The single-player campaign runs about as long as most; you'll probably get about six to eight hours out of it. Then it's on to multiplayer, and it's interesting in that it goes for a decidedly retro look and feel; it ditches the glossier graphics of the single-player game to give character models and animation that is reminiscent of Return to Castle Wolfenstein, the 2001 game. Yet the multiplayer modes themselves feel relatively rudimentary and they aren't as deep as the popular Return to Castle Wolfenstein mod Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory, which is puzzling. Anothe problem is that Wolfenstein is competing against another recent Activision World War II shooter, the wildly popular and deep Call of Duty: World at War.
With almost a decade between installments, it's impossible to argue that id is trying to milk the Wolfenstein license. Yet this also means that a lot of evolution has gone on in the genre. It's admirable that Raven Software recognized this with Wolfenstein, but you can't help but wish that they developed the kernel of the ideas in this game into something more. As it is, this new Wolfenstein comes off as an engaging, though otherwise forgettable, shooter.