A way to dissapoint fans of the Wolfenstein series. Obtuse graphics, AI and Story. Nothing interesting.

User Rating: 2 | Wolfenstein PC
In 1982 Muse Software published "Castle Wolfenstein", and by that time no one could guess, that it would set the bases for the father of all first person shooters. Even by 1992, when ID Software published "Wolfenstein 3D", there were lots of similar games, but none settled the standards so high. It was a revolution, a brutal change that marked a new era, the first step in a up going stair with titles like Doom, Duke Nukem 3D, Quake, etc.

The feeling, of walking the dark corners of a Nazi occupied castle, filled with soldiers, strange experiments, and 7ft. tall bosses was indeed a great experience, the beginning of a series that had a lot of potential. The second title of the saga, "Return to Castle Wolfenstein" (November 2001) clearly followed the path, breaking all the rules, showing the gaming world that improvements were possible when the spirit was strong. The game was exquisite, in both Single and Multiplayer modes, a great community of fans of the last mode gave credit to a great initiative.

Finally, 8 years after, ID Software and Raven mainly published "Wolfestein" (August 2009), and it was a clear step back. This review will focus on the single player mode, since I think its quite soon to judge the multiplayer mode.

The disc burns in my hands, I have to set in into the drive as an injection of ID pleasure, a long waited injection of Wolf pleasure. In my mind the images of a bombed castle, undead knights brought back to life by dark rituals, the atmosphere of a true adventure… I want more!... Done, the icons are on my desktop, and two rapid clicks got me into the game that most of the fans waited for eight long years.

A sharp looking interface, blood pumping rapidly from my heart, seconds away. Highest graphic settings, highest difficulty settings, game on!... As when a movie start, every gamer wants to get in the plot, and I submerged into the plot. Minutes latter, I had nothing in my brain, but the incoming images of a train, and a familiar graphic engine. "Wait a minute, I´ve seen this before"…

I knew it!!! ID Tech 4, Doom 3´s engine is here, improved, disguised, but still there. A 2004 source, a DirectX 8.0 game engine running on a DirectX 10.1 GPU, my first thought: "Isn´t this 2009?" A detonation on a wagon, and then we are all flying, a weird ectoplasmic substance gets me on the air, and my emotion suddenly finds gravity again, falling hard to the ground. A Nazi flag stops my flight, a weird border texture simulates the pain of the character, and finally a mediocre AI gives me the chills, a final thought of that hard round of obstacles to my inspiration, "I want to click Quit".

I get myself together again, and a few hours latter I still have nothing. The veil of mystery wanted to set upon me, but seems quite impossible as the graphic interface shows weird textures in a poor designed village, and a story taking too much of my time to show its plot. No challenge at all, my MP40´s bullets constantly hits practice targets, instead of Nazis trying to kill me.

Killed a boss, finally something that calls my soul back to the game. Halfway in and I have the feeling of watching a bad movie, I keep saying to myself: "I invested 10 hours in this, got to end it".

I finished the last part of this trilogy of games, time to write my disappointment.

There was nothing to point out of this game, except the bosses. Nothing original about it, I had the feeling of playing "Undying" again, even when I didn't install it. As I see life, every emotion has to be felt to actually know them, so I encourage people to play it, but this is my final score (1 minimum – 10 maximum):

Graphics : 3 (Bad) // Logic: Nothing new, an old engine slightly improved, nothing to be proud of. Way behind of the engines fueling this year games, or even 2007-2008 games. Lacks of atmosphere in a story that demands it.

Gameplay: 5 (Regular) // Logic: The character runs in a dorky way, the weapons are the only thing that reminded me of the previous game. Flying around its unnecessary and creates a disconnection between the player and the action.

Story: 2 (Awful) // Logic: Boring, slow, dull, almost no emotion.

Overall: 2 (Awful // Logic: Nothing new, nothing interesting, a mayor setback for a very good title. Story fails getting players to buy it, a disappointing way of wasting time.