the cutting room mirror

Wolfenstein 3D (SNES)

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The SNES port of of the DOS classic. Aside from being heavily cut down compared to the original version, featuring only 30 levels (2 of them being secret) and half the bosses (all of which are taken from Wolf 3D's sequel Spear of Destiny for some reason), this version is particularly notorious for its censorship: a game where you go up against nazis certainly wasn't safe from Nintendo of America's policies at the time, as had been proven six years earlier, so Hitler (or Staatmeister, as he's now known) had his mustache shaved, all the swastikas were scrubbed, and the infamous German voice acting has been redubbed in English. Oh, and the dogs are now giant rats, because Nintendo can't be having you kill man's best friend.

It also ended up spawning an unlicensed and decidedly more kid-friendly reskin from Wisdom Tree known as Super 3D Noah's Ark.

Sub-Page#

Debug Modes#

There are a few different debug screens which can be accessed from the title screen. To see them, hold R while turning the game on. Let go of the button once the title screen appears, then press one of these button combos:

  • Up + Select - Level Select
  • Right + Select - Music Test
  • Down + Select - Sound Test

There is also a MIDI instrument test which can be accessed by using Pro Action Replay (PAR) codes C043F659 C043F768 and pressing Start at the title screen.

Level Select#

wolf3d-levelselect.png

Lets you choose from any of the normal levels, boss levels (*B), and secret levels (*S).

Music Test#

wolf3d-musictest.png

It's a music test, you know the drill. Press Up or Down to choose a song, and just about any other button to play it. Pressing Start returns to the title screen while the current music continues playing.

Sound Test#

wolf3d-soundtest.png

Covers both sound effects and music samples. Values 25 and above are all silent. Pressing Start goes back to the title screen.

Instrument Test#

wolf3d-insttest.png

A bit more detailed than the last two screens. The "Instrument" option selects one of the only 8 or so instrument samples available. "MIDI note" controls pitch, while "MIDI velocity" controls volume (the higher, the louder). "Pitch scale" and "Velocity scale" probably have something to do with per-instrument pitch and volume correction. Pressing B will play a single note with the current instrument settings.

"Test song" allows you to listen to music tracks, just like the actual music test. Pressing A starts the currently selected song. Pressing B to play an individual note will cause the music to stop playing.

(Source: Original TCRF research)

Unused Song#

This song is used in the PC version when completing a level. The SNES version uses the Game Over/High Scores theme instead.

Unused Graphics#

Wolf3d_snes_wall1.png Wolf3d_snes_wall2.png
Multicolored stone wall with a red sign text. In Spear of Destiny it was a swastika.

It's unused because the multicolored stones replace a yellow brick wall, which has no ornament-type variations.

Also unused in the Jaguar version, but it has a swastika emblem and is visibly unfinished.

Wolf3d_snes_wall3.png Wolf3d_snes_wall4.png
Hellish stones from the final level from Spear of Destiny. Also unused in the Jaguar version, and was replaced with yellow bricks.

Wolf3d_snes_wall5.png
Placeholder texture. This completes a set of 64 wall.

Wolf3d_snes_ubermutant.png
Third frame of the Ubermutant firing. Also unused in the Jaguar version.

Development Text#

Starting at 000FF5FF are various messages pertaining to errors:

CONSOLE
Error occurred at line
in procedure
Line
Name
Subrange exceeded.
File is not open.
Read while at end of file.
Set overflow
Jump to undefined case statement label.
Integer math error.
Real math error.
Underflow.
Overflow.
Divide by zero.
Inexact.
Stack overflow.
Stack error

In addition to this, there are also error strings littered within the first several banks of the ROM, mostly used for sanity checking while testing/debugging.

01F6F: StackCheck error
07F78: Walk: Bad dir
07F86: Enemy walked into a solid area!
084A0: MoveActoron: bad dir!
095B7: Static overload!
098FB: Actor overload!
09A5E: Door overload!
09DA7: Bad spawn type
09DB6: Bad spawn type
09DC5: Bad spawn type
09DD4: Bad spawn type
09DE3: Bad spawn type
0B02F: Bad ChangeWeapon
0B0A7: Bad fire
0C0CE: pwall seg not found
0C98E: boxpos == 5
0DC90: Bad secret elevator

(Source: catzlol from the RTC Discord server)

Regional Differences#

The game was also released in Japan. It is pretty much the exact same game with a few exceptions mostly with the storyline.

Intro Screen#

US/Europe

Japan

The Japanese version removes the "Licensed by Nintendo" text, thus shifting the rest of the text down a little.

Cutscenes#

The mission briefings in the US/Europe version were replaced in the Japanese version with black splash screens with the name of the episodes.

Also note how in the 5th episode cutscene, the boss is still referred to as the "Death Knight", which somehow made it past Nintendo of America's censors.

US/Europe

Japan

Japanese Text/Romaji

Translation

ウルフェンシュタインの災厄
Urufenshutain no Saiyaku

The Disaster of Wolfenstein

死霊の巣窟
Shiryou no Soukutsu

The Den of the Dead

アイゼンファウストの爪痕
Aizenfausuto no Tsumeato

The Clawmarks of Eisenfaust

呪いの木偶人形
Noroi no Dekuningyou

The Curse of the Wooden Figurines

戦友
Senyuu

The Comrade

勝利なき戦い
Shouri naki Tatakai

The Battle Without Victory

Oddities#

  • The ending screen of the game shows Dr. Schabbs before the Trans Grosse boss, which is the order which the bosses appeared in the prototype.
    • It seems the Jaguar version attempted to correct this, but swapped the names of Hans Grosse and Dr. Schabbs instead.
  • Despite the censorship for the SNES version, B.J's face in the HUD still has blood for when the player is at 25% health.