It's easy to understand why brutalism has been such a potent source of architectural inspiration for games. The raw forms - solid, legible and with clear lineation - are the perfect material for level designers to craft their worlds with. Simultaneously, these same structures are able to ignite imaginations and gesture outwards, their dramatic shapes and monumental dimensions shocking and attention-seizing.

Brutalism is a branch of architecture that spans roughly 30 years (1950s-1970s). It was borne out of the devastation of two world wars, when there was a need to rebuild. In this aftermath brutalism became a vital global phenomenon. If you live in a city, you've no doubt passed by a hulking example.

The term derives from a French invention: b ton brut, meaning raw concrete. This is the structure's most prominent feature - sheer concrete surface, often left rough, exposed or unfinished. Significant in the emergence of brutalism was the architect Le Corbusier and his Unit d'Habitation. Built from reinforced concrete, the housing unit was an attempt to create what Le Corbusier called "a machine for living" - a place that met our every need. It was a thoroughly modern, progressive and even utopian conception of architecture. Regardless of the visual force of brutalism, it's impossible to divorce it from this socio-historical background.

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Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus was a rip-roaring science-fiction romp through an alternate history. It was, as Edwin more eloquently said in his Wolfenstein 2 review, "vicious, affecting, witty, spaced-out, crude, inventive, morbid and for the most part, a success."

But while we all merrily mashed Nazis in 1960s America, developers at MachineGames cringed at a parade of things we didn't see - the "I"s which weren't dotted, the "T"s uncrossed. Andreas jerfors was one such developer, the senior game designer for Wolfenstein 2, and in a talk at Digital Dragons 2018 in Poland last week he outlined what he thought went well, and what he thought didn't.

Take stealth, for instance. The idea was for Wolfenstein 2 to cater to three playstyles: mayhem, tactical and stealth. The first two were fine but stealth was weak. "Sometimes it felt inconsistent," jerfors said in his talk. Enemies discovered you too easily and too often, and you'd be left with no choice but to fight. "We didn't spend enough resources and attention on stealth." He thinks it's because not enough people believed in stealth across the company so it didn't have the creative buy-in it needed to really work.

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