What if the Beatles were Nazis? That’s just one of the questions that live-action+CG+gameplay trailer for the Wolfenstein: The New Order reboot brings up. The clip has some fun perverting some of the 20th Century’s best known photographs and shows us that the Nazis’ domination over the rest of the world is pretty all-encompassing.
UPDATE: This trailer was released today, June 6, which is also the anniversary of D-Day in Europe, the bloody day in 1944 when the Allies stormed the beaches of Normandy, France to push back against the Nazis and eventually win World War II. That timing riled some news outlets, at least one of which pulled the trailer.
The game's publisher, however, called the timing coincidental.
In a statement to Kotaku, Bethesda v.p. of marketing Pete Hines said:
It was not intentional. It was actually supposed to be released yesterday but some last minute things pushed the release to today. We didn’t realize it was the D-Day anniversary. It was simply the Thursday before E3.
We have the ultimate respect for men and women who served their countries on that day, and every day since. This game has nothing to do with their history; this is an alternate universe and timeline. Anyone suggesting we intentionally released a trailer today to make some kind of statement, or wanted to take advantage of the D-Day anniversary as a promotional opportunity, is simply wrong.
It’s pure coincidence, nothing more.