I swear Raven Software must be using some black magic to make their games; because it seems like pretty much all of their games come from weird or bad ideas but they always come out really good. I mean they even made a licensed game on par with an actual AA game, that shit is crazy.
Replace the open world with a more linear structure and it would be better since the combat is fun, if easy, and the story is enjoyable schlock but the OW gets in the way.
I hesitate to use the term, but this has always seemed like a sterling example of an "underrated gem." Raven came together to craft a solid FPS experience with a few unique features to freshen it up a bit - a semi-open world hub, the magical Black Sun power-ups, a tone that leans more into the occult elements of the franchise than some of the prior entries. In retrospect, I can see how The New Order proved that BJ required some degree of development as a character, since he does come across remarkably flat here along with nearly every other member of the cast. With that in mind, I still have quite a lot of fun shooting up Nazis with magic super-powers and exploring a refreshingly unique setting for the franchise. It may not be perfect, but it's a damn fine game that deserves a lot more love than it's given.
Esse jogo é uma maluquice tremenda, mas sem o carisma que os Wolfensteins The New Order e The New Colossus tem (esses últimos também tem maluquice, mas não necessariamente sobrenatural).
Esse é um ótimo exemplo que prova o potencial da Raven Software quando se trata de produzir experiências do estilo da velha-guarda do FPS. Assim como em Quake 4, Soldier of Fortune e Singularity, ela (pelo menos pra mim) conseguiu fazer um jogo divertido com uns diferenciais interessantes, mas que ainda assim é chato no geral e desinteressante.
Eu não acho esse jogo memorável, e acredito que a maioria das pessoas que gostam da franquia e já jogaram esse jogo também compartilham dessa opinião.
A franquia já tinha se envolvido com o sobrenatural antes, que foi em Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Porém, nesse jogo de 2009, chamado apenas de 'Wolfenstein', o sobrenatural foi usado tanto que chega no ponto de ser parte central do jogo. E isso pra mim é um problema.
A questão é que os poderes sobrenaturais, pelo menos pra mim, não são interessantes, e eu praticamente não usei eles durante o jogo, com excessão das vezes em que eu fui obrigado a usar eles pra prosseguir no jogo e no finalzinho dele, quando eu já estava de 'saco cheio' da história do jogo e eu só queria terminá-lo logo. Fora que a história em si, tentando enfiar goela abaixo toda essa parada sobrenatural foi tão genérica e chata pra mim que eu realmente não me lembro de nada da história, nem dos personagens secundários.
A questão é que eu me diverti bastante do início do jogo até o meio. A partir do momento em que o final do jogo começava a dar as caras, o jogo ficou MUITO chato e eu nem consegui mais acompanhar a história, que já não era das mais interessantes.
Uma coisa que me irritou durante o jogo são as animações. A animação do personagem que controlamos, B.J. Blazkowicz quando corre é bizarra e desconfortável. O mesmo vale para as animações dos inimigos, A maneira como eles correm, são atingidos pelas balas das armas, e caem no chão quando abatidos é muito estranha. Até as animações dos personagens e inimigos de F.E.A.R., de 2005, são muito melhores que as desse jogo, de 2009.
Um outro problemaço desse jogo é a câmera. A câmera balança MUITO. Eu nunca havia ficado desconfortável com a visão de um jogo FPS. Nem as animações de teleporte do poder 'blink' de Dishonored, que causam uma distorção na imagem, conseguiram me deixar desconfortável.
O jogo é bastante curto. Porém, ao mesmo tempo, pareceu que a última hora foi interminável. Eu acho incrível que esse jogo conseguiu descer de divertido para chato em poucas horas de jogo.
A história é maluca, sem pé nem cabeça, exageraram muito na dose de sobrenatural, mesmo que isso já tenha sido explorado no passado, e por algum motivo mais bizarro ainda, o Wolfenstein: The New Order, de 2014, segue 'um pouquinho' como continuação desse jogo.
Enfim, esse aqui tinha potencial. A Raven Software já produziu outros FPS que eu curti, mesmo também não tendo grandes histórias, como os que eu citei no começo desse texto, e eu acho que esse jogo poderia ter sido muito melhor.
Pena que hoje em dia ela está 'presa' na Activision e fadada (pelo menos por enquanto) a produzir os Call of Dutys que todo ano são lançados. Um baita potencial desperdiçado.
Esse é um ótimo exemplo que prova o potencial da Raven Software quando se trata de produzir experiências do estilo da velha-guarda do FPS. Assim como em Quake 4, Soldier of Fortune e Singularity, ela (pelo menos pra mim) conseguiu fazer um jogo divertido com uns diferenciais interessantes, mas que ainda assim é chato no geral e desinteressante.
Eu não acho esse jogo memorável, e acredito que a maioria das pessoas que gostam da franquia e já jogaram esse jogo também compartilham dessa opinião.
A franquia já tinha se envolvido com o sobrenatural antes, que foi em Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Porém, nesse jogo de 2009, chamado apenas de 'Wolfenstein', o sobrenatural foi usado tanto que chega no ponto de ser parte central do jogo. E isso pra mim é um problema.
A questão é que os poderes sobrenaturais, pelo menos pra mim, não são interessantes, e eu praticamente não usei eles durante o jogo, com excessão das vezes em que eu fui obrigado a usar eles pra prosseguir no jogo e no finalzinho dele, quando eu já estava de 'saco cheio' da história do jogo e eu só queria terminá-lo logo. Fora que a história em si, tentando enfiar goela abaixo toda essa parada sobrenatural foi tão genérica e chata pra mim que eu realmente não me lembro de nada da história, nem dos personagens secundários.
A questão é que eu me diverti bastante do início do jogo até o meio. A partir do momento em que o final do jogo começava a dar as caras, o jogo ficou MUITO chato e eu nem consegui mais acompanhar a história, que já não era das mais interessantes.
Uma coisa que me irritou durante o jogo são as animações. A animação do personagem que controlamos, B.J. Blazkowicz quando corre é bizarra e desconfortável. O mesmo vale para as animações dos inimigos, A maneira como eles correm, são atingidos pelas balas das armas, e caem no chão quando abatidos é muito estranha. Até as animações dos personagens e inimigos de F.E.A.R., de 2005, são muito melhores que as desse jogo, de 2009.
Um outro problemaço desse jogo é a câmera. A câmera balança MUITO. Eu nunca havia ficado desconfortável com a visão de um jogo FPS. Nem as animações de teleporte do poder 'blink' de Dishonored, que causam uma distorção na imagem, conseguiram me deixar desconfortável.
O jogo é bastante curto. Porém, ao mesmo tempo, pareceu que a última hora foi interminável. Eu acho incrível que esse jogo conseguiu descer de divertido para chato em poucas horas de jogo.
A história é maluca, sem pé nem cabeça, exageraram muito na dose de sobrenatural, mesmo que isso já tenha sido explorado no passado, e por algum motivo mais bizarro ainda, o Wolfenstein: The New Order, de 2014, segue 'um pouquinho' como continuação desse jogo.
Enfim, esse aqui tinha potencial. A Raven Software já produziu outros FPS que eu curti, mesmo também não tendo grandes histórias, como os que eu citei no começo desse texto, e eu acho que esse jogo poderia ter sido muito melhor.
Pena que hoje em dia ela está 'presa' na Activision e fadada (pelo menos por enquanto) a produzir os Call of Dutys que todo ano são lançados. Um baita potencial desperdiçado.
I really, really hate to speculate on behind-the-scenes, production stuff when talking about a game - I am, at the end of the day, uneducated in game development & production, and besides, it always feels less interesting to talk about since its just pure random speculation anyway - but it's kinda hard to talk about Wolfenstein without thinking about the behind-the-scenes of it all, because it feels like so much about the game stems from, I guess, mis-direction during its creation.
See the thing about Wolfenstein is it really feels like it was made by two teams who never ever collaborated; there are individual elements that are interesting to talk about, pieces that could be built into something quite cohesive and well-constructed if put together with the right extra pieces or in the right way. But the final product feels like a handful of really disparate mechanics and designs just thrown together to meet a deadline, there's no other way to conceptualise it in my head. You have a hub level, from which you go to other places around Isenstadt to complete missions, so it's kind of structured like an open-world game where you might come and go as you please to do the sort of things BJ does best - kill Nazis - but everywhere that isnt the hub areas is essentially its own linear level which you have virtually no reason to return to afterwards, unless you want to hunt collectibles (which, like, you might, but honestly I never did and I never struggled either). Maybe I'm not explaining it in the best way, it just feels really jarring to have an "open-world" which is actually just a level selection with some Nazis in it.
There's a monetary system where money can be earned either by finding certain collectibles or by completing missions, and the money is spent upgrading weapons & amulet powers. The game makes a point to tell you that there's not quite enough money in the game to enable you to get all the weapon upgrades, which I must admit is quite clever - usually games of this ilk are all too happy to make sure you're as beefy as possible if you spend enough time grinding some sort of resource - and being forced to prioritise and carefully consider your choices as you go is rather engaging, as you've no idea how much more money there is or how much you personally will be able to find. The problem is that also you can use this money to buy ammunition for all of the weapons, some are which are extremely rare in the game itself; so you immediately have this situation where your fairly limited currency can kind of be wasted? It's a system that would probably work really well in something like, I don't know, maybe Far Cry? But it just feels a bit at odds with the kind of game Wolfenstein has historically been and, indeed, was only one game ago. Power weapons are cool and even moreso when you know you have enough opportunity to use them - one major improvement in Serious Sam 4 was an abundance of laser cannon ammo - but this implementation feels oddly restrictive.
There's a weird problem with the narrative and presentation too, which feels like it hints at mechanics and systems that probably just didn't make it into the finished product; Nazis bark about "the American spy!" whenever they encounter you, but if we're being honest, you don't really do any spying in this game, and what you do doesn't really feel like the sort of thing that would give you the reputation amongst Nazis as a spy. Blazko is made the literal moment he arrives in Isenstadt, and every time you are seen on the street you are instantly recognised, so it all feels like maybe some kind of espionage mechanic was planned and then just dropped at some point? The Saboteur released around the same time and, while I never played it, it seems to hint at the sort of thing that Wolfenstein might have been going for. As you progress through the game, you meet members of two resistances, but while the game makes scarce use of cutscenes except for particularly dramatic moments (and some level transitions), interacting with the games cast consists of them basically blurting out their entire backstory and current motivations the moment they see you. Maybe comparison to the MachineGames Wolfenstein reboot is unfair, a series which started 5 years later and has vastly better characterisation and narrative, but maybe not when this game came out five years after Half-Life 2. I was genuinely shocked to learn John Carmack had been nowhere near this game, considering its approach to story-telling has his "story in a game is like story in porn" ethos written all over it.
This probably isn't the most elegantly written review - a bullet-point list of things about the game that I didn't particularly like isn't really my preferred way to talk about a game - it's just utterly bizarre because there's glimmers of excellence here. I know Raven Software are good and that is on display in Wolfenstein; the moment-to-moment gameplay of the games combat is actually really good, having aged surprisingly well, with a range of weapons and the ability to pair them up with some really entertaining magic powers, a particular highlight being the Empower power-up, which makes it an absolute treat to just strut through the open emptying magically supercharged MP40 rounds into Nazis with. There's a mechanic to the magic powers where you can use magical beasts to your advantage in combat, but only a little bit, or they will turn on you instead, which is really engaging and clever! I wish someone had reconsidered the choice to make the screen black & white when you run out of magic powers, because it reads kinda weird in a game with The Dreaded Regenerating Health System and it ends up becoming really easy to get gunned down because you had way less health than you thought, but this is an issue which is small potatoes in the big picture.
There's probably two decent games in here and then they got put in the teleporter from The Fly and Wolfenstein came out the other end.
See the thing about Wolfenstein is it really feels like it was made by two teams who never ever collaborated; there are individual elements that are interesting to talk about, pieces that could be built into something quite cohesive and well-constructed if put together with the right extra pieces or in the right way. But the final product feels like a handful of really disparate mechanics and designs just thrown together to meet a deadline, there's no other way to conceptualise it in my head. You have a hub level, from which you go to other places around Isenstadt to complete missions, so it's kind of structured like an open-world game where you might come and go as you please to do the sort of things BJ does best - kill Nazis - but everywhere that isnt the hub areas is essentially its own linear level which you have virtually no reason to return to afterwards, unless you want to hunt collectibles (which, like, you might, but honestly I never did and I never struggled either). Maybe I'm not explaining it in the best way, it just feels really jarring to have an "open-world" which is actually just a level selection with some Nazis in it.
There's a monetary system where money can be earned either by finding certain collectibles or by completing missions, and the money is spent upgrading weapons & amulet powers. The game makes a point to tell you that there's not quite enough money in the game to enable you to get all the weapon upgrades, which I must admit is quite clever - usually games of this ilk are all too happy to make sure you're as beefy as possible if you spend enough time grinding some sort of resource - and being forced to prioritise and carefully consider your choices as you go is rather engaging, as you've no idea how much more money there is or how much you personally will be able to find. The problem is that also you can use this money to buy ammunition for all of the weapons, some are which are extremely rare in the game itself; so you immediately have this situation where your fairly limited currency can kind of be wasted? It's a system that would probably work really well in something like, I don't know, maybe Far Cry? But it just feels a bit at odds with the kind of game Wolfenstein has historically been and, indeed, was only one game ago. Power weapons are cool and even moreso when you know you have enough opportunity to use them - one major improvement in Serious Sam 4 was an abundance of laser cannon ammo - but this implementation feels oddly restrictive.
There's a weird problem with the narrative and presentation too, which feels like it hints at mechanics and systems that probably just didn't make it into the finished product; Nazis bark about "the American spy!" whenever they encounter you, but if we're being honest, you don't really do any spying in this game, and what you do doesn't really feel like the sort of thing that would give you the reputation amongst Nazis as a spy. Blazko is made the literal moment he arrives in Isenstadt, and every time you are seen on the street you are instantly recognised, so it all feels like maybe some kind of espionage mechanic was planned and then just dropped at some point? The Saboteur released around the same time and, while I never played it, it seems to hint at the sort of thing that Wolfenstein might have been going for. As you progress through the game, you meet members of two resistances, but while the game makes scarce use of cutscenes except for particularly dramatic moments (and some level transitions), interacting with the games cast consists of them basically blurting out their entire backstory and current motivations the moment they see you. Maybe comparison to the MachineGames Wolfenstein reboot is unfair, a series which started 5 years later and has vastly better characterisation and narrative, but maybe not when this game came out five years after Half-Life 2. I was genuinely shocked to learn John Carmack had been nowhere near this game, considering its approach to story-telling has his "story in a game is like story in porn" ethos written all over it.
This probably isn't the most elegantly written review - a bullet-point list of things about the game that I didn't particularly like isn't really my preferred way to talk about a game - it's just utterly bizarre because there's glimmers of excellence here. I know Raven Software are good and that is on display in Wolfenstein; the moment-to-moment gameplay of the games combat is actually really good, having aged surprisingly well, with a range of weapons and the ability to pair them up with some really entertaining magic powers, a particular highlight being the Empower power-up, which makes it an absolute treat to just strut through the open emptying magically supercharged MP40 rounds into Nazis with. There's a mechanic to the magic powers where you can use magical beasts to your advantage in combat, but only a little bit, or they will turn on you instead, which is really engaging and clever! I wish someone had reconsidered the choice to make the screen black & white when you run out of magic powers, because it reads kinda weird in a game with The Dreaded Regenerating Health System and it ends up becoming really easy to get gunned down because you had way less health than you thought, but this is an issue which is small potatoes in the big picture.
There's probably two decent games in here and then they got put in the teleporter from The Fly and Wolfenstein came out the other end.
Didn't deserve the backlash it got. Was the best Wolfenstein game in terms of story at the time it was made. Built the framework for the MachineGames Wolfenstein games.
Having a nazi skull as your cover is very 2000's
Raven's tendency to build a solid core and decorate it with half-finished bullshit is in full effect here.
This is just a very fun shooter. Most of the guns feel great to use. The MP's feel good, I love shooting bolt action rifles in games, flamethrower is cool, the tesla coil is crazy, a bunch of fun stuff. The supernatural powers also just make stuff fun. Empower just letting you shoot through cover is great, and the Shield melting enemies when you touch them with it is also awesome. BJ really just feels like a walking disaster.
Also god bless whoever decided to have pickup-able melee weapons in this game. The way you can just throw them at a Nazi's head and insta-kill them is endlessly entertaining, especially since the weapon will just bonk of their head and fly somewhere.
The hub is also neat. It does get a little back tracky, but I still find it entertaining to go through it.
I do wish that you could lean in this game though. Return to Castle Wolfenstein let you lean for some fucking reason even though you couldnt shoot out of it, and it just feels like it would fit way more in this game.
Also god bless whoever decided to have pickup-able melee weapons in this game. The way you can just throw them at a Nazi's head and insta-kill them is endlessly entertaining, especially since the weapon will just bonk of their head and fly somewhere.
The hub is also neat. It does get a little back tracky, but I still find it entertaining to go through it.
I do wish that you could lean in this game though. Return to Castle Wolfenstein let you lean for some fucking reason even though you couldnt shoot out of it, and it just feels like it would fit way more in this game.
standard MCU shooter. Good visuals for its age. Bland writing could barely keep me awake. It's only thanks to the combat that I can give this atleast a generous 3/5.
Should have left this one in dev hell until The New Order
Wolfenstein 2009 is a boring, soulless, slog of a game. Technically speaking there's not a lot wrong with it, it looks alright, runs alright, plays alright, but there's just nothing engaging at all in this game.
You know, it's ok. They tried.
you shoot nazis or something.
Well... It wasn't the most bad thing in the world, but it also wasn't the best either, I enjoyed my entire run through this game, it is simple and gives you what you probably want... That it is to shoot nazis.
Comparing it to the reboot series, the new ones obviously look and play better, but what I loved about this game, was the WW2 aspect, this point may be biased because I love WW2 shooters and the gunplay in this doesn't disappoint, while there is paranormal and sci-fi elements, this wasn't the entire thing, not everyone in the nazi army were super futuristic advanced which, for me, is a positive point... The one power I most used was the slow time one because it helped during gun fights, the other ones, only in boss fights, the rest of the game I played like Wolf 3D, just running and gunning with a MP40 in my hands and spraying nazi blood all over the walls, and I loved this simple aspect.
May be a guilty pleasure, but this game, alongside Return to Castle Wolfenstein and New Order are my favorites of the franchise.
This game also has one of the best flamethrowers in the entire game industry, the sound design, the feeling of holding the mouse button and the screaming of the burned, all culminates on a masterful and very fun weapon. It is up there with the COD World at War and Far Cry 2's flamethrowers.
7/10
Comparing it to the reboot series, the new ones obviously look and play better, but what I loved about this game, was the WW2 aspect, this point may be biased because I love WW2 shooters and the gunplay in this doesn't disappoint, while there is paranormal and sci-fi elements, this wasn't the entire thing, not everyone in the nazi army were super futuristic advanced which, for me, is a positive point... The one power I most used was the slow time one because it helped during gun fights, the other ones, only in boss fights, the rest of the game I played like Wolf 3D, just running and gunning with a MP40 in my hands and spraying nazi blood all over the walls, and I loved this simple aspect.
May be a guilty pleasure, but this game, alongside Return to Castle Wolfenstein and New Order are my favorites of the franchise.
This game also has one of the best flamethrowers in the entire game industry, the sound design, the feeling of holding the mouse button and the screaming of the burned, all culminates on a masterful and very fun weapon. It is up there with the COD World at War and Far Cry 2's flamethrowers.
7/10
This is easily the "safest" feeling Wolfenstein, but I've actually played it a few times because the gameplay is pretty satisfying. Each of the levels feel kind of like checking a box for what a Wolfenstein game should have, and the story isn't very memorable - but there are some surprisingly brutal animations and the gunplay is solid. Odd game, but not too bad.
Oh, woe is me, I can't believe Raven Software were consigned into becoming a cog in the Call of Duty factory, it's clearly not at all what they would've wanted. You can tell because for instance the lead designer of Wolfenstein 2009 Jedi Outcast & Academy is still there, over a decade later, doing hard work on all of your favorite first-person shooter titles published by Activision Blizzard King since 2010, he is one of many being held hostage I'm telling you!...
Half-baked Call of Duty clone with none of the energy from id Software's titles.
After playing the new ones I knew this one wouldn't hold up to them. I liked that it had a different enough play style. The inclusion of the superpowers that you get from the ancient mystical stones is a fun direction. The semi open world aspect felt ahead of it's time. I liked that this one dove head first into the supernatural and mystical elements of the Wolfenstein world whereas the new ones focus more on the sci fi steam punk aspects. I liked the aesthetics of the world and it's design. It was creepy and atmospheric at times. This game felt more rooted in horror than it's successors. It's also very colorful for 2009. Most games around this era were the brown yellow nightmares like Haze. However this game's shooting is very janky. The story and the characters are the epitome of meh. Everything other than the world and some of the enemies is completely boring. This version of BJ Blazkowicz is an absolute slap in the face of the new one. This one is so generic and forgettable. I want to give a higher ranking than 6 simply because of the name recognition of Wolfenstein as I've been a fan of the series since the ps2 days, but I think a 6 is perfectly appropriate. It's no better than a timeshift. Another first person shooter that's generic and has one gimmick mechanic that works well enough
This is a fairly standard shooter from seventh gen. That alone says a lot, but this holds up better than most of those do. The guns feel really good and the more paranormal weapons are really cool. I was surprised by the structure, the hub was a nice addition that was fun to explore for a bit. I don't like this as much as The New Order and The Old Blood, but I'd rather play this than 3D.
They turned Wolfenstein into CoD for 9 hours and somehow it fucking worked.
Wolfenstein 2009 is one of the most underrated games I've ever played. Critically panned on released, sold poorly and basically killed the series for a long time. But this game is quite unique and fun. Raven basically took the supernatural elements of Wolfenstein and hammed it up to the max. BJ is just some dude now, he isn't the roided out beefcake we are used to. The game at the beginning does play like a average call of duty game, with cover and regenerating health. But turns into its own thing when you get the Veil. A powerful object which buffs BJ with superpowers. Wolfenstein may not be the most praised or favorite among fans, but it's still a fun shooter with an insane premise.
Greate game, sadly underrated and hated by the wolfenstein community.
Playtime: 10 Hours
Score: 8/10
My first ever experience with the Wolfenstein franchise before The New Order came out and it was great to revisit it recently. This game has B.J. fighting Nazis as usual, but during WW2, and not the new Nazis won the war time-line that Machine Games have created. It has you travel to Germany to help the resistance, as you try to stop the Nazis from accessing this other dimension, that has allowed them to give their soldiers super powers, and create futuristic weaponry.
The cool part about this game is that you get this medialion that gives you powers as well, such as traveling between dimensions, slowing down time etc.. Its really a cool element and adds some flavor to the pretty standard GPS gameplay, before Call of Duty fully took over.
Gameplay wise, you get to move around freely around this town, which acts as a hub world. You can do main missions and side missions to earn extra cash, to buy weapon upgrades for all your guns, which is definitely a fun system. You can also find collectables such as extra gold, Intel and tomes of power. I really enjoyed the world design and it made it stand apart from other shooters of the time.
Combat is fun as well as you have a mixture of your standard WW2 weapons and the cool futuristic guns which are fun to use. It's not as fast pace as the newer games, but it's still a lot of fun and addictive. Like I said, I really enjoy the weapon upgrade system, and it just makes you feel like your progressing well without the need for RPG mechanics in a game that doesn't need them really.
The story is fairly basic and straight-forward, and it won't be at all as gripping as the newer games, however I did like the more straight forward and less over the top nature. It's a slippery slope and it will just depend if you prefer the older games in this series or the newer ones. This game kind of sits in between the two, which is why I have such a fondness for it.
My one real question is, where the hell is the remaster for this game? Hell I'll even take a port of it on GOG, because unless you have an older console, it's the only real way to play this game sadly. If you do find a copy of it, I highly recommend giving it a shot!
Score: 8/10
My first ever experience with the Wolfenstein franchise before The New Order came out and it was great to revisit it recently. This game has B.J. fighting Nazis as usual, but during WW2, and not the new Nazis won the war time-line that Machine Games have created. It has you travel to Germany to help the resistance, as you try to stop the Nazis from accessing this other dimension, that has allowed them to give their soldiers super powers, and create futuristic weaponry.
The cool part about this game is that you get this medialion that gives you powers as well, such as traveling between dimensions, slowing down time etc.. Its really a cool element and adds some flavor to the pretty standard GPS gameplay, before Call of Duty fully took over.
Gameplay wise, you get to move around freely around this town, which acts as a hub world. You can do main missions and side missions to earn extra cash, to buy weapon upgrades for all your guns, which is definitely a fun system. You can also find collectables such as extra gold, Intel and tomes of power. I really enjoyed the world design and it made it stand apart from other shooters of the time.
Combat is fun as well as you have a mixture of your standard WW2 weapons and the cool futuristic guns which are fun to use. It's not as fast pace as the newer games, but it's still a lot of fun and addictive. Like I said, I really enjoy the weapon upgrade system, and it just makes you feel like your progressing well without the need for RPG mechanics in a game that doesn't need them really.
The story is fairly basic and straight-forward, and it won't be at all as gripping as the newer games, however I did like the more straight forward and less over the top nature. It's a slippery slope and it will just depend if you prefer the older games in this series or the newer ones. This game kind of sits in between the two, which is why I have such a fondness for it.
My one real question is, where the hell is the remaster for this game? Hell I'll even take a port of it on GOG, because unless you have an older console, it's the only real way to play this game sadly. If you do find a copy of it, I highly recommend giving it a shot!
The chronology and canonicity of the Wolfenstein games gets hazy at best, and this one is not helping much. Considered a loose sequel of Return to Castle Wolfenstein, it also is supposed to be the starting point of the next saga handled by Machine Games which follows up with The New Order.
Unfortunately, this is an average FPS with nothing real interesting to it. A central hub lets you access the various levels of the game and you're once again investigating the Nazi's paranormal division. The next games brought much more to the franchise.
Unfortunately, this is an average FPS with nothing real interesting to it. A central hub lets you access the various levels of the game and you're once again investigating the Nazi's paranormal division. The next games brought much more to the franchise.
The guns feel SO GOOD to shoot, and the nazis too, like, it just feels amazing to unload on the crackers and seeing them die. But this dosent carry the game trouhg the awful history, dialogue and the weird hub world which gets boring too quickly. Game is also stupidly easy, you get too powerfull too quickly and nothing ever manages to catch up to you.
underrated af
This review contains spoilers
Kind of misplaced standalone game, but still fun for what it is.
When I wanted to play all the games in the Wolfenstein series, I eventually came across this one, simply called “Wolfenstein”. It serves as a loose sequel to Return to Castle Wolfenstein but can be, as far as I am concerned, treated like a standalone game.
In Wolfenstein, you play as the hero we know and love, William B.J. Blazkowicz. It takes place in some town called Isenstadt in the setting of World War II. If you thought that the original Wolfenstein and Return to Castle Wolfenstein had some wacky and crazy stories, you haven’t seen this one. Here, the Germans are excavating some ancient site in order to harvest rare “Nachtsonne” crystals, which they need to access the so called “Black Sun” dimension in order to harvest great power, used for turning the tide in the war. As the game progresses, the town of Isenstadt changes for the worst and normal German patrols are replaced by supernatural, ghost-like monster things.
In the previous game, Blazkowicz acquired a strange artifact called the Thule Medallion. William meets up with a resistance group called the Kreisau Circle and enters the town of Isenstadt. Here he learns of the strange voodoo that the Germans are pulling of with the excavations and the purpose of the Medallion. He learns that he can use the power of the Thule artifact to enter “The Veil”, a barrier between Earth and the Black Sun dimension, introducing the unique mechanic of the game in which you can run faster, spot enemies in the dark and go through doors with the Black Sun symbol on it. Blazkowicz eventually faces General Zetta, who is actually some kind of abomination when viewed through the Veil dimension. William whoops his ass and returns to town, in a new location that the resistance has set up, to avoid retaliation from the Germans. His buddy Caroline Becker is captured by the Germans, now lead by Blazkowicz’s arch enemy, general Deathshead. Like usual, Deathshead is building some kind of superweapon with the crystals. William travels to the castle that Caroline and Deathshead are in, confronts many enemies and some bosses who all guard the superweapon and eventually reaches Deathshead himself. In true Wolfenstein fashion, Deathshead escapes and William blows up the castle and rescues his chick. He goes after the Zeppelin that Deathshead escaped in and manages to bring it down. In the end credits, a wounded Deathshead crawls out of the crashed Zeppelin and the game is ready for the next follow up.
Wolfenstein plays in the same style as its predecessor. It is a First Person Shooter in which you hold a variety of weapons and gather more guns as you progress. The game follows a linear path but allows for backtracking during areas. It has some new and unique features however, like the black market, in which you can upgrade your held weapons and the new Thule Medallion, which let you enter the Veil and can be upgraded to use more special abilities like slow time, shielding, and dodging projectiles. For this reason, you need to be on the lookout for crystals and cash, making this some sort of FPS RPG. There are some scripted events of course in which you are forced to use a certain power of the Medallion, not allowing for different approaches to the situation, but this is fine.
The graphics in Wolfenstein are really nice for the time period. They look polished and the lighting and blue smoke effects are stunning. This game felt really next gen for the time. Explosion effects and the detail is all great.
In terms of sound design and music, this game is all right. The voice acting is good and the sound effects, like gunfire, are fine. The music is a little generic but it works.
I have to say that the so called “Motion Comics” where a nice addition, but at the same time, a desperate attempt of tying this game to the main series. In these comics, different pieces of story and past events from multiple Wolfenstein games are shown from The Spear of Destiny, Return to Castle Wolfenstein and the final battle with the Fuhrer himself in the first game.
The biggest problem I had with this game is that it just did not feel like a true sequel, it was just there and did not offer that satisfying feeling of continuing the story like the previous and following games.
The Multiplayer was terrible and broken at release but has been fixed later on with a massive patch. The only problem is that no one played this game anymore in a matter of months, so this can be considered a failure.
Nowadays, Wolfenstein (2009) is some sort of obscure relic, with almost no platform that offers it. It is not on Steam, the PlayStation store or the XBOX Live Store. The only way to experience this game as far as I know, is by buying it physically second hand somewhere, or really search the deepest pits of the internet.
In the end, I think the game was not that bad, but it is certainly not memorable. One does not miss out on anything with this game and for this reason, I would not recommend playing it, unless you wanted to experience every game in the series, like I did back then.
When I wanted to play all the games in the Wolfenstein series, I eventually came across this one, simply called “Wolfenstein”. It serves as a loose sequel to Return to Castle Wolfenstein but can be, as far as I am concerned, treated like a standalone game.
In Wolfenstein, you play as the hero we know and love, William B.J. Blazkowicz. It takes place in some town called Isenstadt in the setting of World War II. If you thought that the original Wolfenstein and Return to Castle Wolfenstein had some wacky and crazy stories, you haven’t seen this one. Here, the Germans are excavating some ancient site in order to harvest rare “Nachtsonne” crystals, which they need to access the so called “Black Sun” dimension in order to harvest great power, used for turning the tide in the war. As the game progresses, the town of Isenstadt changes for the worst and normal German patrols are replaced by supernatural, ghost-like monster things.
In the previous game, Blazkowicz acquired a strange artifact called the Thule Medallion. William meets up with a resistance group called the Kreisau Circle and enters the town of Isenstadt. Here he learns of the strange voodoo that the Germans are pulling of with the excavations and the purpose of the Medallion. He learns that he can use the power of the Thule artifact to enter “The Veil”, a barrier between Earth and the Black Sun dimension, introducing the unique mechanic of the game in which you can run faster, spot enemies in the dark and go through doors with the Black Sun symbol on it. Blazkowicz eventually faces General Zetta, who is actually some kind of abomination when viewed through the Veil dimension. William whoops his ass and returns to town, in a new location that the resistance has set up, to avoid retaliation from the Germans. His buddy Caroline Becker is captured by the Germans, now lead by Blazkowicz’s arch enemy, general Deathshead. Like usual, Deathshead is building some kind of superweapon with the crystals. William travels to the castle that Caroline and Deathshead are in, confronts many enemies and some bosses who all guard the superweapon and eventually reaches Deathshead himself. In true Wolfenstein fashion, Deathshead escapes and William blows up the castle and rescues his chick. He goes after the Zeppelin that Deathshead escaped in and manages to bring it down. In the end credits, a wounded Deathshead crawls out of the crashed Zeppelin and the game is ready for the next follow up.
Wolfenstein plays in the same style as its predecessor. It is a First Person Shooter in which you hold a variety of weapons and gather more guns as you progress. The game follows a linear path but allows for backtracking during areas. It has some new and unique features however, like the black market, in which you can upgrade your held weapons and the new Thule Medallion, which let you enter the Veil and can be upgraded to use more special abilities like slow time, shielding, and dodging projectiles. For this reason, you need to be on the lookout for crystals and cash, making this some sort of FPS RPG. There are some scripted events of course in which you are forced to use a certain power of the Medallion, not allowing for different approaches to the situation, but this is fine.
The graphics in Wolfenstein are really nice for the time period. They look polished and the lighting and blue smoke effects are stunning. This game felt really next gen for the time. Explosion effects and the detail is all great.
In terms of sound design and music, this game is all right. The voice acting is good and the sound effects, like gunfire, are fine. The music is a little generic but it works.
I have to say that the so called “Motion Comics” where a nice addition, but at the same time, a desperate attempt of tying this game to the main series. In these comics, different pieces of story and past events from multiple Wolfenstein games are shown from The Spear of Destiny, Return to Castle Wolfenstein and the final battle with the Fuhrer himself in the first game.
The biggest problem I had with this game is that it just did not feel like a true sequel, it was just there and did not offer that satisfying feeling of continuing the story like the previous and following games.
The Multiplayer was terrible and broken at release but has been fixed later on with a massive patch. The only problem is that no one played this game anymore in a matter of months, so this can be considered a failure.
Nowadays, Wolfenstein (2009) is some sort of obscure relic, with almost no platform that offers it. It is not on Steam, the PlayStation store or the XBOX Live Store. The only way to experience this game as far as I know, is by buying it physically second hand somewhere, or really search the deepest pits of the internet.
In the end, I think the game was not that bad, but it is certainly not memorable. One does not miss out on anything with this game and for this reason, I would not recommend playing it, unless you wanted to experience every game in the series, like I did back then.
Wolfenstein 2009 is a really great shooter that offers a better story than its predecessor, Return to Castle Wolfenstein. The gameplay feels more realistic, and its health system and mechanics remind me of the Call of Duty series, particularly Call of Duty 2.
It is a game that follows very well the line of the 2007-2012 videogames, it is a corridor of easy challenges for a shooting game.
Other than that, Wolfenstein is a runner to shoot and have fun being a scary Nazi killer, it works. It's not "Return of the Castle Wolfenstein", but it's an excellent reboot (it's challenges that only require the verb "to shoot", as it should be) that leads to the next ones I'd love to play so much, New Order and New Collosus are important sequels to this one.
Other than that, Wolfenstein is a runner to shoot and have fun being a scary Nazi killer, it works. It's not "Return of the Castle Wolfenstein", but it's an excellent reboot (it's challenges that only require the verb "to shoot", as it should be) that leads to the next ones I'd love to play so much, New Order and New Collosus are important sequels to this one.