Tomb Raider!

[Jessweeee♪]

I was going on about Anniversary in The Lounge and decided to make a thread to talk about it more!

Tomb Raider: Anniversary- It's wonderful! No awkward controls, you can actually tell what everything is supposed to be, and it's all three times as big. It was really cool going through a second time with the commentary. There were so many things they wanted to do with the original that they couldn't until now. Apparently not even some of the developers realized one of the levels was supposed to be a village. The only thing I didn't think was superior to the original was the dinosaur area of The Lost Valley. For me, nothing can ever top the first time I saw that level. Everyone in the house was in the living room watching my dad shoot little raptors, and my uncle said something along the lines of "Good thing there aren't any big dinosaurs, or he'd really be in trouble!" Then a goddamn T-Rex came and ATE HIS FACE. THEN ANOTHER ONE SHOWED UP. I don't know how the he got that second one to show up, I've only ever ran into one of them. Anyway that was cool. You know what, I'm going to make a thread for this right now. I want to gush about it more.

I hate Egypt, though. HATE IT. It was cool the first time, it was cool going through it again through Anniversary, but after that it was very much NOT COOL AT ALL.

Also I kind of liked Angel of Darkness! It was very not-Tomb Raidery but it was a fun change aside from the weird upgrade things you get. I really want to play more games in this series, but I only own I, II, AoD, and Anniversary.


My copy of Tomb Raider II doesn't work anymore. I found out about that weird jumping by a corner glitch until a month or two ago, and I was like, "oh cool I wanna try that RIGHT NOW." I popped it in, the screen went black, and my PS2 was like CLICK....CLICK....CLICK. I cleaned the disc and then it got as far as the PS1 logo before clicking again. Then the PS2 wouldn't recognize it at all. I was still feeling all nostalgic so I put in my Sonic Mega Collection Plus and THAT DIDN'T RUN EITHER OH NO! I thought my PS2 was broken, but it turns out that disc was ruined too. Can discs just randomly die? TRII has a few scratches, but SMC+ is spotless! Although it did get left out of it's case a good number of times.

Done rambling, NOW YOUR TURN GO


EDIT:

The Hand of Midas is awesome. (Speaking of which, talk about your worst deaths!)

[KentaRawr!]

I felt like an idiot when I jumped on the Hand of Midas.

Which version of the game are you playing?

[Jessweeee♪]

The Wii version! The camera took some getting used to, but I really like it.

Except for the interactive cinematic scenes, those were very tacky xD

[Badge]

I'm playing underworld for the second time through on my Xbox, big Tomb Raider fan. So much so I like to dress up as her at parties :} (Think there's a picture in my photo album).

Haven't played Anniversary much but kinda wanna get them all again for psone and complete them all

[VexNet]

as a kid I started out playing Tomb Raider IV, and remember one of the hardest levels was one of the starting levels. I think I couldn't wrap my head around one of the puzzles which I'm sure wasn't as hard as I thought it was. But I remember it being pretty challenging.

At least.. that's what I thought was Challenging.

It wasn't until last year when my girlfriend started to replay through Tomb Raider I, II and III.

Just watching her and her brother play it was painful. I always remember those games as being bad, I never liked them, They were too hard for me to play. But when I watched her play it, it could be something to do with being a bit older, but what I saw was something I never really realised about the game before.

I never played Tomb Raider I, I played Anniversary before I played the original game, I only played Tomb Raider II for a few days (I rented it out) and my I borrowed Tomb Raider III off of my neighbour (who was and still is a TR junkie) and I never got far in it, it was way too hard. I completed Chronicles and Angel of Darkness but hated the games.

But when I watched her play the original games, I realised it was more of a Puzzle game than an Action game (which I assumed it always was since I was more used to more later games which were focused more on action) and once I got my head around that, I found the older games so much more enjoyable. Especially when I played Legend (which is Laughable at how terrible it is) while Anniversary is like playing through Tomb Raider I but on god mode with all these new abilities making it all so much more easier since they were using levels that were not made for these abilities to be used on. (I compare this to how Metal Gear Solid Twin Snakes had first person inserted into the original MGS game, it makes it so much more easier).

I was suprised with Tomb Raider Underworld however, It was made more intune with the original games and didn't give out those "help" buttons constantly which I found with Legen and Anniversary (I tried to get rid of them through the menus but to no avail, those big button commands kept appearing on screen, very annoying). Underworld's levels are a lot bigger and more complex than Legend and Anniversary and it doesn't give you really obvious help hints like there did before (god that was cheap).

The original Three games and Underworld are my favorite Tomb Raider games so far =]

[KentaRawr!]

The Wii version! The camera took some getting used to, but I really like it.

Except for the interactive cinematic scenes, those were very tacky xD

When I first played the Wii version, I had no idea how the camera worked. It kept zooming in on Lara's butt! Maybe subconsciously I learned the controls, and my subconscious just wanted a good look at her bum.

[Breine]

This place doesn't have that many Tomb Raider fans, which is probably why this thread hasn't gotten that many replies yet. Sad

Anyway, I've been a fan of the franchise since the first Tomb Raider. I grew up playing these games along with the Final Fantasy and Tekken games, so they have a pretty special place in my gamer heart. Lara Croft is badass.

I'll now post my opinion about each game. Yay!


Tomb Raider
This game is still a classic. I remember watching someone else play the game back when I was 8 or something, and thinking that this woman was really cool and interesting (plus, she had big boobs.. *snort*). This was in an afterschool club, so me and my pals played the game some times and thought it was awesome.
I unfortunately don't own the game myself, but one of my best friends has it, so I've borrowed her copy countless of times and completed it time after time. I dig the atmosphere of the game - that you're all alone in these magnificent places, exploring these different cultures. Great game!


Tomb Raider 2
This was my first ever PlayStation game, and so I've played it to death. The game is not as good as the first, but it's bigger and more action-y. I hate the underwater levels, but like pretty much all the other ones. There are a bit too many human enemies, though, and I miss some of the adventure feel from the first game. Still, good game.


Tomb Raider 3
I have mixed feelings concerning this game. There are some interesting and fun levels, but overall the game is very hard compared to the first two. Even though she kills more and more humans, the mix of action and adventure is somewhat balanced in this game, which is nice.. but it's still hard! - which is probably the main reason why I've never fully completed this game.


Tomb Raider 4
The franchise finally returned to being more about the adventuring and exploring in this game, which was a thing many fans (including me) missed at the time. I love that the entire game is set in Egypt. Setting it in one of the most classic archaeology places in the world was neat. I don’t own the game myself, but have borrowed it from friends, which is probably also the main reason why I haven’t beaten the game myself yet. Getting to play as young Lara was pretty cool, but I’m kinda ambivalent about the whole cliffhanger ending.


Tomb Raider 5
I liked the whole idea about getting to play different time periods of Lara’s exploring, and that they were these “lost adventures” that nobody had heard about before. I liked the Rome levels (Larson and Pierre making an appearance was nice) and the Russia levels as well. The stealth part of the game seemed out of place, though. The difficulty level being moderate compared to Tomb Raider 3 was a good thing in my opinion.


Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness
I remember looking sooo much forward to this game. Lara making the jump to PlayStation 2, and therefore the next generation was surely going to be awesome. Pretty graphics and thus cooler environments were stuff I really looked forward to.
As everyone knows this game got postponed so many times, and wasn’t even finished when it was released. As a result the controls were clumsy, and there were other annoying flaws in the game. This is a real shame, really, since the game had so much potential. Some levels and environments were actually pretty rad, such as e.g. the Paris levels, but I eventually got tired of the controls and therefore haven’t finished the game as of yet. Such a shame. Also, having another main character (i.e. Kurtis Trent) in this game was weird.


Tomb Raider: Legend
After the failure that ultimately was Angel of Darkness, Eidos said “No more, Core Design” and gave the series to Crystal Dynamics. I remember being very critical at first, thinking that this would definitely kill the franchise. Boy, was I wrong. Crystal Dynamics completely revolutionized the series and made Lara this agile, athletic and fluid feline explorer that was loads of fun to play as. Of course, Toby Gard coming back was a big part of this game being good, and despite the shortness of the game it had an interesting storyline.


Tomb Raider: Anniversary
After the success of Legend I was really looking forward to this game – I loved the original and the thought of them remaking it with new and better graphics and the mechanics of Legend was really exciting. It was really fun to play these revamped versions of the levels you remember playing through many times. Fortunately they succeeded in keeping the atmosphere from the first game, and even though some levels weren’t remade it was an overall great game.


Tomb Raider: Underworld
This game continued the storyline of Legend and did it well, with interesting stuff like Norse Mythology and whatnot in the mix. The return of Natla was pretty cool, and further exploring into Lara’s past made it the story that much more worthwhile. The game had some nice levels, but I must say that I liked the Thailand levels the most. It was fun running through the jungle and hidden Hindu temples.
It’s going to be exciting to see where the series go after this game.



So yeah, overall I’m a big Tomb Raider fan, even though the series clearly has had its ups and downs.

[Old Manus]

Bitch, I LOVE TOMB RAIDER. I only have TR2 and 3 though, but I've played all the other ones to varying extents.

I got TR2 when I was like 10 or something and the game scared the out of me. I couldn't get past the first level until a few years later. I finally completed it last year and it was awesome. Agree with Breine about the whole emphasis on combat with all these blocky Italians, but disagree on the underwater levels. They were the best in the game, nay, the series

TR3 was my favourite one, not only because it was so unbelievably hard, but because of the better balance between combat and puzzling. The Nevada levels too. I still think putting a slope with rows of spikes half way down it LITERALLY ONE STEP FORWARD FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE GAME is the greatest dickmove in videogame history. You died, I know you did. I never finished it, I got as far as the second Antarctica level then it was too hard to get any further.

Not much to say about the others, apart from Legend being far too easy.

[Nifleheim7]

I loved the TR games until TR Chronicles and i still play them from time to time (actually right now i'm replaying TR2.)
AoD was a disaster and the last 3 games are just plain awful.

The next one is supposed to be a reboot but since Crystal Dynamics is still the developer i'm not excited at all.

[Breine]

I loved the TR games until TR Chronicles and i still play them from time to time (actually right now i'm replaying TR2.)
AoD was a disaster and the last 3 games are just plain awful.

The next one is supposed to be a reboot but since Crystal Dynamics is still the developer i'm not excited at all.

What didn't you like about the last three games?

[Nifleheim7]

I loved the TR games until TR Chronicles and i still play them from time to time (actually right now i'm replaying TR2.)
AoD was a disaster and the last 3 games are just plain awful.

The next one is supposed to be a reboot but since Crystal Dynamics is still the developer i'm not excited at all.

What didn't you like about the last three games?

1)The controls.From the movement simulation of the classics they made them too automatic for my tastes.No manual grabs,no aligning to make the perfect jump,all these IMO were very crucial for the game's immersion.With the control system of the recent games the immersion was lost.
2)The awful mommy story and the overdramatization of Lara's character.She became too soft and sentimental.
3)The PS3 port of Underworld was terrible and full of bugs with a broken camera system.
4)The games became too short and too easy.

There are many other things that i don't like in the recent games,but these are the most important issues that i have.Which is a shame since TR used to be one of my favourite series in the 90's.

[Breine]

I loved the TR games until TR Chronicles and i still play them from time to time (actually right now i'm replaying TR2.)
AoD was a disaster and the last 3 games are just plain awful.

The next one is supposed to be a reboot but since Crystal Dynamics is still the developer i'm not excited at all.

What didn't you like about the last three games?

1)The controls.From the movement simulation of the classics they made them too automatic for my tastes.No manual grabs,no aligning to make the perfect jump,all these IMO were very crucial for the game's immersion.With the control system of the recent games the immersion was lost.
2)The awful mommy story and the overdramatization of Lara's character.She became too soft and sentimental.
3)The PS3 port of Underworld was terrible and full of bugs with a broken camera system.
4)The games became too short and too easy.

There are many other things that i don't like in the recent games,but these are the most important issues that i have.Which is a shame since TR used to be one of my favourite series in the 90's.

I agree with you on the games being too short and too easy. But I disagree with you on the controls. I thought they were a big improvement. The control system didn't change at all in the first five games, and the whole "perfect jump" thing where you had to align to perform it right were eventually just an evidence of how block-obsessed the games were, and how old-fashioned the control system became. Making everything run more smoothly (i.e. making it more fluid) was definitely the right way to go. But hey, each to their own.

[Jessweeee♪]

Oh god I forgot about that underwater level with the sharks in TRII. I couldn't figure out where to go! In order to figure it out, I used some cheat that gave me a bunch of health packs. After I ran out of air I'd just open the menu every few seconds and use one so I wouldn't drown.

[Nifleheim7]

and the whole "perfect jump" thing where you had to align to perform it right were eventually just an evidence of how block-obsessed the games were, and how old-fashioned the control system became. Making everything run more smoothly (i.e. making it more fluid) was definitely the right way to go. But hey, each to their own.

You are confusing controls with animations.Totally different things...

[Jessweeee♪]

But the save points were so scarce ;_;


I mean, I'm not asking for as many checkpoints as Anniversary, but a little more forgiveness would have been nice