Wolfschanze

The Good
While not graphically impressive, there are some attempts to impress such as the sky, water, smoke and lighting effects in the levels. Overlooking the map layout, some wall, ceiling and floor textures are something to look at, especially in the castle, adding some believable indoor atmosphere. Blowing an enemy soldier up with explosive ordinance gives off a good gibbing effect. Other features that implement interest in the game are NPCs, breakable objects, vehicles you can drive, and a single boss fight against a Gestapo officer.

The weaponry in the game is certainly unique in its on way. The mauser rifle is ridiculously powerful, so you don't need a precise head shot to make a clean kill. It's also quite surprising that you can destroy an enemy tank with any weapon, even kicking it. If you do manage to commandeer a tank, then you're pretty much unstoppable.

Even though the game deviates from historical events after the failed assassination attempt on the fuhrer, it has some nice references at certain points like General Erwin Rommel's suicide. It's neat that we get to see Claus von Stauffenberg in third-person, only his eye patch is the wrong eye. Other funny unrealistic features are Claus being able to wield an MG-42 like a submachine gun when his right hand and two left hand fingers ought to be missing (prosthetics I guess).

The Bad
Players will find to their dismay, that the game has a plethora of problems despite the engine working enough not to crash. Long loading times will happen no matter how powerful your computer is. And that's just the first problem showing how broken this game is. It's a relief you can save anywhere at any time so you can load to the point before the mishap occurred.

The gun mechanics are quite the issue, where your bullets will now and again not connect even when fired directly at the enemy and sometimes enemy hitscan attacks can hit you through the edges of columns and doors. Enemies also have a tendency to spawn behind you by magic, catching you completely off guard. As a result gunfights are black and white. Either you get lucky and kill your opponents with ease, or you get killed and massacred in a short time, which kind of defeats the difficulty level settings. To make the game even harder, you can only get ammo from an enemy if you kill them while they are in very specific poses, which makes zero sense.

The design of the levels is not only lacking in decor, but it shows some of the rooms being reused to make the levels look longer. There are places you need to ascend and scale, made difficult by the clingy climbing ability requiring you to jump to get off the ladder and clumsy jump mechanics, which will make you fall more than land. And watch that you don't fall into places where you get stuck and can't crouch or jump your way out. The doors all look the same so you can't distinguish the ones that can and cannot be opened. The levels could have also done without levers and wheels which are hardly ever used. Pairing with the bad design is the lack of synchronisation in the music cues so you'll hear the alert theme throughout the level and enemy dialogue that plays even when an enemy is killed. Lol! Even the dogs can talk.

The Bottom Line
Picking on popularity just can't happen when a game does not conform to quality. In the end this is just another of those WW2-themed games following the standards of City Interactive's Battlestrike series, failing to jump on to the Wolfenstein bandwagon and not making their mark by a mile. If there's any reason to play this title, it's just so you play the role of Claus von Stauffenberg and go through an alternate WW2 event experience. This one just doesn't offer you the lasting fun for your PC.