Title: Spear of Destiny
Original Release: MS-DOS (September 18, 1992)
Finished Release: MS-DOS (1992) [Modded]
So this is weird. I'm sure you remember Wolfenstein 3D, which we talked about last time (and you can read about rightcha). I'll just quickly reiterate that, even though it wasn't technically the first "first person shooter" ever made, it essentially created the genre. Admittedly, the follow-up, DOOM (which we'll be discussing soon, possibly) solidified that the genre was actually going somewhere, but Wolf3D was the first big stepping stone.
And yet no one ever talks about the sequel. I'll admit up front that I'm nothing like a gaming historian or anything like that, but I'm pretty sure that I had never even heard of this game before I bought the pack on Steam. But it does exist, I played it, and you have to read about it, so here we go.
So here's a big spoiler for the original Wolfenstein 3D: it ends with you, as B.J. Blazkowicz, killing Adolf Hitler (who's in a robot suit), thus presumably bringing an end to World War II. That's pretty sweet and obviously historically accurate, but it creates a problem: where do you go from there?
Well, that's a question left unanswered, since Spear of Destiny, much like the Nocturnal Missions from the original game, takes place before any of that. In fact, Spear of Destiny takes place before even those add-on missions, thus making this B.J. Blazkowicz's first mission, at least as far as we're allowed to play. And his mission this time is an interesting one, as we're tasked with infiltrating a Nazi base in order to retrieve the titular Spear of Destiny, which Hitler's forces intend to use in some sort of supernatural powerplay to turn the tide of the war in their favor.
It's actually kind of difficult to talk about Spear of Destiny, because it's basically just more of Wolfenstein 3D, and in that respect it succeeds, mostly. The first big change I noticed was that one of the early levels has vines hanging from the ceiling that you can walk through, which I thought was really cool the first time I saw it. Unfortunately things like this almost completely obscure your vision, and the creators seemed to really enjoy throwing bunches of enemies into them, making those sections sheer trial and error as you try to learn where all of the enemies are without dying. Still, it's a cool effect.
But when I say that Spear of Destiny is just more of Wolfenstein 3D, I really mean it. The enemies look the same, the level textures are often the same, the weapons are the same, and that's pretty much it. The previously-mentioned vines notwithstanding, the only majorly new things are the bosses, but they did not disappoint. Sure, the first boss is literally just a reskin of the first boss of Wolf3D, but the rest are unique, at least in design, and the final boss is genuinely surprising when you see it, possibly on par with robo-Hitler. And one of them (the best one, obviously), is an Ubermutant!
In terms of complexity, the Spear of Destiny levels feel like they pick up directly from where Wolf3D left off, and this is, unfortunately, almost always a bad thing. The labyrinthine feeling of the Nocturnal Missions is back in all its glory, and it really gets to the point where each level starts to feel like more and more of a slog. This doesn't detract from the overall atmosphere of the game itself, which I still love, but I had easily had my fill of it by the end of SoD's 27 levels (not including secret levels).
So like I said above, the Spear of Destiny campaign is 27 levels, not counting secret levels, which is just as many as the original three episodes of Wolfenstein 3D put together. The difference here is that the game isn't broken into episodes. Instead it's just one continuous set of levels, with a boss level every five or so. Some levels are fun, some are ridiculously frustrating, but it's overall a positive experience, and the final level features a twist that I knew was coming, yet somehow didn't see coming. I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that it's worth playing through the whole game just for that, but it definitely made the whole experience that much more memorable.
And then you finish that level, you get a few story scenes congratulating you for a job well done, and the game is over. OR IS IT?
Well, no.
See, Spear of Destiny was followed up by two "Mission Packs," referred to as Mission 2: Return to Danger and Mission 3: Ultimate Challenge, and these things... hoo boy.
See, after all the trouble you went through to steal the Spear from the Nazis, it gets stolen back from the Allies offscreen, and only B.J. Blazkowicz can get it back. That's irritating right off the bat (that will be a pun in a second), but whatever. Let's get this over with. 27 new levels! Here we go!
So first, the cool: the mission packs are actually a total conversion for the game. Basically what that means is that everything plays exactly like Wolfenstein 3D, but it's been completely overhauled, graphically speaking. The stage textures have all been redesigned, as have the enemy sprites, weapons, and items. After the entirety of the first game and the base missions of Spear, this was a very welcome change, if for no other reason than just having something new to look at. It helps that the updated designs are almost universally improvements on the old look of the game.
The new enemy designs are especially good with one glaring omission, which I'll get to in a moment. For the most part, the new designs do a great job of preserving the feel of the original designs, while not being quite so cartoony. The one big exception to this is the mutant. Why? Because it isn't a mutant anymore. Seriously, my favorite enemy is the one that gets completely changed, because of course. And that wouldn't be so bad, but what did it get changed to?
A bat. A bat, flapping around, carrying machine guns in its feet. Now don't get me wrong, Wolfenstein is at its best when it's straining credulity, but this just breaks it in two. And it raises so many questions! Who's training these bats to fire guns? Who's designing the guns so that they can be held and fired by bat-feet?? And the most pertinent follow-up question to both of those is Why??? Not to mention that the bats are hard to see, thus them ten times as frustrating as the mutants ever were, and the mutants were already on that spectrum.
But other than that, Mission 2 is fine, right? 'Cause it's just more Wolfenstein 3D again? Well, no, because it's here where the game starts making a cardinal mistake. This is something I was afraid of for the entirety of the original game, but by this point had convinced myself wasn't going to happen.
So remember how the secrets worked in Wolf3D? Certain walls could just be interacted with, so you could push them out of the way, revealing the secret behind them? Remember how much I hated that system? Yeah, well, here it's needed to progress. Let me make that clearer: in order to complete this game, you are required to find pushwalls. This means vast stretches of time were you're running throughout the entirety of a given level, pounding the spacebar like it insulted your mother, all in the hopes of finally revealing the path forward.
There is almost never any indication of which part of the wall is the one you're looking for, and the levels are huge. And this doesn't just happen once or twice, it quickly becomes normal. It isn't fun, it isn't engaging, and it doesn't make you feel any sense of accomplishment when you finally figure it out. It is the very definition of a waste of time.
But hey, new bosses! On the whole I don't think they're quite as interesting as the ones in the base Spear of Destiny game, but they're still pretty cool, for the most part. Hell, one of them, "The Axe" is probably my favorite boss in the series. He looks like an '80s cartoon villain!
But yeah, you get the Spear (again), they pull the exact same twist again, show the exact same ending scenes, and the game is over.
Don't get me wrong, there's still fun to be had here, and the new look of everything, for the most part, does a lot to freshen things up. But it's clear to see that we're getting further and further away from the trendsetter the original Wolfenstein 3D was.
And then we come to Mission 3, and I honestly don't know why they bothered. The Spear has been stolen by the Nazis. Again. The graphics are the same as Mission 2. The enemies are the same. The pushwalls are the same, the bosses are the same, the ending is the same (again.), it's just all the same. Except that by this point, each level has gone past the point of being a slog, and well into the realm of tedium.
The only real saving grace of this mission pack is the final level. It pulls the same twist for the third time, but there's a clever little tweak to it that I quite enjoyed, so that was a pleasant surprise.
But overall, Mission 3 is an exercise in patience, and I can't recommend it to anyone unless you're absolutely dying to play more Wolfenstein 3D. Even then, you could probably easily find a fanmade mod that would be a better use of your time.
So, at the end of the day, Spear of Destiny and its add-ons are a mixed bag with more bad than good. There's fun to be had, but it's hard to recommend any of it outright. Honestly, the best thing to do is probably to mod the original Wolfenstein 3D so that it uses the graphics introduced to Mission 2. But even that isn't much of a good idea, because then you'd have no mutants.
And no one wants that.
Until next time!
Current interests:
Listening - Various
Playing - Elite Dangerous: Horizons (2015)
Reading - Thor: God of Thunder (2011)
Watching - Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
 |
| I warned you that you should get used to it. |
But when I say that Spear of Destiny is just more of Wolfenstein 3D, I really mean it. The enemies look the same, the level textures are often the same, the weapons are the same, and that's pretty much it. The previously-mentioned vines notwithstanding, the only majorly new things are the bosses, but they did not disappoint. Sure, the first boss is literally just a reskin of the first boss of Wolf3D, but the rest are unique, at least in design, and the final boss is genuinely surprising when you see it, possibly on par with robo-Hitler. And one of them (the best one, obviously), is an Ubermutant!
 |
| "Ubermutant" literally means "it's a mutant, but better, obviously," in German. |
In terms of complexity, the Spear of Destiny levels feel like they pick up directly from where Wolf3D left off, and this is, unfortunately, almost always a bad thing. The labyrinthine feeling of the Nocturnal Missions is back in all its glory, and it really gets to the point where each level starts to feel like more and more of a slog. This doesn't detract from the overall atmosphere of the game itself, which I still love, but I had easily had my fill of it by the end of SoD's 27 levels (not including secret levels).
So like I said above, the Spear of Destiny campaign is 27 levels, not counting secret levels, which is just as many as the original three episodes of Wolfenstein 3D put together. The difference here is that the game isn't broken into episodes. Instead it's just one continuous set of levels, with a boss level every five or so. Some levels are fun, some are ridiculously frustrating, but it's overall a positive experience, and the final level features a twist that I knew was coming, yet somehow didn't see coming. I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that it's worth playing through the whole game just for that, but it definitely made the whole experience that much more memorable.
And then you finish that level, you get a few story scenes congratulating you for a job well done, and the game is over. OR IS IT?
Well, no.
See, Spear of Destiny was followed up by two "Mission Packs," referred to as Mission 2: Return to Danger and Mission 3: Ultimate Challenge, and these things... hoo boy.
See, after all the trouble you went through to steal the Spear from the Nazis, it gets stolen back from the Allies offscreen, and only B.J. Blazkowicz can get it back. That's irritating right off the bat (that will be a pun in a second), but whatever. Let's get this over with. 27 new levels! Here we go!
So first, the cool: the mission packs are actually a total conversion for the game. Basically what that means is that everything plays exactly like Wolfenstein 3D, but it's been completely overhauled, graphically speaking. The stage textures have all been redesigned, as have the enemy sprites, weapons, and items. After the entirety of the first game and the base missions of Spear, this was a very welcome change, if for no other reason than just having something new to look at. It helps that the updated designs are almost universally improvements on the old look of the game.
 |
| Everything's so blue... |
The new enemy designs are especially good with one glaring omission, which I'll get to in a moment. For the most part, the new designs do a great job of preserving the feel of the original designs, while not being quite so cartoony. The one big exception to this is the mutant. Why? Because it isn't a mutant anymore. Seriously, my favorite enemy is the one that gets completely changed, because of course. And that wouldn't be so bad, but what did it get changed to?
A bat. A bat, flapping around, carrying machine guns in its feet. Now don't get me wrong, Wolfenstein is at its best when it's straining credulity, but this just breaks it in two. And it raises so many questions! Who's training these bats to fire guns? Who's designing the guns so that they can be held and fired by bat-feet?? And the most pertinent follow-up question to both of those is Why??? Not to mention that the bats are hard to see, thus them ten times as frustrating as the mutants ever were, and the mutants were already on that spectrum.
 |
| Pictured: Bat-feet |
So remember how the secrets worked in Wolf3D? Certain walls could just be interacted with, so you could push them out of the way, revealing the secret behind them? Remember how much I hated that system? Yeah, well, here it's needed to progress. Let me make that clearer: in order to complete this game, you are required to find pushwalls. This means vast stretches of time were you're running throughout the entirety of a given level, pounding the spacebar like it insulted your mother, all in the hopes of finally revealing the path forward.
There is almost never any indication of which part of the wall is the one you're looking for, and the levels are huge. And this doesn't just happen once or twice, it quickly becomes normal. It isn't fun, it isn't engaging, and it doesn't make you feel any sense of accomplishment when you finally figure it out. It is the very definition of a waste of time.
 |
| Eat your heart out, Skeletor. |
But yeah, you get the Spear (again), they pull the exact same twist again, show the exact same ending scenes, and the game is over.
Don't get me wrong, there's still fun to be had here, and the new look of everything, for the most part, does a lot to freshen things up. But it's clear to see that we're getting further and further away from the trendsetter the original Wolfenstein 3D was.
And then we come to Mission 3, and I honestly don't know why they bothered. The Spear has been stolen by the Nazis. Again. The graphics are the same as Mission 2. The enemies are the same. The pushwalls are the same, the bosses are the same, the ending is the same (again.), it's just all the same. Except that by this point, each level has gone past the point of being a slog, and well into the realm of tedium.
The only real saving grace of this mission pack is the final level. It pulls the same twist for the third time, but there's a clever little tweak to it that I quite enjoyed, so that was a pleasant surprise.
But overall, Mission 3 is an exercise in patience, and I can't recommend it to anyone unless you're absolutely dying to play more Wolfenstein 3D. Even then, you could probably easily find a fanmade mod that would be a better use of your time.
So, at the end of the day, Spear of Destiny and its add-ons are a mixed bag with more bad than good. There's fun to be had, but it's hard to recommend any of it outright. Honestly, the best thing to do is probably to mod the original Wolfenstein 3D so that it uses the graphics introduced to Mission 2. But even that isn't much of a good idea, because then you'd have no mutants.
And no one wants that.
Until next time!
Current interests:
Listening - Various
Playing - Elite Dangerous: Horizons (2015)
Reading - Thor: God of Thunder (2011)
Watching - Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
 |
| Why do you exist?! |
No comments:
Post a Comment