New York City

"Men. Women. Children. Not screaming no more. But I can still hear you."

―B.J. when making it to Manhattan.

New York City was a city in the United States of America. It is mentioned in Wolfenstein: The New Order and is a major location in Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus.

Wolfenstein: The New Order

New York being nuked by the Nazis.

Once the largest city in the United States of America, New York was the financial and cultural hub of the nation. At the time of Wolfenstein: The New Order, it was destroyed on December 21st, 1948 by Der Bestrafer (The Punisher), a nuclear bomb developed by the Third Reich. Hundreds of thousands to millions were killed, and only those who had taken refuge underground had avoided its most lethal effects. An irradiated wasteland by 1960, Nazi media boasts that the region may soon be rendered habitable in less than three years, thanks to the Nazi-developed terraformer technology. The Nazis are planning to rebuild New York by Spring 1967 with Über Concrete. Uberkommandant Klaus Klinger called a meeting, where he, along with fellow Uberkommandanten Thomas Wechsler, Raimund Hoffman, and Messer, had detailed plans from the Oberkommando to rebuild New York in the Third Reich’s image, renaming it “Neuyork”, intending it to be the pinnacle of German technology and craftsmanship. His plan was as follows: first, they would clean up the toxic waste left behind by the radioactive fallout caused by Der Bestrafer, along with the removal of all traces of radioactivity within the greater area of the city, using forced labor in the form of slaves to remove the toxic waste, then they would purge all resistance cells from the area. Then they would construct new buildings using uberconcrete, and then construct what they would envision as the “tallest building in the world”. To that end, they would research more Da’at Yichud technology to accomplish such a feat, and then suppress the unfortunate epithet that New York had been given: “The City of a Thousand Ghosts”, replacing it with something much more befitting of the Regime. There were numerous ideas for slogans, such as “The City of Hope”, or “The Big Apfelstrudel”, which Hoffman suggested, which made everyone in the meeting room laugh. The final stage of their plan would be to contact all media channels for positive articles.

Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus

Ruins of Manhattan from the coast

New York City, specifically Manhattan, is a major plot point and playable location in Wolfenstein II. Being exactly as one would expect, it is an irradiated, burned-out ruin. The skeletons of entire buildings eerily curl with altitude due to the kinetic energy of the nuclear blast stretching them. The Statue of Liberty now lies a crumbled mess at the bottom of the Hudson River, and only a few sections of the city's vast underground network have survived relatively intact. The population of the city did not fare well either with many corpses and decaying skeletons found in the ruins in the city.

A small but formidable cell of rebels led by Grace Walker reside at the top of the Empire State Building, which in itself is badly damaged but still standing nonetheless. It is also the only habitable location left in the city without protective gear, with the radiation levels at the topmost floors being non-lethal. Thanks to the efforts of William Blazkowicz, contact is reestablished with Walker and the rebels escape the city before the Nazis can intercept them.

After the Second American Revolution, the city falls back under the control of the US.

Gallery

The ruin of Manhattan in the morning.

Manhattan from the Empire State Building at night

The decimated skyline

Trivia

• In the Separate “Riverside” part of New York, upon reaching the area where Gernot Herrmann is positioned, the remains of the Statue of Liberty can be seen. The way the remains are positioned appears to be a reference to the famous “Statue of Liberty” scene from the sci-fi film “Planet of the Apes”.
• If Nazis were planning to rebuild the city in 1967, means that Der Bestrafer was more powerful than Little Boy and Fat Man. These bombs in real life kept their zones radiated for around two year, while German made New York City uninhabitable even after 13 years (date when TNC occurs).