The Enigma Machine
The Enigma Machine (AKA the Enigma Terminal or Übercommander Tracking Terminal) appears in Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus. It is a minigame used to decipher the Enigma Codes found on killed Commanders, and locate Übercommanders for assassination missions.
Accessing the Enigma Machine[]
The machine is located in the helm of Eva's Hammer, outside of Grace's quarters. When you first encounter the machine it is inaccessible: The chair will be lowered and the machine unlocked for use after completing the second Manhattan mission, "A New Suit".
Selecting a minigame[]
The first screen is a list of Übercommanders. The right side of each row shows you if an entry is locked, and how many Enigma Codes you will "spend" unlocking it. For example, if the "cost" is 2 codes, you will lose 2 codes whether you win or lose.
The top right of the screen lists how many Enigma Codes you have left to use.
Select a locked entry from the menu to start the decryption minigame.
Cracking Enigma Codes[]
The top of the screen shows the timer, which starts immediately. The timer resets when each column of code is completed. Letting the timer run out at any point will fail the minigame. The codes you "spent" will be lost (unless you press 'back' to leave the decipher screen before the timer expires).
The enigma code is displayed in the top half of the screen, as 7 columns of 3x6 dot matrix patterns. Column 01 will be highlighted.
The lower half of the screen shows 2 carousels of 3x3 dot matrices, in 9 columns. There are 9 symbols total in each row. You can slide the top row and bottom row independently, left or right. The central column is highlighted; the selected row is highlighted further.
The minigame is a pattern matching game. You must slide the two rows (lower half of the screen) left or right, so that the central 3x6 column matches the highlighted 3x6 column of the Enigma Code (top half of the screen).
Press 'select pattern' to submit your code. Once you have matched column 01, you must now match column 02, and so on.
Once it successfully matched all 7 columns, that Übercommander mission is unlocked. You can start the mission from the war map, (the large table behind the Enigma Machine in the Helm), and read the Übercommander's information on the Killing Board.
Übercommander Missions[]
Selecting missions is done at the electronic tabletop board of the United States by the Killing Board and Enigma machine. During the first part of the game, the missions are unavailable, as each Übercommander mission actually takes place at the various scenes of the previous levels of the game. There are two main places where Übercommander missions may be unlocked at the Enigma machine and played: firstly, after B.J. is repaired by his friends after his execution, and are located in Manhattan, Roswell, and Mesquite; and secondly, after the New Orleans and Venus missions and before finding Wyatt.
The Killing Board displays all the Übercommanders who can be killed, and once they are, an X covers their photographs and they no longer have a sheen. On the table top map, beating a mission causes some U.S. states to turn from red to blank, with the implication that the Übercommanders were in charge of all the Nazi forces holding down those states. After the initial New Orleans and Venus missions, a second new set of Übercommanders are unlockable at the Enigma machine and are put up on the Killing Board, and New Orleans and Venus locations are now also selectable on the table top.
You may notice when playing in an area for the first time that there are sections of the map that are inaccessible. These sections become accessible during the Übercommander missions, and also include Max's toys. Besides indicating if an Übercommander has been killed in an area, the table top also displays whether Max's toys or the weapon upgrades in the area have been collected, with the respective symbols being stick figures (for Übercommanders), gears (weapon upgrades), or robot heads (Max's toys) glowing dim (uncollected) or bright (collected).
Trivia[]
- Once all of the Übercommanders are assassinated completely, the achievement of "Across the Board" will be unlocked.
- Yes, there are Übercommander missions on Venus, which may require a suspension of disbelief even more than the initial Venus missions. You do them by using a Nazi flying saucer.
- If you don't have enough Enigma codes, re-play one of the missions you beat. Some of them are better than others; for example, the Nuclear district in Manhattan has three captains who carry Enigma codes, whereas the Habitat on Venus has only one. The Manhattan Penthouse has two, but is quite compact which makes it convenient.
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