Techtite's PC Game Reviews!

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"The little Details..." 

Much like Star Trek Armada 2, this is a sequel with more than a few added touches worth saluting, that help enhance the whole game. Sheer curtains on the windows blow in the wind, for example. Secrets are rewarded if you shoot and destroy some portraits of Hitler. In case you wondered --not that you'll get the chance often-- though the uber-female elite guards even have a little feminine "wiggle" to their walk. It's little touches like these that make the good games great. 

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Return to Wolfenstein: Prima's Official Strategy Guide

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Finally, ID Software offers a game sequel requested for almost a decade by now; a sequel to the widely popular classic game, that made ID what it is today: Wolfenstein 3D. That action game had you fighting the Nazis, including Hitler himself; what could be cooler? This was a game series that should've been resurrected in the days of the Doom game engine, the Quake game engine, or the Quake 2 game engine. Now, the nearly-flawless Quake III Arena engine offers us what we've waited years for...and if you ask me, it was more than worth the wait.

Multiplayer is based, as I implied, on the Quake III Arena Game engine, so you know it as to be good. So let's concentrate on the Single-Player game. The story involves the return of Army Ranger Blazkowicz, who, in the first game, bravely escaped a jail cell in Castle Wolfenstein, then turned the tables around until even Hitler was defeated. This is a few years later, when secret experiments are taking place in Wolfenstein, and they need someone to infiltrate the stronghold and find out what their secret project is. The "Office of Secret Actions" has chosen the man who once escaped there for the job...i.e., you. Cool.

Of course, the game doesn't just involve Wolfenstein. Additional missions involve obtaining an experimental weapon, or sneaking aboard a truck into a secret base. There are some very challenging missions here --much more so than most ID Software games-- and some require a bit of thought, not brute force. At least two missions are so secretive that allowing any Nazi soldier to activate an alarm, automatically scrubs the mission. This is similar to one of the most gripping levels of No One Lives Forever, and it's a welcome addition here.

As for enemies, they are more than just Nazi soldiers, as well. One of the earlier "bosses," for example, is the head of some sort of Witches Coven, that is experimenting with resurrecting the undead for additional soldiers. This means two added enemies; some very powerful skeleton/undead warriors, and some even more challenging members of an all-female "Elite Guard," who jump and dodge your attacks like Olympic Gymnasts. I fully recommend sneaking up to some of these guards at least once; they are way too well modeled (ahem), to go unnoticed. Later --and you knew they had to be there somewhere-- there are a few cyborg super-soldiers to fight, which ID Software seems to add to all their games, even if it has to be brought in, kicking and screaming, into a 1940's wartime environment.

Admittedly, such ingenuity in game levels must lead to more than a few holes in this story, though they add to the fun, not distract. For instance, when the OSA chief is informed that the Nazis are attempting to make soldiers that are half robots, he's surprisingly aware of robotics, for someone in the pre-computer age of the mid-1940's. For that matter, so are the Nazis, who use technology that often looks like something from a James Bond film. There's also the little complication of the first game allowing you, in the final level, to defeat Hitler himself. So, who's the main bad guy, here? As the opening movie implies, the Nazis are attempting to resurrect some ancient overlord...apparently, to take his place. Whatever; it makes for a cool game experience, anyway.

It's obvious ID Software is learning a little from other successful games, and that's a very good thing. The concept of "shoot everything moving" games is getting old, and people want that lifelike aspect, of having to discern who is an enemy and who is not. There is the occasional barmaid to be seen, as well as housemaids and other unarmed civilians. Accidentally shooting any of them is an automatic game-over. In addition, there are 

The best trait of this game is the life-like characters. This goes beyond the high-res textures. Sneak up to a guard, for example (or use the rifle scope) and sneak a look at them smoking a cigarette, complete with smoke coming out their mouth, and ending with them dropping the cig and stepping it out with their foot. It's a simple animation (so simple, you may likely miss it), and yet it's effective in setting the mood. Likewise for the A.I., particularly if you throw a grenade. These guys aren't totally ignorant (well, aside from being Nazis, of course), and will run away from a grenade if they see it coming. Imagine my surprise when, with only grenades left to fight with, one of the female elite guards casually kicked the grenade right back at my character! Talk about artificial sassiness.

It's a small shame, however, that the folks that once paved the road for new game technology, now seem to be borrowing from other works. Even the voice actors are unmistakably from other games (particularly No One Lives Forever), though some alternate game styles have been duplicated as well. Sneak quietly, and you might overhear a conversation or two, just like the Thief series, or N.O.L.F. Find secret areas and retrieve hidden gold treasure, a la Thief: The Dark Project. Some levels look like something out of Heretic 2; others look like a salute to that cool thriller released earlier this year, Clive Barker's Undying. Mind you, these are some great games, and they deserve to be imitated frequently. However, it's a shame that ID Software, which once was the teacher of what-to-do in gaming, has now become the student. The end result is my only gripe with the game; no matter how cool it is, there is that uncanny feeling you've played half these levels before, in other games. Be that as it may, they were award-winning games, so the fun is still there.

In the end, there is a lot to like about this game, and you even get to play Quake III Arena type multiplayer games, in WW2 settings that allow you to fight against Nazis galore. That alone is cool. The game is also sold, for a limited time, in a special-edition collector's tin, complete with a Wolfenstein iron-on patch and a fold-out poster of all the game's main characters. Aside from the feelings of "game cloning" mentioned above, I can't think of a better sequel to a classic game series, and an awesome upgrade to the Wolf3D world. Fans of that game should be very, very pleased.