Wolfenstein: The New Order Reviews
Fans of Wolfenstein of old will appreciate how it has grown and matured, and newcomers will enjoy playing in this horrific alternate history. Not to mention, every day is a great day to shoot Nazis.
Wolfenstein: The New Order is an excellent entry in the series. The gameplay is varied, with a combination of decent stealth and very solid gunplay. The levels may sport drab colors, but the variety in location and inclusion of secrets in the level design make up for that. The story works well in a series that's not really known for telling a good narrative, and the dual pathways mean that an already long campaign is made longer for almost all the right reasons. If you gravitate toward a strong single-player experience in your shooters, The New Order should be high on your list of games to play.
You can blow a Nazi to pieces among some lovingly-designed sixties furnishings and probably should.
Wolfenstein: The New Order didn't just surprise me. It shocked me. My expectations for this one were decidedly low but within the first hour, I was chastising myself for having doubted MachineGames.
Turning into a machine is both the game's nightmare and its surreptitious fantasy. Isn't every FPS player a brain transplanted into a living weapon? Stuck in stiff undying bodies, gun-arms akimbo, we savor a stretched and distorted and rewound moment of carnage that is never allowed to end. Narrative justifications are appreciated rather than felt. What Blazkowicz really stands for is that mechanical satisfaction that keeps returning for its own sake. In the next Wolfenstein, he might not be human at all. As the philosopher said: he who fights Mecha-Hitlers must take care not to become one.
An over-the-top shooter with fun action, memorable set-piece moments, and decent characters, Wolfenstein: The New Order successfully transforms an old-school game into a modern experience.
A more well-rounded outing than the last Wolfenstein game, but its more comfortable employing tried-and-true gameplay conventions than striving for innovation
In the Nazi-dominated alternate history of 1960, it takes more than big guns to topple this new regime.
Wolfenstein: The New Order is smarter than a game called Wolfenstein probably has any right to be, yet it still manages to capture the hyperviolent spirit of its predecessors.
A sprawling epic that sometimes doesn't quite hit the ridiculously high bar it sets for itself, but nevertheless delivers an absolutely spectacular, supremely gory, utterly compelling experience.
Despite the lack of multiplayer and fetch-quests that interrupt the blood-spilling action, Wolfenstein: The New Order is a welcome return to form for the series. Its gameplay is good fun, whether you prefer blasting enemies to bits or being sneaky-like. The beautiful presentation makes the most out of the new hardware, and it squeezes some impressive life out of older systems.
Wolfenstein: The New Order is not a game that should work, really. Plenty have tried to revive old school arcade shooters and bring them into a modern era, Machine Games is one of the first to truly succeed at it.
Though it falls foul to the old FPS bane of occasionally stupid AI, Wolfenstein delivers a story-driven campaign experience that manages to be less po-faced than Shadow Fall and more consistently enjoyable than either Ghosts or Battlefield 4. Killing Nazis never looked or felt so good and, let's face it, what else really matters?
MachineGames' curious sequel has the franchise's requisite screaming Nazis and cybernetic supersoldiers, but it also chews on some unexpectedly big ideas
MachineGames has accomplished their task of bringing some dignity back to the franchise, delivering a shooter that gets more right than many of its better-funded, blockbuster peers. Shooter fans may have had their doubts, but would be wise to play The New Order sooner rather than later.
However, despite its nods to the oldest first-person shooter of all, it does feel thoroughly honed and reasonably modern. It isn't the future of first-person shooters, but it does rank among the best single-player examples.
MachineGames haven't exactly reinvented the FPS or even Wolfenstein here, but they have put together a consistently enjoyable, well-crafted action game and given you the motivation to blast your way through its stringier bits. If this is the New Order for Wolfenstein, then this is a promising start.
A triumphant return for the Wolfenstein series. Despite some lack-lustre boss battles, killing Nazis has never been so much fun.
Wolfenstein: The New Order is a surprisingly strong shooter that aspires to be more than its premise should allow. While it can only do so much with its cliché magnet of a story, and its graphics don't hold up to close inspection at times, it's easy to overlook these shortcomings in the face of everything else that it does well. As a result, the inspired but disturbing world, excellent roster of characters, and exhilarating action make it very easy to recommend this over-the-top rampage.
As you would expect, Wolfenstein: The New Order is fun to play, but what you don't expect is the brilliant narrative that arises from its over-the-top story.