Tomb Raider review

 

It's hard to believe that it's 17 years since the pneumatic archaeologist burst on to the gaming scene but thanks to several sequels, a couple of movies, scores of PR lookalikes and a bunch of action figures, Lara Croft is probably light-years more popular than Indiana Jones.

So the problem for Crystal Dynamics was to find a way to drag what was becoming a deteriorating franchise kicking and screaming into the post-COD era without losing all that mesmerised the hardcore fans.

The result is a strange paradox - a game that has gone back to the roots while looking and playing like a modern movie blockbuster. The aim is to explain psychologically, emotionally and physically how Lara became the daredevil explorer of later years. Thus we meet her in the opening cut scene fresh from college with some student pals on her first major exploration to find an uncharted island.

 

Early conflicts in the group are flagged up, the ship is caught in a lethal storm and after wreck and unconsciousness, Lara awakes hanging upside down in a room surrounded by dead and dismembered bodies. The tone is set - this is going to be darker, bloodier, scarier and more dramatic than any previous Croft escapades.

The level of detail in everything from Lara's appearance to the landscapes, abandoned vessels, tomb interiors and hundreds of 'extras' is astonishing and both the gameplay and the connecting movie scenes are interwoven so expertly that you genuinely feel like you've been immersed in a 3D action film.

Also, the Lara of the earlier games was largely expressionless, her character difficult to fathom. This Lara shivers in the cold, cries from pain and loss, feels guilt when harm comes to her friends and frequently doubts her abilities at the beginning of the story. She has to learn how to forage for food, how to make or improve weapons and most importantly how to kill to survive.

Be warned - this is not family entertainment. The '18' rating is deservedly awarded for some of the goriest scenes yet produced in computer gaming - mutilations, executions, literally rivers of blood and unnumbered corpses litter the map. Lara herself is punched in the face, stabbed in the leg, drenched in blood and mud, dragged down rapids, slammed against floors, thumped against rock faces and (almost) sexually attacked. Her 'death' scenes include falling off cliffs, being impaled underwater, burning alive and being hacked to pieces - not for the faint hearted.
For some diehard fans the shift to Die Hard heroics may well be too much to stomach. Yes there are still some puzzles to solve, climbing routes to figure out and of course tombs to plunder. Yet the shift in emphasis is much heavier towards combat, frenetic pace and adrenaline rushes where standing still means instant termination.

Other new elements include camp sites being used (in the style of The Witcher) to upgrade skills and weapons, experience points earned for killing animals or clever human slaying and the dreaded button-mashing Quick Time Events during key melee attacks. The controls on the whole work well but there are times when the camera angles are deliberately and annoyingly off-centre and certain running sequences make keeping a straight line virtually impossible.

Clearly Crystal Dynamic are doing all they can to steal Uncharted's thunder and for most of the time you have to applaud their success. The storyline is frequently engrossing but it's a shame that Tomb Raider has been released so close to Far Cry 3 where (what a coincidence!) a group of friends is captured by a gang of homicidal loonies on a desert island and one supposedly weaker member has to rescue the others.

British actress Camilla Luddington (who recently featured in the True Blood TV series) makes a believable stab at voicing Lara's progress through the narrative but while the villains always sound suitably menacing, her friends never truly rise above stereotypes. Humour is pretty thin on the ground here, apart from an early "I hate tombs" quip from the heroine. One other note for those who want to extend their gameplay beyond the side quests in the samller tombs - multiplayer has also been included for the first time, with battles between Scavengers and Survivors but the maps are quite small.

Ultimately how you react to Tomb Raider may well depend on how much of a purist you were before you played it. If you come to it as a first timer, this is undoubtedly one of the most exciting, dynamic, graphically stunning and explosive horror-fests yet created. If on the other hand you pine for peaceful puzzle-solving, tomb trickery and hunting for medipacks, this new Lara might leave you seriously traumatised.

 

Score: 4.5/5