izigame.me

I think it's a good if not really enjoyable singleplayer game despite being an older game and having some things that I personally don't like about it. Like I'm not particularly a fan of the drawn out boss fights in all honesty with mechanics that you have to like "brute-force" or "trial and attempt" through in order to figure out what needs to be done but they do add to the experience and charm of the games.
Like, I like design wise the realistic looking levels a lot and enemies that even through technological upgrades still seem plausible but I am also not a huge fan of how the weapons look for instance but they are functional so it's okay I guess.
Truth is I really always loved the Wolfenstein games since the first game which I always used to watch briefly people play, grown ups with their darn PC's and having started to really play the game from Return to Castle Wolfenstein onward I always thought that there was something about these Wolfenstein games that is really appealing in nature. Not just because they have a cool name and belong to a series of epic and often original games that go beyond just Wolfenstein franchise. For instance with the original game it was the fact that it was a shooter in the time that usually people played platformer games or 2D adventure / action games is something that made it stand out to me. Ever since RTCW and its multiplayer counterpart which I really enjoyed which was a little bit like Team Fortress with different classes and different gear kits. Things like a medic and a spy and so on was really great. An aspect that always appealed to me and one what makes these games stand out to me is the dark.
Darkness of these games has a lot to do with the story where Europe is divided and the whole world has basically fallen to the enemies influence and it combines this idea with the technological aspect that really makes it a scary reality and thought but the dark of the game also has to do with the atmosphere and levels of the game which are enjoyable in this morbid sense of basically there being danger around every corner of the game where you change between different play styles alternating from at times pretty intense like suspenseful stealth to like all out action combat and that is also something I enjoy about the game that it gives you this opportunity to stealth until you take out the able-to-call-in-the-reinforcements commanders found in some areas (which is a really cool addition to the game) and then are able to apply more force as you progress through a level or have to go loud as you find more dangerous and difficult enemies so there are like aspects of the game that mix things up gameplay wise and I like that because even though it's a pretty linear shooter with I'd say some hidden areas where you have to explore the levels thoroughly if you want to find everything they hide the way that you play it really is immersive in essence.
Game has elements of world exposition through various lore found in the game not just through cutscenes but also usually in levels through found documents which you have to take the time to read if you want to get up to date but I really found some other games like NecroVisioN to do this aspect a little bit better because if you would open a document in game, a voice actor would read it out loud and you could even close the document and move on in the game continuing to play it and then it would still be read out loud in often heavily accented language which also I think adds to the immersion, conviction and convenience because personally and on a side note when I'm playing an action oriented game be that a shooter or even to some extent an (A)RPG, what have you, having to pause my gameplay to actually read is something I found that I won't do often even though I admit sounding pretty stupid because of that, but regardless. It's like a flow breaking like interrupting endeavor that I don't mind being there but it could have been done a little better I think.
Wolfenstein games have to me always been enjoyable because of the dark and the grim atmosphere they provide with elements from storytelling and the setting and the gameplay and the game's themes and I have always liked to take my time and to enjoy these games because of that and because they are pretty much singleplayer action/story driven games that I appreciate playing because I can choose to take a brake from them, go do or play something else and then over time return to the world.
One more aspect I also like (a lot) is Blaskowicz banter when the player is traversing levels where he reminisces at times about the past or thoughts that he has where he'd like sort of whisper some lines about his life, thinking of the better times. It's some details like this that these games come really close to being immersive sims of sorts which are really my favorite types of games because of many reasons.
I'm playing this one at 144 fps and I'm really glad that the game has the ability even though having to be modded for this externally, and sometimes I'd have to revert back to its 60 fps standard as to be able to advance through some areas of the game but this is something I have to do but a few times and so in that sense I'm really enjoying my time playing it and you should too I think if you like the idea of such a game as I've attempted to describe here.
Truth is we have come relatively a long way from RTCW and NecroVisioN and sometimes I harken back to those moments lost in time where games had some sort of notion of having a soul to them and here is hoping that in the future still games will be made that contain traces of one and I think Wolfenstein games certainly have the character to categorize them as such, enjoyable singleplayer games with some good degree of substance through various ways.
Games with a soul.