Tomb Raider Review
Game Emblems
The Good
Tomb Raider is an exhilarating action adventure that serves as a terrific origin story for the iconic Lara Croft.
The Good
- Story believably builds Lara up from unsure academic to confident adventurer
- Fascinating setting with a rich sense of history
- Intense combat that offers a good deal of flexibility
- Controls make physically overcoming the island's terrain a pleasure
- Good assortment of tombs to raid, relics to collect, and puzzles to solve.
The Bad
- Forgettable multiplayer component
- Outside of Lara's character arc, story is predictable.
When adventurer extraordinaire Lara Croft raided her first tomb back in 1996, she brought with her an exhilarating feeling of isolation and discovery. Over the years, Lara has continued to venture into parts unknown, taking dark turns and frequently tangling with the supernatural as the series evolved alongside the burgeoning third-person action adventure genre. The gameplay of this series reboot takes a few cues from a current titan of the genre--Nathan Drake and the Uncharted series--but don't let that familiarity put you off. This origin story is a terrific adventure that balances moments of quiet exploration with plenty of rip-roaring action to keep you enthralled from start to finish.
As Tomb Raider begins, Lara is more an academic than an adventurer. But when she's shipwrecked on an island full of ancient secrets and deadly cultists, she has little choice but to learn how to survive. Lara endures a great deal of punishment early in the game, and though no small amount of that anguish is physical, it's an unpleasant moment in which a man tries to force himself on her that's most harrowing. But as unpleasant as it is, it marks an important turning point in Lara's understanding of just how hard she has to fight to survive. Rather than crumbling under the weight of her physical and emotional struggles, she emerges from them a stronger person.
It's empowering to witness Lara's journey from the understandably fearful individual she is when she first arrives on the island to the justifiably confident survivor she becomes. Later in the game, when she has proven to the resident cultists that she's not the easily cowed person they mistook her for, she turns the psychological tables on them, letting loose battle cries to strike fear into their hearts. Aspects of the story that fall outside of Lara's character arc aren't as strong; there's a twist of sorts that occurs late in the game that you see coming hours ahead of time, for instance, and the central villain offers little in the way of nuance. But as an introduction to the legendary Lara Croft, Tomb Raider's tale is a success; she emerges as a strong, charismatic and human figure, and you're left eager to see what the future holds for her.
Lara's origin story deserves an extraordinary setting, and the island where Tomb Raider takes place does not disappoint. Centuries ago, it was home to a kingdom called Yamatai. Many shrines, temples, statues and other remnants of that history remain, and often, you just want to take in these places, slowly advancing through the darkness, eager to discover what's just outside the light of your torch. The island is a beautiful place, but not every discovery is a pleasant one; Yamatai's dark history is vividly communicated in piles of bones and far more grisly things.
The ancient structures of Yamatai now coexist alongside bunkers built during World War II, the wreckage of planes brought down by the storms that surround the island, and the shantytowns and makeshift machinery of the island's current inhabitants. It's a fascinating hodgepodge of the beautiful and the utilitarian; the buildings are believably nestled in their rough natural surroundings, and appear appropriately weathered, damaged, and rusty. The island really feels like a place where people have lived and where great and terrible things have happened. It's a place with many facets; it has claustrophobic caverns and breathtaking vistas, and phenomena like gentle snowfalls, torrential downpours, and fierce, howling winds make it alternately seem like a tranquil place, and a brutal one.
It's immediately clear that one thing the island is not is safe, so it's a good thing that Lara soon gets her hands on a bow. You acquaint yourself with using it by hunting animals; Lara doesn't have hunger levels you need to manage or any such thing, but the deer, rabbits, crabs and other creatures that call the island home make it feel much more alive. For reasons of their own, the cult that currently occupies the island doesn't exactly welcome you with open arms, so it's not long before you need to turn that bow (and, soon, a pistol, rifle, and shotgun) on humans. Combat is varied and suspenseful; some situations give you the opportunity to take a stealthy approach, sneaking up behind enemies to perform silent kills, or firing arrows into walls to distract them and picking them off from a distance with well-aimed arrows while their comrades aren't looking. During one particularly tense battle in a fog-shrouded forest, patrolling foes hunt you with flashlights; if you can manage to stay unseen, you can shift from prey to predator, using their cones of light to pinpoint their positions and eliminating them one by one.
Then, there are the all-out firefights. When your presence is known, enemies are smart and aggressive about flushing you out from cover with grenades and Molotovs, which forces you to keep moving and act boldly. Many enemies attack from a distance while others get in close, so you need to be constantly on your toes, switching between your weapons on the fly and evading foes who attack with melee weapons. Dodging and countering melee attacks is easy, but the savage animations of Lara's counters make eliminating those foes who make the mistake of getting too close to you consistently satisfying.
By
Carolyn Petit, Editor
Carolyn Petit has been reading GameSpot since 2000 and writing for it since 2008. She has a particular fondness for games of the 1980s, and intends to leave the field of games journalism as soon as she hears that her local Ghostbusters franchise is hiring.
26 comments
After playing games like resident evil 6, i had given up hope on expecting anything good, when it comes to major genre overhauls to the classic games ive loved for so long. Though i met this game with much anticipation, much like metal gear rising as well, it was mostly negative anticipation. That being said, once i played this game, much like metal gear rising again, it completely convinced me that genre overhauling in games can be done right, and reboot isnt exclusively a dirty word. very very impressed. more of an action game than traditional TR titles for sure, but maintained enough of the desirable elements from the originals. Ive been a TR fan since the beginning, besides that i tend to greet ANY reboots with initial skepticism. I was made a fool by this title. I truly havent been so enamored in a game since the late 90's when zelda ocarina of time came out, which ironically enough i actually saw this game as TR meets zelda in a lot of instances. its been a great first quarter this year for games, TR tops the list for me, its on my top 5 best games of this generation list easily. fantastic game all around. i gave it a 9. I just hope capcom is taking some notes from the likes of this masterpiece when it comes to making big changes in gameplay to games like RE. This is how its done.
1 Like This is a great generic action game, not a Tomb Raider game. Square Enix should deliver the franchise to another producer that bring us a sexy Lara again and exploration.
@ErickPS4 A sexy lara? are you saying you want a torpedo breasted moron of a girl with skin tight clothing like the past Tomb Raider games instead of one like this where Lara is shown to be a human being with realistic proportions and normal clothing? Talk about having bad priorities.. i'm all for more exploration in future Tomb Raider titles , but i liked the fact that Lara was made to be a real women instead of a walking pair of breasts like all the past games. I'll stick with a flawed but realistic Lara Croft from this new Tomb Raider over the shallow one from her past games thank you very much.
@ErickPS4 I don't agree with you, but i can absolutely understand where you're coming from. I feel the exact same way about RE6 when 9/10 other people loved it. Reboots are rough for us enthusiasts who hold dear to the classic titles in a series that are still clearly better. I thought it was good, but not the best. I still hold TR2 in the highest regard. I do however agree with the exploration, felt too linear for an open world game at times, and the tombs were SERIOUSLY lacking.
1 Like Lack of T rex and other cool enemies keeps this from getting a 9. i really love how they made this game more violent. The old Tomb raider games could of used some gore.
Tomb Raiders deception...err I mean Uncharted Tomb Raider. Ahh hell, its Tomb Drake. I miss some of the old elements and I'm not at all upset its crafted after the best adeventure series in the last 10 years - you know the one. really glad to see this rebooted. Carolyn Petit, there are numbers in the alphabet other than 8.5...there is 8, 9, 9.5, 7.5....you get my drift. 8.5 is like your hammer - you use it on every problem!.
"Carolyn we'd like you to review Tomb Raider" Carolyn "8.5...er wait what? sure i'll get to it this weekend"
Comecei a jogar ontem, só fiz a primeira fase, a primeira impressão é de que visualmente o jogo tá lindo demais, mas a parte que requer itneligência tá boba, só vi um puzzle, mesmo assim cheio de dicas pra ser resolvido em 10 segundos. Essa primeira fase tem uma razoável área de exploração da ilha, achei um pouco menos linear do que os TRs antigos, joguei no estilo Tr que curto, não terminei a fase enquanto não achei todas as coisas que tinham pra ser achadas. Nesse ponto, muito ruim (péssimo mesmo) o lance do salvamento automático, fica inviável jogar um jogo de exploração dessa forma, sem a gente poder guardar pontos estratégicos pra poder voltar atrás no jogo, um porre essa meleca, pra mim o grande defeito do game. Essa primeira fase não tem combate, Lara só é atacada por lobos, então lembra ainda os TRs antigos, não sei se isso vai mudar depois, mas parece que sim pelos comentários que li aqui e em outros lugares, isso me preocupa, pois TR Legend começou lindo, cheio de desafios, mas depois caiu numa chatice insuportável de combates e corridas de moto, espero que esse novo TR não caia nesse mesmo problema, pois a exploração e os puzzles precisam conduzir o jogo, e não os combates. Pra essa primeira fase, dou nota 9, pois mesmo sendo uma fase fácil (normalmente as primeiras fases dos jogos são mais fáceis mesmo), tem bastante exploração e quase nenhum combate, o arco é focado apenas na sobrivência da Lara na mata, ou seja, lidando com animais, com gráficos maravilhosos, som de alta qualidade, uma Lara linda demais e muito realista, sem contar que os controles estão muito bons de mexer, só não gostei do "quadrado" agora ser o botão de ação pra pegar objetos, preferia quando era o triângulo, já tava acostumado.
1 Like Have no idea why everybody is upset by the multilayer its way way better then any CoD game and I am having a blast with it.
Great game well worth the 60$
I've Watched The Pulse advert for over 1000 times and I still cant figure out what is it for and i could not care less.
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Got the game yesterday .. Played for about 7 hours
Overall the game is cool .. Graphics , sound acting , action and adventures are very good
But
I think it is far from Lara's biography .. I felt like playing a good game but not Tomb Raider as known from previous games ..
Moreover for the first part which i player till now i feel that the enviroment is over messy .. Over loaded with graphical details which will cause dizziness for long session players
The game is worth playing .. Highly recommended .. My score is 8 due to the lack chalenging combats till now
It is a good game in my opinion. Got the game and played a few hours yesterday and I love it. I think they did well developing the game and don't know if possible but I look forward to possible sequels with the same style. I recommend this game
Also no offense to the Gamespot team and reviewers but it does seem that your reviews and game scoring is a lot stricter? I understand because its compared to other games around and that are coming out and you can't give all games a 9/10 I guess.
Thank you for giving a review for the PS3 version as well, with actual PS3 game footage in it.
Just got this game yesterday...And it is great......I love the style of gameplay and the graphics.....This is a must play game....
I'm loving this game. Need to play it on hard though for the proper challenge. Tomb raiding is ok, but nothing special. Graphics, game play, voice acting, controls/mechanics, story all top notch. I gave it a 9.0 and could be talked into a 9.5. Very on par with UC3...
Hmmmmmmmmmmm! Still not convinced! :/
It looks like a good game yeah, but i'd rather they just launched it as a new IP and left the Tomb Raider trademark out of it. The franchise was one of my all time favorites, re-launching it from a new angle wasn't necessary in my personal opinion, it was great as it was.
They've made a nice job of it at least.. Bonus points for that.
I sure was hoping that the new DLC will be for single player in-game too ! too much content is offered to multiplayer all the time ! GREAT JOB GUYS ! I DO LIKE THIS GAME !
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Tomb Raider
Not Following
- Publisher(s): Square Enix
- Developer(s): Crystal Dynamics
- Genre: Action
- Release:
- ESRB: M
Tomb Raider Navigation
