Wolfenstein (2009)
It's a pity that this game had some good things, very creative elements. However, ultimately, it fails to present something more than just a regular FPS from the 2000s. I think that many of the devs have worked on Jedi Knight 2, because there are some striking similarities between Wolfenstein and JK2. The most important one would be the powers. In Wolfenstein you have a medallion which grants mystical powers which are very similar to force powers. The level design of both games relied heavily on the player having to activate certain powers to find secrets or to use them to pass through certain parts.
This iteration was clearly more modern than the previous iteration, Return to the Castle of Wolfenstein. They reused the idea of gold hunting, but now you can spend the cash to buy upgrades. A very nice addition. The level design is superior to the previous game, because now they applied much more modern design techniques. There is a good sense of progression with the player finding more gold, buying upgrades and gaining powers. It's very similar to how JK2 was built, except that JK2 didn't had any form of weapon upgrades. It was all about the force powers.
From all parts of Wolfenstein I think that the level design was the one that I was most impressed with. They clearly tried very hard to integrate the powers of the medallion into the levels to create a good sense of exploration and enticing the player with interactive environments. It's a hub-like structure, with a main city split into two areas and each area has a path leading to the levels where the missions take place. In some ways it reminded me of how Bioshock was structured. Once you are done with an area you are brought back to the beginning by means of a shortcut. It's circular level design, the same technique adopted in Rage for instance.
The veil dimension was a very neat concept. You acquire a power that allows you to see hidden secrets and passages that cannot be seen in the real world. The post processing filter was great into making the important things glow to get your attention. Because I played Prey (2006) in the same year I could see similarities between the veil dimension and the spirit walk adopted in Prey.
I think that what made this game lack a stronger appeal was the absence of cutscenes in the middle of missions and the repetitive combat. The powers were all cool and the level design did provide plenty of recharging points. However, the combat repeats the same patterns from start to finish. It's all soldiers, firearms and sometimes a bigger and stronger foe. You do travel to different locations and each own is very well designed with excellent environment art. It lacked some more variation in combat with different challenges to overcome. The interface to buy upgrades and read the text files wasn't optimal and I've found it difficult to navigate at times.
Despite the excellent environment art and level design, sometimes I got lost. The biggest offender was the city hub itself. You travel through it multiple times and sometimes you fight soldiers, while other times it's empty because you have already killed all the enemies before. This abrupt change made me quite lost because I'd often travel backwards, unknowingly, to already visited places and meet NPCs which I have already met before.
From a game's flow perspective I guess this game had some issues. Compare it to JK2. In JK2 you don't need to wander around collecting orbs to gain points and in turn, spend points to upgrade your powers. In Wolfenstein you are forced to wander around looking for gold, which deviates away from the action. The dialogues were good but the pacing was dragging when you were forced to follow an NPC and then go from one room to another just for dialogues.
If I compare this Wolfenstein to The New Order, the latter doesn't have any form of supernatural powers or advanced gadgets such as thermal vision or radars. But it's more engaging. It offers vehicles, character development and even mechas. The older game sticked to the standard formula from the 1990s, gunfire till the end. Personally I don't have anything against the setting or the Black Sun Dimension concept.
