Shadow of the Tomb Raider

Bleh... I'm a pretty big fan of the Tomb Raider reboot from back when (2013) and I even thought the sequel - Rise of the Tomb Raider - built upon the first in interesting and unique ways. I love how the reboots try to distance themselves from the linear cinematic-driven Uncharted series by putting more of a focus on crafting, hunting, open world exploration, rewarding backtracking, and world lore. But sadly; Shadow of the Tomb Raider fails at providing a satisfying conclusion to the epic trilogy, it fails to introduce compelling new ideas WHAT SO EVER, and quite honestly feels scaled back and much more flaccid compared to the previous two entries. That's not to say that the game is a complete bomb however, the team over at Crystal Dynamics have become renowned for their work in environmental design, the writing put into the lore and collectables is still inspired, and the challenge tombs still gleam as the game's coolest side objectives. That said; the story is borderline awful, the combat sucks, and most of the puzzle solving is obvious and simple.

The story takes off sometime after the second game concludes (but you would't know it since barely anything from the previous games actually impact this game's story), Lara Croft and her partner Jonah find themselves in Mexico in search of a key to a mysterious silver box that's supposedly used to "remake the world"... Interrupting their search is Trinity; the vague and generic militia lead by a man named Dr. Dominguez who basically shows up out of nowhere at the start of the game without any build up or foreshadowing from the previous games. Dominguez steals the key which initiates a series of natural disasters followed by the apocalypse?... And Lara must follow Dominguez over to Peru in order to stop him and save the world... Ya'know I always kind of liked how the Tomb Raider games leaned more on supernatural elements than Uncharted did, but this time it borders on outrageous.

The acting is stale and dry for the most part which is something the series has struggled with from the very beginning, none of the characters really stand out other than Lara and Jonah; thankfully the writers decided to explore their relationship a bit more and shed light on how Lara's obsessive behaviour negatively effects those around her. There are some weak attempts to have Lara reflect on her childhood and parents, but these themes are so few and far between that they only really serve to give the developers an excuse to add in a childhood sequence that basically rips off of Uncharted 4. The writers also try to connect trinity and Dr. Dominguez to an ancient tribalistic cult which feels completely forced and awkward. There are a few disaster/army/action sequences within the game that are so over the top that it's practically satire, and they also decided to throw in the demented cave people from that Descent movie into the mix cause why not? It's sad but it really feels as though the writers had no clue on how to pick things up after the second game and just pulled this story out of their asses. There's so little emotional content in the main campaign and the villain - Dr. Dominguez - is totally flat and predictable.

Let's move on to the gameplay, but then... What's there to talk about? Nothing's changed... Lara's arsenal and gear are completely identical to that of the first and second games, IN FACT; you actually have less at your disposal than you did in the previous game. The developers actually think they're clever by introducing rock climbing at steeper angles... And repelling from walls with a rope (which is basically just them playing catch-up with Uncharted). What's even more annoying is the fact that the game can't help but blurt out the solutions to puzzles by showing tutorial-esque text prompts where they want you to go (even well into the game!) and having Lara think the solutions out loud herself... I think you may be able to tweek this in the difficulty options under "puzzle difficulty", but it's not like it makes the puzzles any more difficult tbh... There's also a weird new emphasis on underwater sections where Lara must swim between air pockets evading piranhas and giant eels. And honestly I didn't mind it so much in fact I wished they explored these diving elements way further than they did. The challenge tombs showcased the best puzzles in the game; my favourites being a lost Spanish Armada ship and a brain teaser involving mirrors. The game also has crypts to explore and NPC quests you can get involved in through the various hubs and villages within the world, but rarely were they deep or compelling outside of a few items and alternate weapons you can unlock as rewards.

Overall there's less of a focus on combat in this game, whenever bad guys show up the game usually encourages you to take a stealthy route. They did introduce a couple of new abilities for Lara; like crafting "jaguar fear arrows" that make enemies open fire on one another, and the ability for Lara to copy Batman and string enemies up with ropes atop tree branches... Cool ideas, but the thing is; there's so few legitimate enemy stealth sections in the game that it's like why bother? Like you unlock the fear arrows and only have a few opportunities to use them before the game's over (assuming you don't decide to do the boring side quests). Honestly so much of this game's progression system is pointless, you barely ever make use of a bulk of the things you unlock from the skill tree, hunting is completely unnecessary because you can just pick up furs as collectables scattered around the world, and the different outfits you can craft don't make much of a difference either. And good lord is the aiming horrible with her weapons at close range, where the hell were the play testers???

This game is a disappointment man, a really anti-climactic way to end an otherwise terrific trilogy. Nothing here is broken necessarily, and their is a certain level of talent and polish but into specific areas of the game's design. It just doesn't live up to it's predecessors on nearly every level. Rather than taking things a step further the developers just re-tred the same old grounds for the most part and even take a few steps back here and there. I have a hard time recommending this to series fans let alone newcomers, but either way your best bet is to try the first two games out because they are far more robust experiences than this in my opinion.