Wolfenstein: The New Order

The new official game cover for The New Order.

Wolfenstein: The New Order is the ninth installment in the Wolfenstein series and was released on May 20, 2014 for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One and Microsoft Windows. It was developed by MachineGames and published by Bethesda Softworks. It is the sequel to 2009's Wolfenstein and utilizes id Software's proprietary game engine id Tech 5. The PC version of the game requires a Steam account and the program to play.

Unlike previous games, it does not have a multiplayer component.

Announcement

We are excited to bring a new chapter of Wolfenstein to gamers everywhere; As fans of the series, working on this game is an honor, and our team is driven to create an unforgettable action-adventure experience that will make FPS fans proud. Jens Matthies, creative director at MachineGames, Zenimax Online Press Release May 2013

The new game was first teased by the Bethesda Softworks twitter feed, before a trailer was exclusively released to GameSpot.com on May 8.

Plot

Three years after the events of Wolfenstein, the Nazis have developed advanced technologies, enabling them to turn the tide against the Allies. In July 1946, agent William "B.J." Blazkowicz (Brian Bloom), accompanied by veteran Scottish pilot Fergus Reid (Gideon Emery) and inexperienced Private Probst Wyatt III (A.J. Trauth), takes part in a massive Allied raid against a fortress and weapons laboratory run by his arch nemesis, General Wilhelm "Deathshead" Strasse (Dwight Schultz). The three are captured and brought to a human experimentation laboratory where Deathshead forces Blazkowicz to choose whether to gruesomely kill and dissect Fergus or Wyatt before leaving Blazkowicz and the survivor to die in the laboratory's emergency incinerator.

They escape the laboratory, but Blazkowicz suffers a critical head injury, rendering him unconscious. He is brought to a psychiatric asylum in Poland, where he remains in a vegetative state. He is cared for by the asylum's head nurse Anya Oliwa (Alicja Bachleda) and her parents, who run the facility. Blazkowicz watches as Anya's parents are regularly forced to hand patients over to Nazi authorities, who deem them subhuman for their disabilities. In 1960, fourteen years after Blazkowicz' admission, the Nazis order that the asylum is to be shut down, killing all the patients and executing Anya's family when they resist. Blazkowicz awakes from his vegetative state as he is about to be executed, killing the extermination squad and escaping the asylum with Anya.

Blazkowicz and Anya drive to her grandparents' farm, where they inform him that the Nazis won the war by forcing the United States to surrender in 1948 with the use of nuclear weapons, and that the members of the ensuing Resistance were captured. Blazkowicz interrogates a captured officer from the asylum, learning that the top members of the Resistance are imprisoned in Berlin. Anya's grandparents smuggle her and Blazkowicz through a checkpoint in Stetting before they travel to Berlin. On the train, Blazkowicz encounters forced labor camp commandant Frau Engel (Nina Franoszek) and her companion Hans "Bubi" Winkle. Engel appears to subject Blazkowicz to a racial purity test before discarding the results and letting him go.

When they arrive, Anya helps Blazkowicz break into the prison, where he rescues the person he spared fourteen years prior. The survivor leads the two of them to the headquarters of the revived Kreisau Circle led by Caroline Becker (Bonita Friedericy), who was left paralyzed due to her injuries at Isenstadt.

Inspired by B.J's return, the Resistance step up their activities by attacking a research center in Nazi-occupied London, stealing secret documents and prototype VTOL aircraft. The documents reveal the Nazis are relying on a heavily improved version of concrete, allowing them to build cities in weeks, but that a saboteur is tampering with their mixture. Cross-referencing the timeline of the tamperings with a list of resistance fighters detained during those times, the Resistance find a match with Set Roth (Mark Ivanir), who is imprisoned in Frau Engel's forced labor camp in Belica. Blazkowicz infiltrates the camp and meets Set, who tells him that the Nazis stole and co-opted technology developed by him and a secret society of Jewish scientists to produce the machines that won the war, and offers to help the Resistance in return for the destruction of the labor camp. Blazkowicz agrees and finds a battery that can power a remote control secretly developed by Set, but is captured by Frau Engel, who recognizes him from the train. As Blazkowicz and Set are about to be executed, he secretly hands Set the battery. Set uses the battery to remotely control the camp's largest robot. The robot then proceeds to disfigure Engel before freeing the two, allowing them to destroy the camp and liberate its prisoners.

With Set's expertise, B.J. and the Kreisau Circle hijack a U-Boat and discover one of the secret society's technological keeps. They use this technology to intercept a top official of a Nazi lunar base, where decryption codes for the U-Boat's nuclear cannons are stored. Blazkowicz kills the official and takes his place, stealing the codes from the lunar base. However, he returns to Earth to find that Frau Engel has raided the Resistance's main hideout, capturing Anya and Set. He evacuates the Resistance hideout with Caroline and the survivor, escaping to the U-Boat.

Equipped with Set's technology, the group raid Deathshead's personal fortress. In the process, Bubi ambushes Blazkowicz only to be viciously executed as Frau Engel watches in horror from a remote camera. After rescuing the captured resistance prisoners and evacuating them, Blazkowicz makes it to the top of the fortress and reaches Deathshead's laboratories. Deathshead greets Blazkowicz, revealing to him that he possesses the brain of the soldier that Blazkowicz chose to die, and puts it in a robot. The robot comes alive and assaults Blazkowicz, who defeats it and puts his friend to rest by destroying the brain. Deathshead then attacks Blazkowicz in a larger robot.

Blazkowicz defeats the robot and drags Deathshead out of its cockpit. However, as he is about to execute Deathshead, the general reveals a hidden grenade that explodes, killing Deathshead and mauls Blazkowicz. As a gravely wounded Blazkowicz crawls towards safety, he watches Caroline, Set and Anya evacuate the prisoners from the beachhead below. He likens Anya holding an electric lantern to the Statue of Liberty, recalling the famous lines of The New Colossus before the survivor requests permission to destroy the fortress with the U-Boat's nuclear cannons. Blazkowicz confirms the order, and the screen cuts to black.

After the credits, a helicopter is heard approaching.

Downloadable Content

Prequel

Coming Soon!

Aftermath 

Coming Soon!

Protagonists

• B.J. Blazkowicz - Famed American hero and OSA agent.
• Anya Oliwa - A nurse who helps B.J. escape from imprisonment and also leads the resistance movement.
• Caroline Becker - Former Kreisau Circle, alive and part of the resistance against the Nazi dominion.
• Probst Wyatt III - Appears to be a former war buddy of BJ. When captured by Deathshead, B.J. has a choice to allow Deathshead to dissect either Fergus or Probst, resulting in alternate timelines.
• Fergus Reid - BJ's squad leader during the Siege on Deathshead's Castle. He is a Scottish war veteran. He is calm and has a good sense of humor. 
• J (Wyatt's Timeline) - An American guitarist who joins the resistance in Berlin. He has fled from America since the Nazi's invasion and finds the Kreisau Circle where the refugees. 
• Klaus Kreutz - A former Nazi agent who leaves the front lines in order to help Caroline Becker to fight back. The reason of his demise is that his wife and child were killed by the Gestapo. He is always taking care of Max Hass. 
• Max Hass - Pacifist who is found by Klaus when Max was hiding behind some dumpsters. He has a head deformation which has resulted in brain damage. His personality is like that of a child, but he is a strong fighter when forced. 
• Bobby Bram - London resistance member who lost his wife during the London occupation by the Nazis.He is deeply depressed and helps B.J. to get into the fortified London Nautica with a car bomb. 
• Set Roth - Secret member of the Da'at Yichud group, who helps the resistance by creating technologically-advanced machines in order to fight back the Nazis. Also, creator of the "super concrete" which the Nazis built their structures. 
• Bombate - An African resistance member who helps the group to fight the Nazis. He participated in assaults in Africa against the Nazi army, but he was captured and sent to the labor camps. 
• Tekla (Fergus Timeline) - A Russian female resistance member, who is very concerned with equations and results, and is constantly thinking on results and reactions to problems. Not much is known about her past. 

Antagonists

• Wilhelm "Deathshead" Strasse - General and scientist of the Nazis. He has been B.J.'s arch nemesis since the events in Return to Castle Wolfenstein. He was also in Wolfenstein 2009, where at the end he dug himself from the rubble of a castle. He's in charge of all the operations in Germania and the Nazi-controlled world. He developed technologies far ahead of the time thanks to the Da'at Yichud tech that was stolen by the Nazis and started several ethical questionable programs to increase the strength of their "superior people".
• Frau Engel - League of German Girls leader. She is also in charge of a large labor camp where B.J. is sent after being captured. 
• Bubi - The "lovely companion" of Frau Engel. He used to be a very low grade student until he reached the necessary age to start working in a prison, where he met Frau Engel and started a romantic relationship.
• Fredrick Keller - A Nazi officer who appears in the Polish asylum the first time. Later in the game, Blazkowicz kills him with a chainsaw during an interrogation.
• The Knife - A sadistic nazi doctor who works in the labor camp, infamous for torturing anyone he chooses.

References to older games

• B.J. Blazkowicz' appearance in The New Order looks very similar to the 2D character from Wolfenstein 3D. This is due to MachineGames wanting B.J. to feel like the original, but with technology incorporated.
• An 8-bit "Get Psyched!" flashes on to the screen right before the opening cutscene, which is a reference to Wolfenstein 3D.
• At the beginning of the game, B.J. has a 'dream' of another life where the war ended in 1945, and he was able to return home, get married, and have children. This is a reference to Julia Marie Peterson and the original post-war timeline.
• The villain Deathshead returns: He was the head of the Übersoldat-project in Return to Castle Wolfenstein (which was destroyed by Blazkowicz) and B.J.'s enemy in Wolfenstein. He survived the zeppelin crash at the end of the game Wolfenstein (2009).
• B.J. meets Strasse's creations again: Deathshead's Über and Super Soldiers are part of the new Nazi army.
• Caroline Becker survived the fatal shot in Wolfenstein: In 1960, she is paralyzed, but still fights for the resistance group.
• The idea of Nazi cyborgs is due to Wolfenstein 3D.
• In all of the Wolfenstein games are castle levels: In Wolfenstein 3D and Return to Castle Wolfenstein B.J. escapes from the infamous Castle Wolfenstein, in Wolfenstein B.J. and the Kreisau Circle attack a nameless castle. The New Order starts with the assault on Deathshead's stronghold in 1946.
• Collecting treasure items and discovering secrets are key features of the Wolfenstein games since Wolfenstein 3D.
• Wolfenstein: The New Order has a numeric health and armor system like Return to Castle Wolfenstein and does not use complete health regeneration like Wolfenstein, but a few hitpoints regenerate over time. The player needs to collect medipacks for restoring full health, and collect armor for a protection bonus.
• Like in Quake III Arena, it is possible to have more than 100 health points, but then they sink back to 100 over time.
• There is a hidden Wolfenstein 3D level in The New Order. The easter egg can be found in the bed at the top level of the HQ and is called Nightmare. It can be accessed any time as long as you don't progress on Chapter 5. There are some Wolfenstein 3D images near the bed.
• Deathshead shouts "Die, Allied Schweinehund!" to B.J, which is a direct reference to Hitler's final encounter of Episode 3 in Wolfenstein 3D.
• Mecha Deathshead is very similar to Mecha Hitler from Wolfenstein 3D and also uses four chainguns.

Trivia

• TheThe New Order is both a continuation (as it takes place after all previous installments) and a reboot of the series (as it features new situations, settings, and story within an alternate timeline.)
• The teaser trailer features Jimi Hendrix's version of "All Along the Watchtower", which fits as this game takes place in an alternate version of the 1960's.
• Unlike previous installments, The New Order gets rid of all paranormal elements and leans more to retro-futuristic themes and ancient super technology 
• Blazkowicz is older, featuring light-brown hair, which draws a reference to his classic look. His age is 49, which would make Blazkowicz 35 years old when he was incarcerated during in the World War 2 event in 1946.
• Pre-ordering was believed to have allowed exclusive access to a beta for Doom 4 as being the demo of the game and exclusive pre-order exclusive Team Fortress 2 cosmetics based on the Nazi infantry in the game for the Heavy weapons class for the PC version, however, all released retail copies contain a code for the beta and the items are unlocked anyway.
• The second trailer for the game shows that the Nazis have accomplished many scientific advancements, such as the nuclear bomb and space travel. In the real timeline, the Nazi atomic bomb project was slowed by the Heroes of the Telemark, who raided the Gerrman Heavy Water plant in occupied Norway, allowing the American atomic bomb project to overtake. However the Nazis were the world leaders in rocket technology, which was keenly sought after by the Americans, the British and the USSR during the closing chapters of the Second World War. It is worth noting that the Cold War space programs of both the US and (to a lesser extent) the USSR were only possible because of captured Nazi rocket scientists that had been pardoned and allowed to continue their work for either their US or the Soviet paymasters.
• It is unknown whether Hitler is still alive during the events of the game. There was a vague letter found in-game where a magazine interviews him in 1946, and a guard that says "Heil Hitler" when you were stopped in the road.
• According to the "Boom Boom" trailer, the Nazis blew up Mount Rushmore.
• In The New Order the Nazis have reached the Moon, something they planned to do after the war.
  • The Nazis made a Lunar base in 1951.
• According to the Nowhere To Run trailer, the Nazis rig the World Cup by shooting enemy players instead of giving penalty points.
• The New Order's soundtrack contains German parodies of pop music. Labeled under the fictional Neumond Records, a music company in the alternate 1960s.
• The designs for all the Nazi's superweapons were designed by Deathshead according to the schematics found in the secrets caches of the Da'at Yichud scattered all over the world. The group is influenced by Jewish culture, which is to be believed the source of the Da'at Yichud core of members.
• Nazi's more then likely owned more then just the moon from space.

Reception

Wolfenstein: The New Order received generally positive reviews from critics upon its release as Aggregating review websites Gamerankings and Metacritic given the PC version 83.67% and 82/100. The Xbox One version 82.29% and 79/100. The Playstation 4 version 80.70% and 79/100. The Playstation 3 version 78.33%, while the score is unknown.  Some call it decent while others call it "hardly a shining example of next-gen graphical potential."

The sales of the game have be the top notch in the Top 10. Notable in the United Kingdom.

Videos

Wolfenstein The New Order - Boom Boom Trailer

Boom Boom Trailer

Wolfenstein The New Order - Announce Trailer

Announcement trailer

Wolfenstein The New Order - E3 2013 Trailer

The Second Trailer of the game.

Wolfenstein The New Order Gameplay Demo - IGN Live - E3 2013

Game-play Demo of the game in E3 2013.

Wolfenstein Where Are All The Swastikas - TGS 2013

Wolfenstein Where Are All The Swastikas - TGS 2013

Wolfenstein The New Order - Nowhere To Run Trailer

Nowhere to Run Trailer

Wolfenstein The New Order (VG) (2014) - Stealth Vs Mayhem trailer, PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4, Xbox One

Stealth vs. Mayhem Trailer

Wolfenstein The New Order - House of the Rising Sun Trailer

House of the Rising Sun Trailer

Wolfenstein The New Order - Wolfenstein 3D Easter Egg

Wolfenstein 3D Easter Egg

IGN Plays Wolfenstein – The Base

The Base

IGN Plays Wolfenstein - Escaping a POW Camp

Escaping a POW Camp

Screenshots

Castle Screenshot.

Mounted Machine gun.

Wilhelm "Deathshead" Strasse

A ground assault.

The Powered Armor enemy unit concept.

The Level designer Concept.

London Checkpoint

Mech Hound

The BFG Effect Screenshot.

Another Level design concept art.

Nazi Robotic Super Soldier engaging on the resistance.

Massacre of the whole population.

Frau Engel toying with B.J

Blazkowicz's favorite past-time.

Nazi Advanced Weapon

Deathshead in 1946 with an UberSoldat.

UberSoldat being fired upon.

Blazkowicz outside the Asylum.

The Asylum being purged.

Army of Steel

Hello this is dog

60s Mech

The HUD of "Wolfenstein: The New Order"

60s Ubersoldat

Inside the U-Boat

1960s Kriegsmarine

See also

• Wolfenstein 3D
• Return to Castle Wolfenstein
• Wolfenstein (2009)

External links

• Wikipedia
• TVTropes
• MODDB