Careful! This game was made by people with a superiority complex. It sucks!
This game deserves 5 points, not more!
I see the problem of todays games connected to Lara Croft is the fact that they are trying to reinvent her character. Or, even worse, they just hijack the title and expect high sales thanks to fans of these series!
Let me start, as always, from the bad points!
The bad point is a very cheesy story. I'm not an expert, nor I'm an expert at all, at story-tellings, but this game is like those cheap movies with lots of explosions, with cheap and fake hype, and bad, unconvincing acting. Atleast they tried! Because it does look ambitious. Ambitious in a sense that it was made by people with a superiority complex! It almost feels like they are expecting to receive a Nobel Prize Award for this work! Like that Nobel Prize even means anything. I mean, Obama received it..
Anyway, the developers have concentrated on a wrong plane of reality with this game. Instead working on game itself, they decided to win hearts using cheap drama. For Gods sake, this isn't even a game anymore, It is a Movie! And a bad one!
Speaking about lacking game, it almost feels like they just ran out of financial resources and time to complete it! The only decent part of this game is the beginning part. After that particular timeline it just goes downhill, downhill like falling from a cliff onto rocks!
You do jump around, however, climb, crouch, run, swing, fly through air, yes. Even throw stuff, shoot guns, manipulate objects, do acrobatics by jumping on tigers heads; confusing them. But all of this goes away in the middle of the game, where it feels like they rushed through it! They even added a motorcycle which ruins this game all the way down! Hey, I thought this is Tomb Raider, not a motorcycle race game! But, hey, they know better, I guess. But, nah, I don't thinks so. They just want money.
In other words, a very Bad Level Design.
Now the good parts:
The major gem of this game is its outstanding work of detail! Talking from a technical point of view, it is very high quality! Almost impressing. Well okay, I was impressed!
Everything, the sound, the texture, models, environment, animations. It looks gorgeous, it sounds gorgeous, it moves gorgeous! I think I almost can smell Laras hair! That's how gorgeous the detail is! But this alone will not make a good game, obviously.
For animation they used motion capture. So you can expect seeing Lara doing very realistic and smooth moves.
Like I said above, the only good part is the beginning, particularly, that one level. I wont tell you what it is, but when you play you will see what I am talking about. It is the best level in the game. It has so much level of detail, it feels so real, you just want to jump into your monitor and smell the ocean air, hear the breeze, or touch the rainforest leaves! Or even just grab Laras ass, because she do look very good and very lifelike! You actually can hear her breathing!
Lara also interacts with the environment. For example, when you make her run through the bushes, she will react accordingly. She haves new moves and ways to interact with the world. So if you played the previous series, you may be pleased with that.
This particular level is very well designed. Combining it with her abilities to overcome obstacles, there is a room to develop strategy and being rewarded for that. From a gamepoint view, it is very enjoyable and dynamic. There are lots of ways overcoming obstacles. Taking into consideration the fact that everything is so lifelike, you just feel overloaded with environmental information! Watching her moves - so lifelike! And that is the best part about this level. I felt satisfied playing it. I replayed it just to enjoy that world again, by slowly walking and carefully observing the level of detail and the animation that she embodied. If only the developers continued in this manner through the whole game, this game could be a masterpiece. But it seems they have resources management problem. They allocated labor, you know, into another place. But, nonetheless, the result is very, very good, if you look at that one point. But overall, this game is lacking.
So in short, mediocre start, outstanding beginning, horrible ending - all from a gamepoint view. This game has a very good platform, they just need to work on level design. The plot and story sucks also. It is so cheesy and uninspired. So there is another point for reconstruction. The sound, the looks, the moves, and the level of detail are top notch, on the other hand.
That's about all I have to say about my experience with this game.