Leet Gamxrz
2023-01-16
by Darknut
Return to Return to Castle Wolfenstein
I was introduced to Return to Castle Wolfenstein in 2001 by my roommate. For a while, it was the game he played constantly, though not for as long as Counter-Strike or Dark Age of Camelot. He mostly played it multiplayer, though I also remember him playing a level where you have to infiltrate a dam. I seem to recall that you could choose to proceed either inside the dam or along catwalks...
Then some time later I saw my dad playing this game. I remember him playing a level where you start by coming out of a big drain pipe overlooking a large outdoor area with a number of enemy soldiers to snipe before they get too close. There may have been an airfield in the distance. Eventually there was a metal structure in the end of a valley with platforms and ladders leading up to a door into the mountainside. I remember that this scene took place just before sunset, or at least that's how the outdoor lighting made it feel. (My dad wasn't the fastest player, and he only played the single-player campaign, but he was methodically making his way through the game at his own pace, sniping Nazis as prescribed, hah!)
Then some time later I played the game myself. This would have been around 2004. But strangely, I have almost no memory of playing it myself. I remember thinking the game wasn't anything special at the time, just something I was obligated to see. Did I forget because it wasn't worth remembering? I remember a lot of silly exposition about how the Nazis wanted to bring some mythical dead warriors back to life. I don't remember the first levels, only that they were "normal" levels to establish a baseline because soon enough I had to go into a sort of catacombs filled with a lot of square rooms and undead mummies. In another stone building, I had to kill Nazi chicks in leather as they came running around corners. One of the guns I found would overheat constantly and had to be fired delicately. I remember getting to the level I'd seen my dad play, and beyond... But that's about it; I don't remember any other scenes. Did I beat the game? Did I just get bored and stop playing it?
Well, I just accidentally watched a video of someone playing it today, and I realize I haven't seen or even thought about this game for about 20 years. It looks pretty competent, like something I might play. It's a lot more like Goldeneye than I remember. I almost want to try playing it again. But most importantly, I realize I remember none of the levels, even ones I know I had to have played through, and the few bits I do remember are a little scrambled, like trying to remember a dream. This is really bothering me. It took a while for me to accept that "Mission 3, Part 4" must be the level I first saw my dad play because the layout isn't quite right. The weapons all look familiar, but I still can't tell whether I might have beaten the game before.
But why? Why do I remember (seemingly) every detail about some games, and almost nothing about certain others? Why did this game leave no impression on me?
Apparently this is the only part I remember?Let's take Rygar on NES for example. I know I played this game once and got pretty far. I got to a boss that was a snail that shot things at me, three shots at a time, while moving comically slow because it's a snail. I want to say this took place in a treehouse or uh at least some kind of small rectangular room above the ground, slightly offset to the left. I remember being exhausted by the time I got to this point, and maybe that's where I quit because killing the snail was taking forever. But the strange part is that I don't remember anything else about Rygar except the opening scene, the opening music, and the switch to an overhead view in this area between levels. What about the other bosses and whatever happened in between? Why do I remember nothing about this game? Was it really that bad of a game? Was it that I only spent one day playing it, and it never got a chance to sink in?
Let's take Crystalis on NES for example, a game I'm pretty sure I like. I played it once in 1991 or so, probably because we rented it from the video store. (Remember that?) One of the first places you have to infiltrate was this dark jungle area that was about 3×2 or 3×3 screens big; you enter from the south-east corner. It was mostly black with some foliage or dust obscuring the corners of each clearing, and the repeatedly appearing enemies were mostly flying bugs or something like that. I remember being content to go around in circles in this area killing enemies for a while and absorbing the strange atmosphere. Some years later I bought the game at FuncoLand because I remembered that I liked it, if only for the feeling of that one dark area. Then I played the game much farther than I did before and confirmed I did like it, but today I can't remember much about the rest of the game. You kill these tiger guys on some grass, then you walk down a lot of long pathways in the snow, and it keeps going, maybe a water area? And you keep getting new swords... But this means I played Crystalis on at least two occasions, yet I still don't remember any more detail than that. Was it, again, because I didn't spend enough time absorbing it all?
Well, it seems to me that my attitude has a lot to do with it. But also whether I was able to "breeze through" the game too quickly. (I don't have trouble remembering most of fuckin' Castlevania III, yaknow?) And sometimes also due to whether the game itself presents things so as to make it easy to form a mental map. There are probably multiple game design principles you could choose to learn from this... Or it could just be that I'm broken.
On the other hand, if you need any tips playing something like uh Space Quest II, no problem, I somehow won't have to look anything up. I promise I won't spoil the game for you.
