Will Wolfenstein 3 ever happen? After two excellent FPS games – and a pair of solid spin-offs – effectively revived legendary Nazi-killer BJ Blazkowicz for the modern era, fans are still waiting to see what the third part of the story holds. As it turns out, developer MachineGames already knows where the plot's going, because the studio planned this whole thing as a trilogy from the start.
"The first game is very much about BJ," studio head Jerk Gustafsson explains in a new Noclip documentary. "Obviously he understands that the Nazis won the war but it's also a very personal journey for him. At the same time, he meets Anya and he starts to see that there are other things at play as well – not only fighting Nazis. Then moving into New Colossus, we move into a wider group of people around you being part of the resistance. Something bigger, and something also very like a family to you. But at the same time you're also preparing to start and build your own family."
"I think this is important to say because we have always seen this as a trilogy," Gustafsson continues. "So that journey for BJ, even during those first weeks at id, when we mapped out New Order, we still had the plan for at least that character – what will happen in the second one, and what will happen in the third one. I think that's that's important to say because, at least I hope, that we're not done with Wolfenstein yet. We have a story to tell."
That's several steps shy of confirmation that Wolfenstein 3 is in production, yet at least we know MachineGames hasn't abandoned its ideas for the story. It's a little difficult to be mad about Wolfenstein 3 being MIA when MachineGames delivered the excellent Indiana Jones and the Great Circle last year, but can any of us really rest easy believing a kick-ass fight against Mecha-Hitler is nothing more than a twinkle in a game developer's eye?
We have some idea of what might happen in Wolfenstein 3 thanks to the futuristic co-op spinoff Youngblood, which MachineGames insisted around launch was "canon to the story," but that just raises more questions than answers. Would a third game take place even further into the future? Would it be an interquel set before Youngblood? I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
Wolfenstein 2 is still one of the best FPS games ever made.
