Game - Wolfenstein: The New Order (Xbox One)

After the solid but uninspired Wolfenstein (2009), we did Nazi this coming.

It's 1946, and the war is still going. The events of the previous games in the series could be explained away as the behind-the-scenes classified goings-on of World War II: Hitler's interest in the paranormal, and the Nazis' desperation for a technological or scientific edge to win the war are oft-portrayed elements of WWII fiction, sometimes with grounding in reality. But here, the series verges totally into alternate history: having dropped their fixation on ghosts and ghouls, the Nazis have turned to their resident mad scientist Wilhelm 'Deathshead' Strasse, and his technological terrors are winning them the war. This latest entry in the Wolfenstein franchise begins with an all-out Allied assault on Deathshead's Baltic compound: a last-ditch attempt to cut the head off the snake before the war is lost. Needless to say, it doesn't work and BJ and co. need to flee with their tails between their legs, but not before some shrapnel gets lodged in BJ's bonce and leaves him drooling in a wheelchair in a Polish sanatorium for the next 14 years, during which time he inexplicably doesn't age or suffer from muscle atrophy, but hey-ho. Prolonged sessions of physiotherapy would make for a laudably different tutorial, but in BJ's own words, the game is about "strangling, stabbing, shooting Nazis". Consistency being sacrificed in the name of entertainment is nothing new, though, and it would doubtless be rather disappointing for BJ and the player if Deathshead, looking pretty ragged even by the 1946 prologue, popped his wizened jackboots peacefully in his four-poster bed with swastika sheets and eagle headboard in the interim before BJ's rude awakening.

You can expect to see these guys a lot.

Revived in 1960 by a Nazi attack on the asylum he's recovering in, BJ is disconcerted to discover that the war is over, the Allied nations have capitulated or been crushed, the Resistance is all but a memory and the Nazis rule the world (and, courtesy of an Iron Sky-style lunar base, the Moon)! Escaping with the nurse who tended him for 14 years, Anya, BJ is convinced there are surviving Resistance fighters, and determines to hook up with them and take the fight back to the Nazis. Although the Nazis now have a globe-spanning empire to deal with, the game wisely restricts its focus to BJ and the Resistance's long-standing vendetta against the Reich's primary dealer of death, Wilhelm 'Deathshead' Strasse.

Evolution of a hero: Return to Castle Wolfenstein (2001), Wolfenstein
(2009), Wolfenstein: The New Order (2014)

Returning as the player character and gaming's premier meatheaded, growly-voiced slab of steak is B.J. Blazkowicz. However, Machine Games have innovated here as well: no longer a guttural growler with a voice like the Elgin Marbles going through a rock tumbler, Blazkowicz is injected with some real personality, courtesy of excellent writing and a surprisingly nuanced performance from Brian Bloom. Instead of being an implacable walking engine of destruction - and let's face it, he still is to a large degree - Blazkowicz comes across as tired and war-weary: he doesn't continue to survive and fight because he's a hero, but because he's a soldier who's had the good fortune to survive fighting Nazis long enough to become exceedingly good at it. Many characters mention that Blazko (not commonly referred to as BJ anymore. One wonders why.) seems born to kill Nazis, and the character's obvious discomfort at several instances throughout the game pointedly illustrate his worries about what he has become, and his fear that, once victory is attained, he will no longer be able to function doing anything else. One memorable episode features a protracted sewer-swimming sequence - no enemy encounters, just BJ left alone with his thoughts and the occasional interjection of guidance from his mission control on the radio. The game takes the time to use BJ's voiceover to give glimpses of his childhood: other times he's swum in deep, dark or dangerous waters are referenced - rescuing his father's watch, diving in a lake, falling in a pond, along with a fan-pleasing reference to the sewers beneath Deathshead's X-Labs, one of the more memorably punishing levels in Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Character-building and nuance are nothing new to video game writing, but their compelling appearance in this franchise is a welcome surprise.

Evolution of a madman: Return to Castle Wolfenstein (2001),
Wolfenstein (2009), Wolfenstein: The New Order (2014)

Deathshead, who cunningly survived the previous two games by dint of not even attempting to fight Blazkowicz himself, here appears as the main villain in place of a curiously absent Hitler. A Führer or Leader is mentioned occasionally throughout but never seen or alluded to by the main characters, and is normally read about attending some kind of ribbon-cutting or speaking event: the 'Leader' may be the ruler of the Nazi Empire, but Deathshead is clearly the engine powering the Nazi war machine. Dwight Schultz (aided by Kaspar Eichel, for his German dialogue, of which I am sadly much less of a judge) turns in a powerfully chilling performance, cunningly making use of misplaced stresses and pauses to suggest not only the character's mental instability, but even something as subtle-but-obvious as the impression that this character rarely speaks English and is a little out of practice. All of the villains, in fact, are infinitely smug and despicable, spouting the Nazi rhetoric of racial superiority, that previous games shied away from portraying, with fanatical conviction. The result is that the Nazis are treated more seriously than their comic-book-villain portrayals in movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark or The Rocketeer, but are kept over-the-top enough that they are never permitted the undeserved dignity of being displayed as anything other than the psychopathic fanatics that they are.

Anya, Blazkowicz's potential love interest, is equally well-developed, and though in the end she does little more than act as BJ's mission control, she demonstrates her capability and strong will throughout the game. The ladies of the game are all served rather well, in fact: Caroline Becker, especially, is a strong character - crippled but resilient, she effectively runs the resistance from her wheelchair, proving herself a capable intellectual foil to the machinations of Wilhelm Strasse. Holding up the ladies' end for the bad guys is Frau Engel, a concentration camp commandant, whose sadistic test of Blazkowicz' racial purity when they meet by chance in a train dining car is one of the most masterfully tense moments in any game I have ever played. For those who are interested to know, this is definitely a game that passes the Bechdel Test.

Deathshead's Ubersoldats return with a new lick of paint,
as dangerous and resilient as ever.

In addition to its loathsome core villains, the game supplies a bountiful range of Nazi foot soldiers and elites for players to shoot, stab, zap and explode their way through, but the lack of a paranormal component to the game thins out the ghosts, zombies, ghouls and demons from the Nazi ranks that previous games offered. The basic troops and officers are given unique and impressively varying models and colour palettes based on location (Berlin, Prison, U-Boat, London, Africa, the Moon) and broken up with a selection of shotgun troops, rocket launcher troops, bionic guard dogs, giant security robots, flying machine-gun drones, and old favourites Deathshead's hulking Super Soldiers, still occupying the role of punishingly damaging bullet soaks that will require either your strongest weapons or all your patience to overcome. The range of weapons to combat them with is small but versatile, with every weapon packing an alternate-fire mode unlocked gradually throughout the campaign rather than instantly, encouraging the player to revisit old weapons to gain the edge over new enemy types. This being said, the basic assault rifle and silenced pistol are versatile enough to see you through all but the most dangerous encounters, and it is no coincidence that the sections where these weapons are taken away from you are some of the game's most difficult.

The game's locations are exotic and interesting, taking in sewers (of course), a Nazi super-prison, a U-Boat, Deathshead's compound and research-facility, and a Nazi airbase and museum of technology in London. There is also a fairly lengthy mission as BJ goes undercover in a concentration camp, and while some may be disappointed that the developers shied away from portraying the majority of the horrors the Nazis perpetrated in such places, I don't think it is unfair to suggest that they may have realised that they could never do such subject matter justice and avoided it as a matter of taste. Aside from the hideout that acts as a hub for the majority of BJ's missions, only two locations are reused in different missions, and the developers are careful to focus on different areas within those missions, meaning the reuse of assets or locations is limited. The 16 levels are surprisingly large and sprawling for a modern FPS - many missions will probably take 40 mins to an hour to complete, especially on a first playthrough, and that's only on the Normal difficulty. In stark contrast to the Call of Duty titles which like to aggressively railroad you in one direction, The New Order's levels will always provide multiple routes to each objective, but the way forward never becomes unclear through canny level design and the use of prominent features and lighting to highlight the way, as well as the presence of maps (Maps! In a modern triple-A FPS title!) that suggest alternate routes as well as the presence of hidden collectibles, like the series' stalwart golden relics, world-building letters, or additional game-mode unlocking Enigma code pieces. Stealth is always available as an option,

Although it's nearly a launch title for the new generation,

The New Order looks damn fine. The basic pistol looks more

detailed than a Halo 3 tank.

encouraged by the insta-kill throwing knife and an array of satisfying but not overlong melee kill animations, but the game doesn't unduly punish you if you either suck at it or simply choose to ignore it, and the reinforcements the officers call in when you've been detected will likely only overwhelm players who don't use cover well, or who don't kill the officers and instead give them free reign to keep summoning hordes of jackbooted stormtroopers.

The dual timeline conceit, based on which of two squadmates you choose to save in the prologue mission, is little more than a gimmick, sadly, only altering a few lines throughout the game, and determining which of the two BJ gets as a sidekick during the main campaign, as well as which of two different but both underdeveloped Resistance characters appear in the main hideout from which BJ's missions are launched. The only gameplay-affecting changes are that one timeline offers BJ the opportunity to find pick-ups upgrading his maximum health, and the other allows him to upgrade the value of his armour pick-ups; one timeline allows BJ to hotwire keypads to access secret areas, whereas the other allows him to pick locks to access different secret areas. As a result, there will only be a smattering of spots across the game where it matters which timeline the player is in. Fortunately, there is a much more effective added incentive to replay, in the form of a 'perk' levelling system that gradually unlocks new or improved abilities as you play. Shoot an enemy making him drop his grenade and blow himself up? You now take less damage from explosives. Get 5 stealth-kills with your knife in a row? You can now throw the knife for an instant kill. Dedicated players who hop back to the skills menu every minute and specifically target the perks system could probably attain all the unlockable skills in one playthrough, but for most it will probably require a second or third run-through.

On the whole, this is a triumphant return for the grandfather of FPSs. The New Order doesn't really innovate much, but what there is is accomplished with such skill, flair and polish that it's impossible to dislike it, and the lack of a multiplayer mode allows for a supremely polished and focussed singleplayer campaign. The few complaints are so minor that they can't even come close to derailing what is an extremely solid and competent game and a promising herald for the future of next-gen First Person Shooters.

9/10 - Guten tag, indeed.