Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus

Absolutely amazing. I walked into this one without knowing much and it just completely blew me away. As far as single player FPS goes, I think this might be my favorite of all time. The production values are through the roof, the cut scenes are some of the best of its kind with high quality cinematography (yes this is like a film). The alternate story of nazis taking over and winning WW2 is perhaps not a new concept, but I really like exploring the idea every time. There are some clear cues to our modern times with neo-nazis/white supremacist being on the rise again, really good criticism overall of society as a whole and how they would react.

The game needs more that just an amazing story right? Well the gameplay brought me back to my FPS loving days. At one point is was up there in my favorite genres, but I have only played a few here and there in the past decade. I just felt like every game either has to be a shooter or action adventure, it definitely felt like AAA titles were getting redundant and lacked originality. While this one isn't really groundbreaking, it's just really fun and it gets everything right. The level designs are great, each area has its own style and really different from the next. The story will bring you into all kinds of situation and you've always have to go with the best strategy to get things done (I completed the game on the "Bring It On" difficulty, but this is one of those rare games where I would replay on a higher difficulty). Tons of adrenaline rush moment, and it's just super fun to play, Plus you really want to complete these levels to get the story rolling, it's very rare that I feel compelled to finish a game more than anything else.

Wolfenstein 3D is a classic and changed the whole gaming world around, but I feel that this one blows it out of the water. It took everything great about that game and just pumped it to the max and added this amazing cinematographic experience in the process. I feel a little left out cause I didn't play The New Order or Old Blood prior to this, but I'll be definitely looking forward to playing those now to see more of this world. Top notch shooter, the best of its kind.

The cutscenes are better than the actual gameplay.

I'm not sure that this improved upon DO4M or the original...second...reboot? Let's just rephrase this: I'm not sure that this improved upon The New Order in terms of shooting mechanics.

It's got a good story to carry you through, though.

Great example of an experience that's a good deal more than the sum of its flawed (yet still enjoyable) gameplay parts. If they take the surprising emotional punch and wild (yet somehow organic) tonal shifts to the next game with significantly more fluid and organic level design the next could be an all timer. Hell why not have BJ just team up with the doom marine who can show him some tricks.