It’s a rather lovely story, the tale of Lara’s rescue. Tomb Raider, too infamous to maintain the reputation it deserved, span out of control. People, when reflecting on the series, will recall the first couple and begrudgingly admit that they were really good. But then they’ll say things tailed off, descending into generic sequels, eventually finishing in the hideous plane-full-orphans-crashing-into-train-full-of-puppies mess that was Angel of Darkness. But they’re wrong.
Not about AoD of course – you couldn’t even walk in straight lines – but about the previous games. They were all good. Not as great as the first two, purely because of familiarity, but every one was a lovely collection of third-person platforming levels, each improving the graphics and adding in new moves and abilities for the super-posh hero. Even The Last Revelation, with it’s hopelessly stupid ending of a pyramid falling on Lara, was enormous fun. It was what happened around Tomb Raider became increasingly rubbish. There was the tabloid excitement that a new girl with long brown hair had been chosen to be the new Lara, or whatever marketing tosh that was. There were the movies. And, more than anything, there were people writing about a videogame character having big tits. It all must have become too much for Core, who when making Angel of Darkness attempted to reinvent the whole thing, but instead put out an entirely unfinished and barely playable embarrassment. And with that, despite having died two games earlier, Lara was dead.
Then three years later Eidos wanted their cash cow lady back, and picked a new developer, Crystal Dynamics. As if everyone weren’t cynical enough, especially now everyone had decided that most of the excellent games were actually crap, this was received with heavy sighs. And what came out was great! Tomb Raider: Legend got a fine 80% from me in Gamer (and I would have marked higher if the idiots hadn’t sent me bugged code that they fixed before release). It was great because it remembered what made the first five games great: tile-based platforming. Add in a genuinely well written script, with new characters cracking wise in Lara’s earpiece (if you played the Cornwall levels, you’ll remember the best gags), and some of the first ever pixel shader 3.0 graphics, and you’ve something well worth playing.
Rather than sequelling it, and continuing the cliff-hanger story about Lara’s mum, CD then made Anniversary, a sort of modified remake of the original game, and hit the same high. And now the third is dated, and what I want from you is not, “Oh no, another Tomb Raider game, what’s this, the 93rd?” but, “Hooray! A new Tomb Raider game! Another game in a series that, apart from that one, has been consistently really good!”
The Tomb Raider website has been redecorated, rather disturbingly with a picture of Lara at the top in which she appears to have some horrible skin-wasting disease. There’s diaries and assets and all sorts of treats to play with. But more importantly, there’s a release date: November. Good. Click the pics for full size.
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Yeah I know Mr Walker is one of the good guys, which is why I said he did the right thing in his rating, but the issue is interesting and it’s kind of harsh to lay the blame on the publisher for playing the game that the mags have just as big a part in.
It wasn’t my intention to start a big discussion so I’ll just leave it there. I really appreciate what you guys at RPS do and didn’t mean any offense.
“On the game itself, I’m not sure Crystal Dynamics have it in them to make a genuinely polished and consistently excellent game, going by their previous efforts. Both Legend and Anniversary had moments that really got in the way of enjoying the better aspects of the game, the motorbike section in particular was woeful filler in an already too short game.”
This pretty much nails some of my main worries for the game at the moment; both Legend and Anniversary were quite inconsistent in their design quality, and, while they were rarely bad, they had many parts where great areas contrasted with more average ones. Hopefully CD have worked on sorting that out for Underworld.
Actually, I still maintain it was simply Eidos’ fault ack. If any company sends out a copy of their game for review, then it means it’s the same thing that will end up in retail, just as it means that when they send a game out for an age rating or whatever else.
Otherwise it is up to THEM to mark it for preview as an early pre-release version and if they do that I’m sure it will be mentioned. The fact it wasn’t in stores yet means shit as it could be for many reasons other than the game not being gold yet.
And once again, unless the actual developers state there’s even a chance this won’t be the final product, the journalist can do nothing about it because in each and every case there’s no interest for anyone in sending out something that’s not representative of the store version and mark it for review while it’s the same developers or publishers that should be damn aware a game can be marked down for such reasons.
Similarly, you cannot expect reviewers to go out and buy the games they review, that only happens on websites like this, not when it’s just a day job you go through, whoever spends his own money for his day job (unless it’s his own small or big business)?
Inspired by this thread, I went back to look at Tomb Raider The Last Revelation. It may have been a good game on its native platform, but by anything like modern standards the PC port is terrible. Ugly graphics (bear in mind this was released the same year as Silent Hill and FF8 on the PS, let alone Kingpin and Outcast on the PC), terrible control system (not modifiable from the game), bloody unskippable cutscenes every three minutes (okay, this was the tutorial, but the fact that it drops you straight into the tutorial is no plus point) and no way to quit it except Alt-F4.
hey just for the info you can already pre order tomb raider underworld at game stop.com (yes this comment is a little off topic)
“terrible control system (not modifiable from the game), bloody unskippable cutscenes every three minutes (okay, this was the tutorial, but the fact that it drops you straight into the tutorial is no plus point) and no way to quit it except Alt-F4.”
What? The controls are fully changeable in the options, and you can quit the game on the pause menu. Also, the cutscenes in the tutorial can be skipped with the look key, although the same can’t be said of the later ones (and it’s an irritating step backwards from the earlier games). Though I’ve never been too fond of Last Revelation anyway (it has the most attempts at innovation, but theres a bunch of strange steps backward in general interface and it falls apart towards the end).
Legend was disappointing. Good graphics and sceneries and pretty good guys in “Lara team” (those three). Nice boss fights. And finally – pretty good price (bargain bin purchase).
On the other hand – small levels with ’studio’ feel to it. Some really terribly looking models and textures – especially in cut-scenes IIRC. Heavy console feel to it.
Parkour-ish, linear, boring levels without exploration. Antagonists look like they dropped from US silicon porn film. And ‘hilarious’ motorcycle chase parts (or rather utterly awful).
And last but not least – one dog is more dangerous enemy than group of blokes armed with assault rifles and submachine guns? Really funny (really :).
Oh, and it is also quite short too (which can be plus for somebody, though).
And, sadly, mediocre entertainment for me – not bad, but not something I would be looking forward to play either.
My wish for TR series – less human enemies (way less) and more areas to explore – I don’t want to play Tomb Raider – Hitman Chronicles. NO parkour, which I sincerely hate.
All in all, my end mark would be something around 3/5. Nice and shiny, without deeper substance = shallow entertainment.
after 7 years i found that aldwych level in tr3 has some mason message, i couldn’t solve extra catch with planet problem , but maybe somebody can tell me how to manage that ( btw . i passed that level with no solving planet but i am courious). thx