Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus – 4 Things We Want To See

New Colossus

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus is approaching quickly, stalking towards us like a huge mechanical cat. Foreseeably, it will find itself in our hands by the 27th of October – two months away. Despite the stream of sneaky-peeks, there is still a lot of content to be discovered, probably discussed with a hush-hush between the folks at Bethesda. This aura of uncertainty does however allow for a wide degree of hoping and wishing that certain features make an appearance, and these are the four that would make Nazi-killing and inciting revolutions so much better.

 

1. Canadians

New colossus

It would be difficult to conduct combat within the United States without running into some of their northern neighbours. Besides the wonderful accents, maple syrup, and other stereotypes pursued by video game creators in order to bring attention to characters’ nationalities, it has to be remembered that Canada boasts a rather impressive civil rights record. After all, Canadians did facilitate the ‘underground railroad’ – a network of safehouses for escaped Slaves who sought freedom in Canada, before the arrival of abolition in the US.

Despite the fact that swastikas probably adorn most of the space between Vancouver and Quebec, it would be sweet to note a few helpful Canadians, or even to have a level set in Canada. On the contrary, it’d be even more bewildering in today’s world to spot a Nazi Canadian.

 

2. Familiar settings

New Colossus

There was no problem with keeping the settings interesting in the previous instalment, spanning multiple nations of Europe; from the dystopian, Nazi version of the city of London (briefly reminding me of Orwell’s depiction) to the mental asylum in Poland. Bethesda’s world creation has been fantastic for their past few games and there is little to fear. Taking BJ Blazkowicz to America gave the designers a brand new palette of locations where he might be able to mutilate Nazis.

The team responsible for producing trailers for the new game did a fantastic job showing off the ‘Nazified’ American aesthetic of the sixties, yet without giving away too much. It’s not out of the question that we will be pitted against fascists at the White House or the 1920 statue of Abraham Lincoln. Likewise, what happened to the Statue of Liberty? Perhaps it was scrapped and replaced with a statue of Hitler (which we will blow sky high)? There is no need to tell that to Bethesda, because the locations appear vividly varied, but we’d love to see plenty of historical locations.

 

3. Polarised forces joining hands

Wolfenstein The NEw COlossys

One of the most striking moments of the previous game, for me, was the resounding speech given to Blazko by ‘J’. Yeah, I picked the Wyatt timeline; shame me. In case for whatever reasons you have not played the game, or replayed it to view both timelines, spoiler alert: ‘J’ gives Blazkowicz a stern talk, reminding him that for African-Americans, life in the US was not great, and that “Back home, you (whites) were the Nazis”.

The tensions between the two were a stark reminder that before the Civil Rights movement, African-Americans were indeed treated as second-class citizens, and that not even the common threat of Nazis was enough to forget about the horrifying treatment of people of colour. What ‘The New Colossus’ can achieve, is display how in Nazi America people fundamentally opposed – such as Communists and Capitalists, as the trailers have shown – will be able to put aside differences to gore Nazis together.

 

4. A badass flame weapon

Back to more basic features; a way to singe, burn, scald, cook and otherwise subject the Nazis to extreme volumes of heat. Perhaps it’s the psycho within me talking, but frying fascists always provided me with a subtle smile. Back in the days of Call of Duty: World at War, and more recently within Red Orchestra 2, the flamethrower is my go-to weapon when I care more about having fun and less about collateral damage when I get picked off by a sniper’s bullet to my fuselage. We already know that Blazko will be packing a badass armoured suit, and here’s to hoping it will allow me to cremate a few swastika-wearing grunts.

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus releases on October 27, 2017 for Xbox One, PS4, and PC.

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