Wolfenstein: The New Order

Wolfenstein: The New Order is a 2014 first-person shooter created by the Swedish studio MachineGames and released under Bethesda Softworks. It revives id Software’s venerable Wolfenstein franchise, but shifts the series toward a more character-driven, story-heavy experience while preserving the chaotic gunplay that defined earlier entries. Set in an alternate 1960 where the Third Reich has won the Second World War through the use of mysterious super-technology, the game follows long-time series hero Captain William “B. J.” Blazkowicz as he attempts to ignite a resistance movement and dismantle the Nazi regime from within. A prologue in 1946 establishes the premise. Allied forces mount a last-ditch assault on General Wilhelm “Deathshead” Strasse’s coastal fortress; the mission fails, Blazkowicz sustains a head wound, and he spends the next fourteen years catatonic in a Polish asylum. He regains consciousness just in time to witness SS troops liquidate the hospital, escapes alongside nurse Anya Oliwa, and discovers a world where swastikas hang over London, Berlin, and even New York. The narrative then follows a traditional hero’s-journey structure, but MachineGames layers it with vignettes showing how ordinary people accommodate or resist authoritarian rule. Blazkowicz recruits survivors from a ragtag underground cell, infiltrates a research facility hidden inside the bombed-out ruins of the London Nautica, rides a train across a conquered Europe, steals a secret dossier guarded by Frau Engel, and eventually boards a rocket to the Moon—one of the series’ most memorable set pieces—to seize launch codes needed for a final raid on Deathshead’s compound. The story closes with Blazkowicz detonating explosive charges as he orders his comrades to flee, an ambiguous sacrifice that sets the stage for the sequel, Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus. Gameplay balances raw aggression with stealth, offering broad, multi-path levels that let players tackle firefights with dual-wielded assault rifles or silently dispatch guards with knives and suppressed pistols. An old-school health-and-armor system replaces the regenerating bars common in contemporary shooters, encouraging scavenging and moment-to-moment risk assessment. Killing enemies with specific tactics unlocks perks that permanently enhance abilities—larger ammo belts for heavy weapons, faster movement while crouched, improved thrown knives—rewarding whichever style the player prefers. Collectibles range from newspaper clippings, which flesh out the game’s darkly satirical alternate history, to “Enigma codes” that unlock brutal challenge modes. MachineGames built The New Order on id Tech 5, the engine previously used for Rage, and targeted a locked 60 frames per second on both last-generation and new-generation consoles of the time. Levels are laced with small environmental details—propaganda posters, Germanized pop songs, and period architecture—creating a palpable sense of place. The soundtrack, composed chiefly by Mick Gordon with contributions from Fredrik Thordendal and others, blends distorted guitars and industrial percussion to evoke the game’s fusion of 1960s counterculture and dystopian militarism. The development team consisted largely of former Starbreeze Studios employees who had worked on narrative shooters such as The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay. Their influence is evident in The New Order’s emphasis on performance and dialogue; supporting characters like Fergus Reid, the idealistic Wyatt Matthews, and the gentle scientist Set Roth are given extended screen time and emotional arcs rarely seen in the genre. Still, MachineGames resisted including competitive multiplayer, believing it would siphon resources from the campaign—a decision that, while criticized by some, helped focus design on single-player pacing. Critical reception highlighted the tight gunplay, world-building, and surprisingly human storytelling, though some reviewers noted occasional graphical pop-in, uneven difficulty spikes, and limited enemy variety. Commercially, the title exceeded Bethesda’s expectations, becoming one of 2014’s best-selling shooters in both North America and Europe. Its success paved the way for the standalone prequel The Old Blood in 2015 and the direct sequel The New Colossus in 2017. Wolfenstein: The New Order occupies an intriguing space between nostalgia and reinvention. It preserves the power fantasy that defined early ’90s PC shooters—secret rooms stuffed with loot, grotesque boss fights, and outrageous weaponry—yet couches that fantasy in a modern framework of cinematic presentation and thematic weight. By marrying pulpy sci-fi spectacle to thoughtful reflection on resistance, dehumanization, and hope, the game demonstrated that even a series famous for mindless Nazi-shooting could evolve into something more nuanced without sacrificing its kinetic core.