![]() Honestly, if the game was just a series of these amazing challenge tombs strung together with some type of a thin plot, it would probably be a much better game. Their environments are unique, like a little microcosm where it’s easy to get a feel for the people who built each one, and after some exploration you start to almost get a feel for their thought processes in terms of how they design their traps and protect their sacred artifacts. If you are on the main path and see another way you can go, odds are there is a challenge tomb at the end of it.Īll of the challenge tombs are pretty much miniature games in themselves. Given the linear nature of the levels, uncovering them is not too difficult. They are not placed on your maps at first, though the game alerts you when you are near one, so you can start the hunt for it. These are completely optional tombs that you can explore. The game is filled with so-called challenge tombs. Interestingly enough, the best content in Shadow of the Tomb Raider is contained in the optional areas. Crafting matters very little in this game from what I could tell beyond the basic tiers, and there is so little combat that maxing out the warrior path just seems wasteful. However, I would caution players to mostly focus on the exploration or mobility perks, things like holding your breath underwater for longer or having more time to complete an action sequence before triggering one of those rebar-from-nowhere cut scenes. The world for the most part is very linear, but I didn’t really mind because it kept me moving from one of those big figure-out-the-ancient world type of puzzles to the next, with minor puzzle solving in-between.Īs with Rise, Lara has a skill tree and multiple paths she can take regarding leveling up. Ignoring the plot, the gameplay is really good, assuming you enjoy puzzle solving like old-school Lara used to do. South Park came to mind.Īnyway, after that you eventually leave the tutorial part of the game and begin your quest to set things right and save the world before the Mayans can destroy it, or something. At several points, my Lara fell into what was clearly open water, only to be shown a cutscene of her landing with a squish on a pile of rebar. This triggers one of those endless running sequences where you have to jump or swim or climb while water or fire is chasing you, and if you make a wrong move you end up falling to your doom and have to repeat the sequence over again. When Lara comes out of the tomb, the Trinity leader is like “Silly girl, you killed the world.” But he has a helicopter, so he just flies away. Let’s just assume that is somehow true (rolls eyes) and move on. Yes, the ancient Mayans were so powerful that if you stole a dagger from them there would be earthquakes, tsunamis, mudslides, volcanic eruptions, a permanent solar eclipse, and pretty much the end of the world, all starting about five minutes after you swipe the weapon. Only, what she does not know is that taking the dagger without holding another artifact at the same time triggers the end of the world courtesy of a Mayan apocalypse. In the earliest tomb that you raid, Lara grabs a sacred dagger (this is a cutscene so you have no choice) because she is afraid that Trinity is closing in, and she doesn’t want them to have it. I don’t really hold this against the game, but I personally had a hard time suspending belief on this one. The plot of Shadow is just a little bit far-fetched. ![]() I don’t think too many people who really enjoyed Rise will love Shadow, and vice versa. In Shadow of the Tomb Raider, you instead have a mostly linear environment, with about 20 percent or less of the game involving combat and the rest being exploration or some type of puzzle solving. The main challenges there involved taking out heavily defended Trinity outposts. ![]() For the latter type of player, Rise of the Tomb Raider was a somewhat open world with lots of combat. Of course, your enjoyment of this game might depend on how much you like atmospheric puzzles compared to combat shooters. Of the three games in the most recent trilogy, Tomb Raider in 2013, Rise of the Tomb Raider in 2016 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider now, this most recent entry goes the farthest in sending us back to those glory days. So when the developer said they were rebooting the franchise, it was kind of a subtext that what they were actually doing was trying to get back to their roots. Underworld was not a bad game, I actually enjoyed it, but it wasn’t what longtime fans expected from a Tomb Raider game – or what we have experienced over the many years exploring tombs with this series. The last game before that was Underworld, in 2008, which seemed to jump on the Call of Duty craze at the time to try and make our beloved Lara Croft more of a run and gun type action hero. Back in 2013, when the Tomb Raider franchise was rebooted, it was sitting at a kind of low point for the series.
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