Supplies may be found in chests or on guards, and useful supplies include bullets, grenades, keys, armor, and uniforms. Exits may appear on any side of the screen, or as stairs to a different level. Guards patrol the hallways, and you can shoot in eight directions. The castle is randomly generated, but you always begin in the lowest level. Rules of play are reminiscent of Berzerk. A dying cellmate gives you a gun and ten bullets, and you must escape and find the war plans if possible. The manual outlines the premise – it’s WWII and you, an allied soldier, have been captured behind enemy lines and are held in the Nazi headquarters in labyrinthine Castle Wolfenstein. Perhaps in this alternate history, there’s a hit title Flucht aus Schloß Volchiykamen for the Volkcomputer 48kb. I understand that the latest spinoff has the mainline protagonist’s teenage daughters fighting Nazis in the 80’s.

And they’re still releasing official Wolfenstein sequels. As I write this in 2019, Castle Wolfenstein is as distant a memory as WWII itself was in 1981.