By finding and killing them in secret, you can mitigate the challenges presented by specific areas while illuminating the locations of secret items on your map (like gold, Enigma codes, and letters).

I also enjoyed the inclusion of special enemies with the ability to call endless reinforcements if you're spotted. Slinking around wide-open maps and linear corridors - knife in hand - is satisfying, especially when you score a stealthy kill with a slash or toss of your blade or the shot of a silenced pistol. Gunplay is fun and fluid, though I have to question the inclusion of dual-wielding, which, while cool in theory, is exceptionally cumbersome and entirely inadequate in heated firefights.Ĭombat is made more dynamic by a heavy emphasis on stealth, which is both a blessing and a curse in The New Order. Blazcowicz has a typical array of weapons at his disposal - a knife, a pistol, a machinegun, a sniper rifle, and so on - as well as some Nazi future tech, like laser rifles, that give the game the alternate history feel that Wolfenstein has thrived on for 22 years. Then again, when it comes to mechanics, The New Order doesn't do much to differentiate itself from the glut of shooters that come out every year. Neo-Berlin is frighteningly beautiful in its order and grandeur, yet quainter, picturesque moments can also be found out in the wilderness, for instance when Blazcowicz escapes from a hospital in Poland early in the campaign and gets his first look at the blue sky in 14 years. It's pretty, too, both in-game and during cutscenes, especially when you get a chance to marvel at some of its open vistas and cityscapes. The New Order plays and runs well, though you'll encounter occasional texture pop-in and some poor audio mixing that frustratingly drowns out some well-acted voices.

Wolfenstein's bloody brutality, especially when it comes to those Blazcowicz loves, only makes it easier to be sympathetic. Virtually everyone around him - from the fiendish General Deathshead to the brave Caroline Becker - also command attention. You get to see an interesting side to him that makes it easy to become invested in his journey, and he's not the only character who's worth noting, either. But when you fast-forward to 1960, Blazcowicz is older and smarter, hardened by his experiences in the post-war, Nazi-controlled world. You catch a glimpse of him 14 years before the events of the main campaign in a shockingly weak intro sequence that takes forever to put an actual gun in your hand, and at that point, he's more unrelenting meathead than poet laureate. The Wolfenstein series' longtime hero - BJ Blazcowicz - returns, though he's deeper, better written, and more fleshed-out than he's ever been.

Wolfenstein the new order cutscenes