Last year, the one-man-army known as B.J. Blazkowicz returned to relevance in the latest chapter of the Wolfenstein franchise, The New Order. Instead of tacking on an awkward expansion to the game, Bethesda and MachineGames have instead created a standalone prequel that shares a lot of elements with last year’s bloody-good war-shooter. It’s the perfect opportunity to get a taste of what New Order has to offer at a discount.
The story follows Blazkowicz and Richard Wesley, aka Agent One, as they infiltrate the infamous Castle Wolfenstein to recover a document detailing the location of New Order’s central villain, Deathshead. You’ll have to work your way out of solitary confinement a few times and sneak around the castle before you pick up some decent weaponry, but the overall mission is much more focused than the full game from last year. Wolfenstein, and later the village of Wulfburg, feel like actual places and it’s rewarding to explore them from all angles.
Although the campaign starts off slowly you’ll be spitting plenty of lead before your journey is over. The new weapons are explosive, but not spectacular. Since your primary objective is infiltration, you’ll spend a lot of time sneaking around. You’ll pick up rifles, shotguns, machine guns, and suppressed pistols, along with stationary guns you can dislodge and take with you at reduced walking speed. The first weapon you acquire is a metal pipe that proves surprisingly versatile, letting you climb walls, open up passages and stealthily dispatch Nazis.
Old Blood loves to reference older games in the franchise. You can access the classic id FPS at various sleeping spots on the map, just like in New Order. Zombies eventually replace the army of trained soldiers, reminding us of the necromantic insanity from Return to Castle Wolfenstein from 2001. There are only a few boss encounters, but it’s still satisfying bringing the big guys down. When you finish the expansion, and you still want more, there’s a challenge mode that lets you revisit specific chapters and aim for high scores.
The biggest element that feels missing is the incredible character interaction from New Order. There are some memorable people in Old Blood, but no strong attachments, despite the game clearly attempting to toy with our emotions. The pace of the adventure grows too fast to develop the type of relationships we remember from New Order, but when the whole thing is over it’s clear that’s not the point. This is constructed as a fun trip through the best parts of prior Wolfenstein games, and it mostly succeeds in that mission. We wish it had crazier weapons and more complex personalities but it’s still fun.
Score: 7.7
Reviewed on Sony PlayStation 4.
Written by Brandon Jones.
Summary
This is constructed as a fun trip through the best parts of prior Wolfenstein games, and it mostly succeeds in that mission. We wish it had crazier weapons and more complex personalities but it’s still fun.
