Crystal Dynamics already made a reboot of sorts with their Legend trilogy, but now have decided to come up with a completely new direction. The game starts out with Lara and a science crew on a ship, as they travel to Yamatai in "Dragon’s Triangle" off the coast of Japan. A mysterious storm destroys the boat and Lara and team are stranded on this island. I thought this iteration of Lara wasn't supposed to be sexualised but the team is on a boat, with men wearing thick coats, and Lara is there with a low-cut tank top with the camera sometimes peering down her top.
Lara is captured by a cult and the first thing you will need to do is escape. The cult seems to want to find a woman to offer Himiko the Sun Queen to end the supernatural storms that prevent people from leaving the island. The mystery of the island makes me think it was influenced by Lost, although I only saw the first 2 seasons of that show.
It feels more like a horror game at the start, (then a few moments across the game), with the night-time setting, rain, and the grim cult caverns, which are littered with carcasses and human bones. Walking on piles of skulls is pretty grim.
The game seems to want to show a more realistic side to the characters (although still has the mythology like in previous games). So the game shows more emotion, mental struggles from Lara’s current experiences: scared, cold, forced to kill etc. However, she seems to soon get over this and I'm not sure the game really makes her character arc convincing at all. She does tell herself "You can do this" during several scenarios at the start, then later either deals with these situations without remark, or goes charging into dangerous situations with aggressive statements. She has definitely gained more confidence, but is it done in a convincing way?
The fact that she should have broken her back (and other bones) several times throughout the game, and should be dead by various injuries in constant falls and bullet wounds means that it isn't really setting out to be more realistic at all. It is darker thematically: it's more gritty from the very beginning; with darker colour tones graphically, then Lara gets kidnaped and tied up, and ends up impaling herself, rips it out, then goes trudging through dirty water.
The game seems confused in style. It wants to be more realistic and gritty, but then the over the top action and Lara's immunity to fall damage in cutscenes makes it a very gamey/action film in tone. At certain points of the story, Lara will be injured and needs to find a medpacks. If you get injured in combat, you just regenerate your health. There's no health bar, but it's like those Call of Duty games where the screen begins to go dark but restores if you keep out of fire for a few seconds. Taking lots of bullets here seems more jarring, even though the old games had this.
The action set-pieces do get progressively ridiculous, with Lara riding rapids, climbing massive communication towers, parachuting through a dense forest, escaping burning buildings, collapsing bridges, sliding and falling from great heights, time and time again. Sometimes the game makes use of Quick Time Events for these, and other times it relies on platforming. Just like previous games, there's some brutal death-sequences if you fail these action sequences. It is often very predictable that something is going to collapse. As Lara is thrown around, you will be hearing numerous grunts, pants and screams.
Early on, Lara is hungry and needs to find a source of food. She finds a bow and arrows, then goes after some deer. The hunting/survival mechanic seems like it's going to be a big part of the game, and even one of the skill trees is called "hunter", but this mechanic is pretty much forgotten about instantly. For a large part of the game, I didn't see any animals, and only when you return to the woodland area did I see the wolves and deer again. The only animals I can recall were the boar and crabs by the sea, and there was an area with a few chickens.
The salvaging idea is something that happens throughout, and is influenced by the recent trend in gaming. So you will be looting soldiers' bodies, crates, and other objects which gives you salvage and a bit of XP. You choose perks at campsites which act as quick travel and save points. There are many upgrades that increase damage, accuracy, reload speed, and alternative fire.
At first, the amount of upgrades you have access to are pretty limited, and I wondered if the upgrade mechanic was meaningful. Your initial bow has 2 upgrades so I thought I had maximised within a couple of hours. However, at certain story points the bow is replaced (your upgrades transfer) and more options become available. New weapons are also found across the game at story points; pistol, shotgun, rifle, which can also be upgraded too.
Sometimes the combat is based on close-range stealth kills, ranged stealth with your bow, or cover based shooting like Gears of War which can end up with long firefights.
Lara automatically moves into stealth mode, so sometimes it gives away the fact that there are upcoming enemies, because I saw her react before I saw or heard any nearby person. You can sneak behind enemies and strangle them, or take them down from afar with the bow. If enemies see a fallen enemy, see you, or hear you, then they, and nearby enemies will actively engage you. You can't just hide to make them return to a default state like many stealth games. Combat is often about popping in and out of cover, and that's how most enemies will engage you. Some are more melee focussed and will try and flank you. Many have Molotov cocktails to force you to move to another location, or burn. Many forms of cover can also be destroyed by gunfire or burned, which also forces you to change position.
Lara is efficient with the bow or guns, but the way she dodges is a "scramble" which is a less elegant form of fleeing, almost on all fours, and great for moving between cover. There's no acrobatic flip like in the previous games. Some upgrades allow you to counter after scrambling, like throwing dirt to stun, or following up with a close attack with the axe or gun.
It's always beneficial to look out for the classic exploding barrels which can quickly dispatch groups of enemies. Otherwise try and go for a trusty headshot. You can incapacitate enemies by shooting them in the legs, which allows you to perform brutal finishers if you are close to them.
At the end of the game, you are up against a large, armoured foe which you think is going to be an epic boss battle but it largely plays out like some of the other fights against armoured foes so is a bit disappointing.
It's a large island, and although it's kind of portrayed like an open-world with fast travel points. Unless you want to 100% the game, there is no need to fast travel, and the game can be played in a very linear fashion. There's loads of crates to find, then more unique relics, "GPS caches", and diary entries. Artefacts you find shows off Lara's knowledge of archeology/history. There is a Survival Instinct ability that highlights map markers, objectives, and when you unlock the skill, you can see items through walls.
There are hidden tombs too which is where you find the majority of puzzles (although there is 1 per tomb) and get rewarded with more generous XP. The puzzles mainly rely on physics, so you might be weighing down a ramp/elevator, or spinning structures. When you enter them, there is usually a winding path in the dark for some reason, then a single puzzle room to get to a chest. There are no enemies in the tombs.
There's lots of climbing around which is like the usual Prince of Persia style stuff such as shimmying, jumping off poles etc.
Throughout the game, Lara will acquire gadgets (torches, lighter, ropes, rock climbing axe, shotgun, and grenade launcher) that will be useful to access new areas or previous areas that can't be reached before. I like how these gadgets make Lara's life easier: e.g. initially you are taking an unlit torch to a heat source to light it, but then later, you are igniting at will.
When you find the rope, Lara can fire it with her bow. At first, you can only fire it at other roped objects (don't ask me how that works, it just does), then later on, you can fire it at craggy rocks. This then gives you a way of navigating chasms.
The direction was probably a response to the action-packed Uncharted. The original games influenced Uncharted, and now this franchise is then taking influence from there. Since it's probably too far away from the previous games in the series, why didn't they just make a new IP? I know publishers always want to capitalise on branding, but did this really need to use the Tomb Raider name? couldn't it just be its own franchise.
Even though I’ve criticised the tone of the game, it might just be a difference in how I thought the game was going to be and how it actually is. It doesn’t need to be realistic, and it doesn’t need the hunting/survival mechanics that it seemed to hint at at the start. If you expect it to be an over-the-top action game, then it definitely excels in that. It does really well at mixing up the gameplay, so is definitely well-paced. It does feel like you are experiencing an interactive film because it is action-packed, but does have slower moments to allow you to appreciate the visual design.