Wolfenstein II The New Colossus will be released on October 27, 2017, for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC from MachineGames and Bethesda. This first-person-shooter features stylized combat set in a world where Nazi influence is in power and you play as William ‘BJ’ Blazkowicz once again. Bethesda was kind enough to invite us to a preview media event where we got our hands on two levels of the game ‘The Reunion‘ and ‘Rosewell‘. The Reunion level was more of a “corridor shooter” where you are navigating the level in a wheelchair and the Rosewell level felt more like an arena where enemies swarmed at you from different areas.
Generally, when you preview a game in development you hope the company is showcasing the ‘best’ levels of a video game to help draw you in and build hype. Unfortunately, the two levels we played didn’t have much of an impact on raising our excitement level. The Reunion level felt too scripted even to the point where it felt like it was ‘on rails’ – maybe it didn’t help that we were in a wheelchair and the Rosewell level was too dark and made it difficult to determine what types of enemies were attacking. We asked developers at the event if there was something missing like maybe night vision goggles but they stressed that the level we were getting stuck in was further into the game and we would have already mastered combat by then – we’ll just have to assume that’s the case.
The cut scenes and characters in Wolfenstein II The New Colossus are all very interesting and you get a sense that a cinematic military resistance movie is unfolding in the disguise of a video game. We got to witness an extensive dialogue scene with Grace and meet an undercover agent who works in the cafe and is researching military conspiracies and alien activity.
When Wolfenstein The New Order (2014) was released it was a nice surprise with plenty of great moments. Wolfenstein II The New Colossus is from the same development team and they’ve had plenty of time to up the ante this time around – we are hoping the final product is double the fun and twice the carnage.