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2 weeks ago
Feature: The worthiest reticules of all time
The best shooters endure. While other genres warp beyond recognition, there is something solid about the first-person shooter that makes it as dependable as a nice big AK-47. Maybe it’s the gung-ho simplicity - look down a barrel and pull the trigger. It's as fun to fire a double-barrelled shotgun from an early 90s FPS as the slick shotties of today. For that reason, this…
1 year ago
Feature: The worthiest reticules of all time
The best shooters endure. While the state of the art moves on in other genres and leaves old designs in the dust, it's as fun to fire a well-made shotgun from an early 90s FPS as from one released today. For that reason, this list runs the gamut from genre classics to those released in the last year. There's bound to be something for you…
Feature: Canonically Jewish
B.J. Blazkowicz and the need for more diverse Jewish characters
For a series built around the deconstruction of Aryan bodies, it’s taken a long time for players to take the hint that Wolfenstein’s ubermensch William Blazkowicz is Jewish. That hesitation betrays our definitions of Jewish identity as old-fashioned, and also reflects that the few prominent Jewish characters in games play into and reinforce stereotypes. While Blazkowicz is the most high profile character to break the…
2 years ago
President Trump showed a weird frag montage in his video game violence meeting
US President Donald Trump yesterday held a private meeting to discuss the issue of violence in video games, having suggested after February's murders at a school in Parkland, Florida that it "is really shaping young people's thoughts." This would clearly amount to nothing productive, given mostly industry representatives and conservative pressure groups were attending, but it is a surprise that Trump showed attendees a short…
Feature: Wot I Think: The Freedom Chronicles
Note - this piece presumes familiarity with Wolfenstein 2's entire plot, and as such contains some spoilers, though no specific character fates are discussed. Out this week is part two of 'The Freedom Chronicles', a triptych of story-led DLC for last year's pretty decent singleplayer shooter Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus, giving us a pretty clear sense of what's on offer from the season pass.…
Feature: Tool of destruction
How Wolfenstein: The New Colossus takes the white dudebro hero apart
Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus is a shooter that often feels at odds with its own protagonist, the worn-out vanilla action hero who is somehow the heart of a neurodiverse, multi-ethnic cast of socialist firebrands, civil rights campaigners, pacifists, lapsed jazz maestros and rabid UFO chasers. At first glance, it has a lot to say in spite of BJ Blazkowicz rather than through him, its…
Feature: Absolute discretion
It's taking me a long, long time to play through Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus. The reason for that is because I'm playing it as a stealth game - a claim about a Wolfenstein game that would have sounded absurd a couple of years ago, but is now taken for granted as a result of 2014's The New Order offering a limited sneaky-stabby path. Both…
Feature: Colossal
Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus does not pull its punches. Early in the game a returning villain asks, “is this what a hero looks like?” She's mocking and threatening a wounded, degraded and broken woman. She's about to execute that woman. Wolfenstein's answer is a defiant “yes”. Its heroes don't look like any one thing because they are many and they are diverse. They are…
Feature: Footage from and thoughts about The New Order sequel
Cool coats, comedy copulation and cyber-cats – Wolfenstein: The New Colossus wants to do everything
In the surprisingly, refreshingly excellent 2014 shooter reboot-o-sequel Wolfenstein: The New Order, it was the eyes that captivated me. The sad, aged eyes of BJ Blazkowicz, a war-weary he-man forced to take up arms yet again - tirelessly heroic, sure, but those windows to his haunted soul revealed his longing for an end to all this suffering. I could not look away from those eyes,…
Feature: The best bargains
The Steam summer sale is in full blaze. For a while it even blazed so hot that the servers went on fire and all the price stickers peeled off the games. Either that or the store just got swamped with cheapskates looking for the best bargains. Cheapskates like you! Well, don’t worry. We’ve rounded up some recommendations - both general tips and some newly added…
Feature: A world worth fighting for
The early stages of Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus [official site] show the same blood, guts and heart that were key to the first game's success. Described by Bethesda's Pete Hines as “fucking bananas”, it's a game of extremes, but it's the care that it shows for its characters and setting that stand out as unique in the field of alt-history Nazi war-shooters. Alongside the…
3 years ago
Feature: "War is a fun hell"
“Those who do not learn from from history, are doomed to make another World War II videogame.” A famous saying, and one we all know well. So when Activision hosted a live presentation for the reveal trailer of their latest shooter, Call of Duty: WWII [official site], I watched and felt nothing but a tired wave of low-burning resentment for everyone involved. During this presentation…
Bethesda, developers of Elder Scrolls and Fallout and publishers of Dishonored, Doom, Wolfenstein and more, say that their policy now is to send out "media review copies" one day before their games come out. That's what they did with DOOM earlier this year and that's what they intend to do with the approaching releases of both Skyrim Special Edition and Dishonored 2. We think this…
Do you remember a time when Wolfenstein hero B.J. Blazkowicz was a grinning, bum-chinned sprite with shiny blue twinklers rather than a morose sad-eyed man in a broken world? I've enjoyed several versions of Wolfenstein over the years, and perhaps none more so than The New Order, but I'm still fond of the first 3d title in the series. And I fucking love Doom. What…
Depending on to what extent you accept 'Bethesda' as official, of course. This isn't id's work, and it's definitely not Quake-era id's work, but it is the work of neo-id's stablemates Machine Games - they of the improbably good Wolfenstein: The New Order. (And who, according to its credits, pitched in to some extent with this year's even more improbably good DOOM). They've just unexpectedly…
Bethesda's E3 2016 showcase brought with it news of Quake Champions, new Prey, Dishonored 2 and a few other things. What wasn't there was any word on what Wolfenstein developers Machine Games were doing - or at least, no explicit news. There was one hint at what might be next for BJ Blazkowicz: "The New Colossus."
Feature:
Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day of the year, perhaps for all time. We're all doing Macauley Culkin faces about how good DOOM turned out to be despite high suspicion to the contrary, but let's not forget that, under Bethesda's stewardship, olden id games had already been treated surprisingly well. Wolfenstein: The New Order [official site]…
4 years ago
Feature: Dishonorable Dining
Hey, good to see ya, how ya doin'? Take a seat anyplace you like - we got window seats, we got booths, we got stools over here at the counter. I'd keep shy of the table just at the back there - it's reserved, on a strictly unofficial basis, and the guy who plants hisself there most days ain't exactly particular about whose keister he…
Feature: In my defence...
The Advertising Standards Agency publishes rulings every Wednesday on everything from psychic hotlines to videogames. I'm incredibly fond of their rulings. I think it's mostly because of the language the companies use to defend themselves, breaking videogame concepts down and presenting them in what's intended to be a neutral manner. The upheld complaints are generally less entertaining for obvious reasons – the concerns have been,…
Feature: Games for new and lapsed gamers.
One day I'll write a Desert Island Discs about the games I'd keep with me until the end of days, given a choice of ten. It'll no doubt be a Desert Island Digital Downloads given the absence of physical media in my life. I live with the ghosts of entertainment. Rather than compiling the list of games I'd take to the Vault with me though,…
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