Wish I was writing reviews when I played this. It's all over the place in terms of experience.
To me, the classic FPS games of this time are historically relevant but nigh unplayable. If there were some QOL improvements, a remade version would be alright.
Hey so you can actually deal with the terrible level design with a pretty advanced strategy... WARNING: FOR PRO WOLFENSTEIN PLAYERS ONLY!!! It's called "No-Clipping Through Doors Instead of Searching 15 Minutes For A Key"
This review contains spoilers
Good DLC, and a welcome change in scenery.
In the league of the “big three”, the father of all FPS games today can, of course, not be excluded. Wolfenstein 3D is the foundation of all the great FPS games today, from other classics to the modern titles.
Like DOOM and Duke Nukem 3D, I played this game as one of the first titles in my gaming career as a kid, failed miserably and needed to take revenge on it at a later age. Then, in 2014, I decided that it was time and I finally finished this hard son of a b… It was all worth it and the nice blast of nostalgia that came with it, was worth the wait.
In Wolfenstein 3D, you play as the legendary hero B.J. Blazkowicz, who must escape from the prison Castle Wolfenstein and carry out his secret mission against the nazi’s. You start one of the three main episodes which form the story and blast your way through the prison. You need to find the plans for “Operation: Eisenfaust”, a plan to create an army of undead mutants to ensure nazi victory over Europe. You find the plans, venture deeper into Castle Wolfenstein and eventually fight the Fuhrer himself, in a big ass mecha suit.
After this (or before), you can play the three prequel episodes called “The Nocturnal Missions”, in which you find plans for chemical weapons that the Germans are planning to use in favor of the war. You eventually confront the German General behind these plans in Castle Offenbach and stop him.
Graphicly, Wolfenstein 3D looks amazing for its time. The whole 3D perspective was mind blowing back then and even today, it still holds up. There are many other 3D games out there, especially on the SNES and Megadrive that looked a lot worse and are, in my opinion, unplayable today. The graphic nature of this game, along with all the nazi art is something unique, and of course, the source of much controversy, especially in certain countries, like my neighbors in Germany.
When talking sound, the guns all sound really good, especially for a game this old. The German spoken by the enemies is spot on (when understood) and the big blue guys even scream “Mein Leben” when shot down, something that I think is really cool, even to this day.
The gameplay, movement and animation is all really fluent, and it is this basis that laid the foundation for great games like DOOM, Duke Nukem and Half Life. The best example of this, is when playing Wolfenstein: The New Order, and you play realistic graphics and movement in the old Wolfenstein 3D world.
Although not fair, the only problem I had with Wolfenstein 3D, while finishing it, was the repetitive nature. This is surely also present in a way with games like DOOM, but in Wolfenstein 3D, everything looks the same all the way through. It made it a little bit harder to finish. Nevertheless, it was not all that bad overall.
The DLC Spear of Destiny is a welcome diversity from the main game. In this DLC, you fight in a tunnel themed map, giving you a break from the grey bunker walls. In Spear of Destiny, you can play two campaigns, each in another nazi base, but eventually with the same goal: retrieve the Spear of Destiny that the Germans have stolen from Versailles. God only knows what they were planning with it, but you saved the day like the hero you are.
In the end, I enjoyed Wolfenstein 3D. It remains an all time classic. However, from the “big three”, I think I prefer Duke Nukem 3D and DOOM over this one, based on their variety. Although it is not a fair comparison because this game came first, it is just a little too linear and repetitive today.
Still would recommend this relic from the past.
In the league of the “big three”, the father of all FPS games today can, of course, not be excluded. Wolfenstein 3D is the foundation of all the great FPS games today, from other classics to the modern titles.
Like DOOM and Duke Nukem 3D, I played this game as one of the first titles in my gaming career as a kid, failed miserably and needed to take revenge on it at a later age. Then, in 2014, I decided that it was time and I finally finished this hard son of a b… It was all worth it and the nice blast of nostalgia that came with it, was worth the wait.
In Wolfenstein 3D, you play as the legendary hero B.J. Blazkowicz, who must escape from the prison Castle Wolfenstein and carry out his secret mission against the nazi’s. You start one of the three main episodes which form the story and blast your way through the prison. You need to find the plans for “Operation: Eisenfaust”, a plan to create an army of undead mutants to ensure nazi victory over Europe. You find the plans, venture deeper into Castle Wolfenstein and eventually fight the Fuhrer himself, in a big ass mecha suit.
After this (or before), you can play the three prequel episodes called “The Nocturnal Missions”, in which you find plans for chemical weapons that the Germans are planning to use in favor of the war. You eventually confront the German General behind these plans in Castle Offenbach and stop him.
Graphicly, Wolfenstein 3D looks amazing for its time. The whole 3D perspective was mind blowing back then and even today, it still holds up. There are many other 3D games out there, especially on the SNES and Megadrive that looked a lot worse and are, in my opinion, unplayable today. The graphic nature of this game, along with all the nazi art is something unique, and of course, the source of much controversy, especially in certain countries, like my neighbors in Germany.
When talking sound, the guns all sound really good, especially for a game this old. The German spoken by the enemies is spot on (when understood) and the big blue guys even scream “Mein Leben” when shot down, something that I think is really cool, even to this day.
The gameplay, movement and animation is all really fluent, and it is this basis that laid the foundation for great games like DOOM, Duke Nukem and Half Life. The best example of this, is when playing Wolfenstein: The New Order, and you play realistic graphics and movement in the old Wolfenstein 3D world.
Although not fair, the only problem I had with Wolfenstein 3D, while finishing it, was the repetitive nature. This is surely also present in a way with games like DOOM, but in Wolfenstein 3D, everything looks the same all the way through. It made it a little bit harder to finish. Nevertheless, it was not all that bad overall.
The DLC Spear of Destiny is a welcome diversity from the main game. In this DLC, you fight in a tunnel themed map, giving you a break from the grey bunker walls. In Spear of Destiny, you can play two campaigns, each in another nazi base, but eventually with the same goal: retrieve the Spear of Destiny that the Germans have stolen from Versailles. God only knows what they were planning with it, but you saved the day like the hero you are.
In the end, I enjoyed Wolfenstein 3D. It remains an all time classic. However, from the “big three”, I think I prefer Duke Nukem 3D and DOOM over this one, based on their variety. Although it is not a fair comparison because this game came first, it is just a little too linear and repetitive today.
Still would recommend this relic from the past.
More of the same gameplay, worse levels.
If you really needed more Wolfenstein 3D in your life, this should do it. It doesn't add anything new though and the levels annoying and not that fun.
When you find a secret, when randomly mashing the walls, get ready to run a marathon in these long purple hallways to eventually get to a room full of generals. That shit sucks.
The mission packs are objectively bad though. Everything is blue for some reason and the walls are even more repetitive than usual. I would rather endure cock and ball torture than the bat enemies.
If you really needed more Wolfenstein 3D in your life, this should do it. It doesn't add anything new though and the levels annoying and not that fun.
When you find a secret, when randomly mashing the walls, get ready to run a marathon in these long purple hallways to eventually get to a room full of generals. That shit sucks.
The mission packs are objectively bad though. Everything is blue for some reason and the walls are even more repetitive than usual. I would rather endure cock and ball torture than the bat enemies.
Played using the ECWolf Source port.
This expansion of Wolfenstein 3D basically takes everything I disliked about the base game and made it worse! Despite this, I think this does get over-hated, it really isn't THAT much different than Regular Wolf3D. This review is not about the Mission Packs though so idk how bad those are.
It feels like most levels, especially in the second half, were designed to be as obnoxious and tedious as possible. just about every level will be filled with humongous labyrinths, Enemies in super cheap spots, and really just cheap level design in general. you'll constantly be required to backtrack through every level 3 times over, all while dealing with a ridiculously high enemy count.
Halfway through the game they bring back the "mutants" which are like robot Nazi's, and these guys are such a pain in the ass cause they will deal damage to you almost instantly. They just make an already exhausting run even more grueling.
I think this expansion was built with purely making challenge, and they disregarded making the game fun. This is really just not that fun, just a challenging gauntlet of absurd level design and cheap placements.
I Don't have much else to say on this one, it's neat that they basically tease Doom at the end, but uhh yeah, just not a good time, feels like more of a chore than anything.
This expansion of Wolfenstein 3D basically takes everything I disliked about the base game and made it worse! Despite this, I think this does get over-hated, it really isn't THAT much different than Regular Wolf3D. This review is not about the Mission Packs though so idk how bad those are.
It feels like most levels, especially in the second half, were designed to be as obnoxious and tedious as possible. just about every level will be filled with humongous labyrinths, Enemies in super cheap spots, and really just cheap level design in general. you'll constantly be required to backtrack through every level 3 times over, all while dealing with a ridiculously high enemy count.
Halfway through the game they bring back the "mutants" which are like robot Nazi's, and these guys are such a pain in the ass cause they will deal damage to you almost instantly. They just make an already exhausting run even more grueling.
I think this expansion was built with purely making challenge, and they disregarded making the game fun. This is really just not that fun, just a challenging gauntlet of absurd level design and cheap placements.
I Don't have much else to say on this one, it's neat that they basically tease Doom at the end, but uhh yeah, just not a good time, feels like more of a chore than anything.
Хорошее дополнение к оригинальной Wolfenstein 3D. Совместимо с модом Brutal Wolfenstein, так что проходить будет ещё приятнее!
This review contains spoilers
The Angel of Death was cool as hell! The rest of the game? It's fine. It's just more Wolfenstein 3D.
It's more Wolfenstein, not much to it
Wolf 3D but way worse
Complete playthrough (all three mission packs). Wolfenstein 3D, but moreso, this standalone expansion follows much the same formula with few additions (one new enemy type is about all), but levels are typically much larger. While this might be seen as a positive in being more content, most are quite labyrinthine, to the point that it detracts from the experience - especially as mission pack 2 onwards features a lot of levels with mandatory routes hidden in 'secret' walls. With little indication of where these are - there's no graphical difference, just occasional aspects of the level design might suggest their presence - finding them becomes largely guesswork, which just isn't much fun. Regardless, the enjoyable core of the game is still present so, while there's little depth to the gameplay, Spear of Destiny is a decent enough experience all told.