Bethesda and nostalgia. Bethesda has become a video game juggernaut over the past few years. It used to be that their games were outstanding, with excellent gameplay and nuanced and interesting plots. They still produce some great games, like Fallout 4, Doom, and Wolfenstein: The New Order, but they are starting to get complacent and overly self-assured with their success.
The nostalgia comes in with the franchise itself. Wolfenstein is one of the longest video game franchises in the world, going back to the early 80's where it was one of the earliest stealth games. It's the grand-daddy to games like the Metal Gear series. The boys at Id Software were fans of the original games and wanted to make their own take on the game, so we got Wolfenstein 3D, the grand-daddy of the first person shooter genre. So it has a long and fondly remembered history in the gaming world with many fans being nostalgic for it.
Mix those two together and you have the recipe for Bethesda to feel they can charge whatever they want for something that would have been a free shareware demo back in the early days of Id Software.
Never change Germany.
