Wolfenstein 3D

Wolfenstein 3D (also known as "Wolf3d" or "Wolf") is a FPS created by id Software and published by Apogee Software in 1992. It involves the adventures of an Allied soldier, B.J. Blaskowicz, fighting his way through a series of Nazi dungeons during World War II. It owes much of its success to an aggressive shareware marketing campaign which was later repeated with even greater success for Doom. It also spawned a commercial sequel, Wolfenstein 3d: Spear of Destiny, which used the same engine, and was the inspiration for id's Return to Castle Wolfenstein, released in 1999.

Inspiration for this game came from the even older 2D games Castle Wolfenstein and Beyond Castle Wolfenstein, published by Muse Software. Unlike these predecessors, Wolfenstein 3D shifted the focus away from puzzle solving in favor of more action-oriented gameplay, though id had planned to include more strategic elements seen in these earlier games (such as wearing captured uniforms and dragging bodies), these features made gameplay too complex, slowing the action down. The game still contained some arcade-style concepts though, such as lives and scoring.

The engine is fairly simple, using maps composed of tiles, which only allow 90-degree angles. Floors and ceilings are shaded with flat colors instead of having textures. At the time, however, Wolfenstein 3d was seen as a revolutionary new product, and is regarded by many to be the granddaddy of all later FPS games, as it popularized the genre. It is especially noteworthy for having directly led to the development and release of Doom just a year after its release. Although Doom and its successors quickly superceded Wolf to become an equally important milestone in the development of the first person shooter, Wolfenstein still enjoys a substantial following on the internet, including websites, user-created maps, and even totally new games based on the same source code, such as Spear of Destiny: Resurrection. There is also a total conversion for Doom (the Wolfendoom series), created by Laz Rojas, which uses the Doom engine (and DEH files) to recreate an enhanced version of the Wolf3d environment. All of the original levels are meticulously reproduced, but Rojas had also created a number of extremely atmospheric standalone missions following the theme of fighting Nazis in a WWII setting, such as "Operation Arctic Wolf", "Astrostein", and "Operation Rheingold" which pushed the engine to its limit with new weapons, enemies, maps, and special effects. Since releasing a special edition of "Operation Arctic Wolf" in 2003, after a three year hiatus, Rojas has not updated his site any further, leaving most of his projects in limbo, most likely never to be completed.