Tomb Raider: Chronicles Review for PC

Tomb Raider: Chronicles Review

The main problem is that the Tomb Raider series hasn't grown with the times.

Core Design, maker of the Tomb Raider series, has proven to be a prolific developer. Without even counting the "gold editions," Tomb Raider: Chronicles is the fifth Tomb Raider game in as many years - a feat that deserves some sort of recognition. Not many games make it to a fifth chapter, let alone in such a short time span. But while Core and publisher Eidos Interactive should be commended for their commitment to avoiding the long development cycles that plague so many games, they can also be criticized for squandering what began as an imaginative and interesting series. Tomb Raider: Chronicles features good level designs and a bit of variation on the tried-and-tried-again Tomb Raider formula, but there's too little in the way of innovation to make it seem like anything more than just another trip to the cash cow.

At the outset of Chronicles, Lara Croft is presumed dead and several of her colleagues and friends are holding a memorial service in her honor. This service leads to a sort of vigil, where the gathered recall some of Lara's past exploits. These stories make up the adventures, and there are four unrelated episodes. Each of these finds Lara searching for some mythical artifact in some mystical land, usually against some European adversary. Descriptions of the episodes sound like variations on Clue solutions: You have the Frenchman with the Philosopher's Stone in the Roman Colosseum and the German with the Spear of Destiny in the Russian submarine. Lara will also have to hunt demons in an Irish moor and find an Egyptian artifact in a high-security skyscraper.

The first three of these episodes follows the Tomb Raider formula to the letter, though veterans of the series will note that Chronicles is an easier game than its predecessors. But the basic gameplay remains the same. The first puzzle in the very first Tomb Raider involved finding some gears to open a new area. And almost every puzzle in every Tomb Raider game since has been exactly the same, though the gears have been replaced by seals, medallions, or what have you. Between these door-opening puzzles is a series of jumping puzzles. You must simply find the right area to jump or climb to and then execute the proper moves. Lara has some new moves in Chronicles, including tightrope walking and hand-over-hand swinging, but these are little more than slight variations on the theme.

The problem with Tomb Raider's jumping puzzles is that they are so clinical. In most platform games, such as the excellent Rayman 2, learning the pattern required to complete an area is a test of reflexes. This is not the case in Tomb Raider. Instead, you only need to jump within a certain window of time, and Lara will jump at precisely the right time for you. Once you learn to execute the moves, and you will do so very early on, the puzzles are just a matter of trial and error. This takes away much of the surprise and suspense needed to make a game like this fun, and the high-action settings that Lara explores are made somewhat dull as a result of gameplay that all but does away with the element of surprise. There are a few areas that require you to perform a series of actions in precisely the right order, but these are the exception.

The jumping puzzles are interrupted by the occasional gunplay sequence, but these aren't much better. Lara aims automatically, and most combat is simply a matter of mashing the fire button while frantically trying to avoid being pinned into a corner by your opponent. This can be harder than it sounds, especially considering that the camera angles seem to conspire against you to make seeing your opponent impossible until he (or she or it) is upon you. Luckily, there is little combat in Chronicles.

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