

But once you do leave the city Raven just decided to let it all hang out perhaps as a good bye present to all of us since I don't really know if id and Raven will get to work much together anymore now that id is owned by Zenimax. Regardless, the level designs from the Dutch farmlands, Nazi airships, mountaintop castles and subterranean lairs all provide a wondrous place to plow through some Germans while humming the Star Spangled Banner (or God Save the Queen, or whatever you desire). Personally I think the id tech 4 engine is the best in the business for environments even if their character rendering can't compete with HL2.

Anyway, let’s not go down the technical road which I think is too often used as filler in game reviews and get to the summation and then look ahead a little at the future of what Wolfenstein should do next.

In summary then what are the criteria? Does Wolfenstein have lots of absurdly vile Nazis who would gas their own grandmothers? Yes. Does Wolfenstein provide us with opportunities to find all their loot and take it from them while also exploring secret chambers and bunkers to unveil their sinister plots? Yes. Does Wolfenstein give us fantastically huge weapons that let your plow through Nazis like a Jon Deere tractor? Yes. Finally does Wolfenstein give us some excellent level design to show off the first three things? Yes it does.

Wolfenstein then is batting a perfect 1.000 when it comes to Nazi murder simulators and to not partake in this iteration would be doing yourself a disservice.

But, what lies ahead for Wolfenstein? While of course nothing's been said in the press I have a radical idea that others might like too. In the next iteration, Wolfenstein should put aside the Nazis and instead turn its attention to the Pacific Theater.

First the Japanese were just as bad if not worse than the Nazis with their marching through Nanking and using Chinese as human petri dishes plus it would open a new venue of soldiers, landscape, and weaponry. In fact, make the new hero someone else besides Blazkowitz so when the sequel after this one occurs you could have a co-op based Wolfenstein campaign similar to something like Army of Two except a lot less gay and full of Nazis with Japanese ninja robots. Or make it massive multiplayer co-op akin to Serious Sam. But then again that's my normal answer for making every game even more badass: make it more like Sam.