Video games - Wolfenstein 3D

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	Video games - Wolfenstein 3D

* Spear of Destiny

Return to Castle Wolfenstein

Wolfenstein 3D is generally credited as being responsible for the first-person shooter craze that continues to this day. Released at the height of the 'Interactive CD-ROM' era, there were surprisingly few clones until Doom
's release in 1993, the most notable being Rise of the Triad
in 1994 and Duke Nukem 3D
in 1996. Most of these games were distributed via the same shareware strategy as the original.

The game success ensured that id Software quickly became a high profile developer. id's development efforts were closely watched by fans of the game, and when it released its next first-person shooter, Doom, it was guaranteed a receptive audience. Rather than rely on the technology that made Wolfenstein a hit, however, Doom introduced several technological leaps over Wolfenstein 3D. Doom's technology outdid that of Wolfenstein by providing multiple levels of detail and characters with more detail and animation than those in its predecessor. Wolfenstein would later be recreated in a Doom II fan modification aptly titled WolfenDoom. id again later revolutionised the FPS genre with the release of Quake
in 1996, the first FPS to feature full 3D graphics.

A new first-person shooter, Return to Castle Wolfenstein
(RtCW), a loose sequel to Wolfenstein 3D, was released in 2001. The gameplay and the setting are similar to the original, but the graphics and audio elements receive an upgrade due to the Quake III Arena
rendering engine. RtCW begins as the first game does, but from there the two games' storylines diverge. A spinoff to RtCW, Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory
, was released in 2003, which was a free full-version multiplayer-only game, featuring elements from RtCW.

Overall, RtCW bears little resemblance to its predecessor, beyond the title and the setting. A small bit of nostalgia is available to players of RtCW with a console command. Activating 'cg_uselessnostalgia' via the in-game console overlays a replica of the original game's interface across the bottom of the screen. However, as the name of the command implies, this interface does not keep track of vital game statistics, such as the player character's health or remaining ammunition. However, the Xbox version of RtCW contains the full emulated version of Wolfenstein 3D as a bonus for beating the game.

Also, a new Castle Wolfenstein game has been announced for Microsoft Windows and Xbox 360.

Trivia

The game manual mentioned that maybe you would have "a story to tell your grandchildren", if you survived. William Blazkowicz's grandchild is Billy Blaze, aka Commander Keen, who is an early id Software game character. The following is an excerpt from the Official Hint Manual for Wolfenstein 3D which explains the relation with Commander Keen: "William Joseph Blazkowicz was born August 15, 1911, to Polish immigrants. Blazkowicz was a top spy for the Allied Forces, receiving the Congressional Medal of Honor and other accolades for heroism. "B.J.," (as he was called by his friends) married after World War II, at age 40, to Julia Marie Peterson. Their son, Arthur Kenneth Blazkowicz, became a television talk show personality in Milwaukee. For show biz purposes, Arthur changed his last name to Blaze. Arthur later married Susan Elizabeth McMichaels. They had one son (which they named after Arthur's father), William Joseph Blazkowicz II, or as he signs his grade school homework, B. Blaze...."
In another id Software game Doom 2, there are two secret levels that are based on Wolfenstein. The blue SS soldiers make a guest appearance, demons take the place of the guard dogs and the Cyberdemon takes the place of Hans Grosse.
Christian game makers Wisdom Tree bought the Wolfenstein graphic engine to create a non-violent game called Super Noah's Ark 3D
. The game narrative is about Noah, armed with a slingshot trying to stop the restless animals on the Ark. The game was released for the Super Nintendo and DOS. It is commonly rumored that id Software gave Wisdom Tree the Wolfenstein 3D code, because Nintendo made id change the SNES port in order to make the game look less violent, which turned off many players and made this port very unpopular.
Hans and Gretel Grosse is a reference to Hansel and Gretel.
Tom Hall originally did not want to make this game. They originally had plans for another Commander Keen game (hinted at in the end of the last one), but John Carmack and the rest of the team persuaded Hall to make a game based on the Catacomb 3D engine.
The Apple IIGS port is the only version to use authentic German voices and speech, recorded by native Germans.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Wolfenstein 3D ]

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