After finishing the brilliant Indiana Jones and The Great Circle, MachineGames is going back to its roots with the long-awaited Wolfenstein 3. Following up on 2017’s Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus, the upcoming third entry is finally in development.
In a surprise announcement, MachineGames confirmed that the next game in the series is in active development. The scripts have been written, and motion capture is currently being filmed for the next adventure of everyone’s favourite fascist-killer: B.J. Blazkowicz.
By the time the game releases, it will have been over a decade since the release of the series’ last mainline entry, but that wasn’t the last game in the series. Since 2017, two spin-off games have released in the form of 2019’s co-op spin-off Youngblood and 2019’s VR-exclusive Cyberpilot.
While not mainline games, these titles were set 20 years after the events of The New Colossus, and showed that the Nazi regime had not changed all that much since the events of the second game. The resistance is still the resistance, Blazkowicz is still fighting, and the world has not evolved much in the 20-year gap.
This comes after the incredible hype ending of Wolfenstein II which ends with Blazkowicz and his peers executing Irene Engel on national television. As the game’s credits continue, the revolution breaks out across America with multiple resistance groups emerging to push back against the Nazis. While some did not enjoy the cliffhanger ending, it at least had the momentum for an epic third installment.
Unfortunately, the events of Youngblood, which stars Blazkowicz’s twin daughters as the protagonists, has already spoiled how Wolfenstein II’s cliffhanger ending resolves. Set 20 years later, we know the American revolution pushes out the Nazi occupation with the focus now on France, but should that actually be the case?
As an epic finale, maybe it would serve better for Wolfenstein II to be a globe-hopping adventure as the ever-growing resistance continues to pummel the Nazi forces across the world. While somewhat realistic, it does feel unsatisfying for the series’ likely finale to finish with just America being freed from the villainous regime. After all, prior games took us all the way to space.
This would also give the developers more space to tone down the personality of Blazkowicz’s kids which were unfortunately quite annoying in Youngblood. The characters themselves can stay, but some form of retconning would give space to improve their personalities. After all, Youngblood created characters that felt like modern interpretations of 80s characters in a world where the 80s zeitgeist that would’ve created those personalities doesn’t actually exist. (Largely because the game is built on heavy asset reuse.)
While retconning is often a dirty word, it’s okay to admit fault in some cases. It’s not as if Wolfenstein fans are particularly protective of Youngblood or Cyberpilot. The series itself has seen numerous retcons over the past decades. Yes, there are some fans of these spin-offs, but removing them from canon doesn’t remove them from being played.
I don’t think that removing Youngblood and Cyberpilot from canon is essential for a good Wolfenstein 3, but it would certainly be less restrictive. For this epic finale, every card should be on the table, and with Youngblood in place, we just kinda know where this story is heading, and that shouldn’t be the case.
