I recently acquired a
PS4, and the first game I got for it was Tomb Raider. This was
originally out for the previous console generation but (as seems the
fashion nowadays) it was remastered for the PS4.
Storyline
Lara, her mentor Roth,
a few friends and a TV dick called Whitman are sailing to find
Yamatai for archaeological/television purposes. Lara suggests going
into Not The Bermuda Triangle, which naturally causes the ship to
sink in a massive storm and the crew to wash up on a dreaded island.
After spending her
first evening on the island suffering bondage and puncture wounds,
Lara sets out to find her crew and a way off the island.
Unfortunately, the island is inhabited by an assortment of murderous
lunatics.
The premise is nice and
simple. Characters and their relationship with Lara are revealed
naturally as the game progresses. The way the story goes won’t be a
shock, particularly to gamers familiar with this sort of thing, but
it’s perfectly sound.
There’s a mid-point
which is so involved, lengthy and thrilling I thought it might
actually be the climax of the game, and was a bit surprised it wasn’t
(feels almost like the end of the first half of a play, which plenty
of excitement prior to the interval).
Upon completion, you
can return to the island to collect things.
Gameplay
The controls are very
intuitive, and the initial section teaches you the basics without the
dreaded tedium of a typical tutorial. Most players will have the gist
from older Tomb Raider (or Uncharted) games, but for those new to
this genre it’s a good introduction.
I played the game on
Normal. Discounting occasions when I tried making impossible jumps, I
got killed perhaps half a dozen times during the playthrough. Here
and there you’ll be forced into a proper gunfight, in many areas
you’ll have the option of taking a stealth approach (which I
usually went for). Combat in this genre isn’t my favourite aspect,
but I thought it worked pretty well.
Tombs are smaller areas
you stumble across (there aren’t a huge number) within which you
find treasures/upgrades. The puzzles, such as they are, tend to be
pretty straightforward. If you’re stuck for a little while you’ll
have the option to press L1, and Lara will offer a hint.
On the downside,
there’s too much in the way of QTEs (quick-time events, the work of
Satan) early on, and occasionally later in the game. Apart from the
first hour, there’s not really a glut of them, but I’m not a fan
of that approach.
Graphics
The graphics generally
look very nice, as the screenshots I’ve included in this review
show. Sometimes water effects look outdated compared to the rest.
Likewise, flames can sometimes look a little bit dated.
The sea itself looks
very nice, though, and there are some great vistas in a reasonable
variety of settings.
A nice touch is that
Lara’s default outfit undergoes the John McClane process, getting
dirtier and slightly torn as the game progresses. Unfortunately, this
doesn’t occur with the six extra outfits. She also gets some small
scars, which makes sense given she spends several hours getting
battered [but these magically disappears if she changes outfit].
Sound
I’ve bought a few Tomb
Raider games, and really liked Keeley Hawes’ past
performances. The reboot, unsurprisingly, went for a new actress,
Camilla Luddington [who also, as is becoming commonplace, did the
motion capture for the character].
A good choice, I think.
She does sound pretty young, which fits, as this is basically an
origin story for how Lara Croft became female Indiana Jones.
The rest of the cast do
a solid job, and I like the dynamic of slightly bickering shipmates.
Sound effects are nice,
from zip-lining to forcing open metal crates with a pick. By default,
you also get sound via the mini-speaker in the controller. As I
usually play with earphones in, I disabled this.
The music fits the game
well, and is enjoyable without being overpowering.
Bugs and other issues
In my entire
playthrough I encountered one bug. Lara froze at the end of an
animation, and was stuck in an ice-skater type pose. She kept on
gliding forward too, which was weird. I got out of it by changing my
weapon. No freezes, lags, excessive screen-tearing, prolonged loading
times or any other issue occurred, so that was pretty good.
Conclusion
I enjoyed it a lot. The
game’s been out a while, which means you should be able to get it
for a low price and I probably spent 20-30 hours on the main
storyline (I did some exploration on the side, but not much).
Thaddeus
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