OUR TOMB RAIDER
ANNIVERSARY REVIEW
Copyright 2007 www.tombraiderchronicles.com
[ June 4th 2007 ]
The
Tomb Raider brand of video-games – originally
developed by a team at Core Design in 1996 – has,
during the past eleven years, sold in excess of
30 million units; spawned two motion pictures
starring Academy Award-winner actress Angelina
Jolie (of which one still holds the record
for the highest revenue earned from a motion picture
with a female lead) and has tramped down countless
merchandise avenues promoting everything from
confectionary, toiletries, soft drinks, running
shoes, satellite television, credit cards, vehicles
and even a cancer awareness campaign.
The brand
also harbours a massive fan-base, with thousands
of web sites dedicated to the series, fiction
authors, comic illustrators and real life models
all feeding the phenomena. Owner and IP holder
Eidos Interactive
has surged forward with new wind harnessed from
a merger with SCi Entertainment Group, and a series
of wise management culls and project decisions
has helped revitalise the company, ensuring it
remains one of the leading publishers and developers
of entertainment software in the world. Recent
low-risk acquisitions have also solidified its
standing on the London Stock Market and the future
certainly looks bright and shiny for Eidos.
Without
question, Eidos is most notably recognised for
its Tomb Raider video-game brand, and the fictional
British archaeologist Lara Croft. Under the charge
of U.S. developer Crystal
Dynamics, the brand has been rejuvenated thanks
largely to the success of Tomb
Raider Legend and now the release of a special
celebratory adventure marking ten years + twelve
months in the business of entertaining the masses
via tombs, mystical artifacts and rather nasty
characters.
Tomb
Raider Anniversary is a game about reflection
and implies a certain degree of regression for
those old enough to remember queuing for the original
and the ensuing chaos of the following years.
While the game tries to stay faithful to the original
1996 adventure, invariable it has become so much
more, and for those of you who jump right to the
conclusion and the score, we’re going to be giving
this one a rather large thumbs up. But not without
some criticism.
Graphics
Tomb
Raider Anniversary is a visual delight on Windows
PC, as it should be, but this has been eclipsed
by the overall performance on the Sony Playstation
2. Sony’s PS2 console was first released in March
2000 and will soon be retired in favour of the
Playstation 3.
Crystal
Dynamics are beating the proverbial hell out of
the PS2 console, and I can almost smell the GPU
****ting bricks as it more than compares with
its PC counterpart. Using the same purge-redundancy
feature as with Legend – whereby only the immediate
locale is loading into memory – the PS2 version
is looking vibrant and seamless. There are few
texture discrepancies, and so confident was Eidos
in the performance of Sony’s number two that most
of the screenshots prior to the release of Anniversary
matriculated from the console version of the game.
The environments
are richly decorated with minute detail, which
adds to the overall atmosphere of the game. The
emphasis on vast environments has been realised
without any shadow of the doubt. While the original
adventure was a groundbreaking and genre-establishing
product, Anniversary amplifies that admirably.
All hint of claustrophobia present in the original
has been replaced with cavernous regions literally
riddled with non-linear paths and challenges,
all positively yawning into range effortlessly
and without any noticeable reduction in frame
rate.
Game
Play
The control
system attached to Tomb Raider Anniversary can
be fully configurable via a menu section when
firing up the game, or during game-play. The latter
is a welcome addition because it enables the player
to custom-configure his or her controls as play
ensues, resulting for the most part in a very
responsive setup.
Lara
has several new moves this time round, a pole-balancing
manoeuvre and new combat moves. Crystal Dynamics
have certainly answered the call from members
of Tomb Raider Forums with the option to disable
auto-grab and remove tips from being displayed
on screen. Players can now substitute the previous
hand-holding scenario with the same isolation
present in the original 1996 adventure, which
is a very welcome return to what raiding tombs
is all about.
Load
times are extremely fast, further endorsing the
purge-redundancy technology we mention above,
which all aids in keeping the overall flow and
momentum at boiling point as the adventure unfolds.
Checkpoints are back, which means progress is
automatically saved for when Lara faces an untimely
death.
Once
again, Crystal Dynamics has invested a considerable
amount of time and detail into the construction
of their puzzles. The cog puzzle for example is
now a mammoth challenge in Lost Valley, the final
piece a reward for dispensing with the T-Rex,
and interactive cut scenes cap off each challenge
as they are completed, giving the player an overall
view of their progress in the adventure.
Level
statistics make a welcome return, and we already
have members of our forum posting their best completion
times. Artifacts are back, and contribute to unlocking
a variety of Easter eggs embedded into the adventure,
most popular of which are clothing accessories
for Lara Croft.
AI
For the
most part, enemy combat and animal interaction
is pretty responsive and in certain places considerably
challenging. Defeating the monstrous T-Rex and
the final showdown with Natla being two of the
challenges which resulted in some testing times
here in the office.
However,
some criticism must be levelled at certain enemy
incursions and their subsequent behaviour in confined
spaces, namely wolves that entrap themselves between
boulders, bats that bury themselves into rock
surfaces and raptors than just stand there looking
stupid while being shot to pieces by an amused
and somewhat bored Lara.
In fairness,
these anomalies occur on rare occasions, but one
cannot think that a few more months of play testing
might have resulted in a more polished product.
Time constraints imposed by Eidos may have played
their part in inadequate and/or insufficient testing.
Having said that, the odd idle-challenge doesn’t
impair the overall quality of the product.
Enemy
combat is also staggered per character, and sinking
5 rounds of lead into a pestering bat before stone-pigeon-syndrome
occurs won’t dispense with a raging bear or hungry
wolf. Taking this route enables gamers to experience
a more realistic combat challenge which is hindered
further by the necessity to reload. Overall, this
method creates a fun and somewhat strategic assessment
of a situation rather than blasting in with all
guns blazing.
By far
the best incursion was the T-Rex, and those who
read our original preview of Tomb Raider Anniversary
should be in no doubt that this portion of the
game made it for us, as it perfectly amalgamated
past with present and made the connection between
Anniversary and the original adventure a perfectly
indelible link. T-Rex is more than a bunch of
richly-textured polygons, he’s a maniacal Jurassic
beast bent solely on crushing Lara or ripping
her to pieces.
There
is a clear strategy in defeating the T-Rex – draw
him onto the spikes in his lush-green amphitheatre
by using his ****-off meter, and it sounds so
simple doesn’t it?! But a review cannot convey
Troels Folmann's part in all of this. His score
simply amplifies the challenge to dizzying heights,
and first time round we simply sat there stunned,
eyeballs glazed, hearts thumping hard and hands
involuntarily twitching on the mouse as we tried
to defeat him. We got the scaly bugger second
time round.
Soundtrack
BAFTA
Award-winning composer Troels Folmann has once
again infused Anniversary with the same magic
present in Tomb Raider Legend, perfectly encapsulating
each moment as it unfolds during game-play. From
the playful accompaniments around Croft Manor
to the overwhelming assault during the battle
with T-Rex and the final conflict with Natla,
Troels has once again scored an incredible soundtrack
and I wouldn’t be surprised if he taps another
BAFTA for his contribution to the overall success
of Anniversary.
Console
Support
As with
Tomb Raider Legend, Eidos has so far confirmed
Anniversary on Windows PC, Sony PS2, Nintendo
Wii and Sony PSP, with a noticeable absentee.
However, watch this space ;)
Conclusion
Tomb
Raider Anniversary has pretty much achieved the
aims set down by Eidos when the game was first
announced in 2006. Crystal Dynamics has faithfully
preserved the original adventure, but also infused
so much more vitality into the broth. The game
has – as promised – been brought up to today’s
technological standards and that is a real acknowledgment
of Eidos’ appreciation of the fans who have supported
the company through thick and thin.
Tomb
Raider Anniversary continues in the same new and
rejuvenated direction as it’s forbearer, and judged
simply on the quality of the PS2 version of the
game, one can only dream of what future consoles
have in store for Lara Croft. Eidos has already
confirmed Lara’s next adventure will exploit the
power of the Sony PS3, and Tomb Raider Anniversary
further endorses our confidence in Crystal Dynamics’
ability to produce a quality product time and
time again.
Our
Score: 90%
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