PixlBit

This is another review that's way too late in two respects: It's been over a year since the game was released and I played this in December, when it was on sale on the Xbox Marketplace. I wasn't very happy when PS Plus announced it would be free in March 2014. Hell, chagrined is the word I should be using. (I could go into a rant about Xbox's ridiculous sales and Marketplace promotions because they are just stupid. Really, really stupid. But I won't.)

But before that time, I spent some days eagerly firing up the Xbox and diving into adventure.

Crystal Dynamic's 2013 Tomb Raider release is meant to be a reboot of the long-running series. It uses the the graphics capable in late last gen development to produce a phenomally beautiful game with a strong story. That was something I didn't expect, as the first few lines spoken felt very "junior high school pretentious," but as the game progressed, it overcame the weak opening.

You play as a young Lara Croft, who is a recent graduate in archaeology and is part of the staff for a NatGeo type "explorer on tv," James Whitman. During an expedition, they become stranded on the island of Yamatai. This island holds strange secrets and a bloody history that Lara uncovers as she treks to find and save her compatriots.

As I said, the story is strong. It's fairly deep and finding artifacts of the previous inhabitants not only fills in gaps in the history, but sets up the premise of the story well. You can very easily tell the influence the Uncharted series had on the development, (which of course took it's own inspiration from the older Tomb Raider games) and while I might normally cry foul on what could be considered a rip-off, I felt that Tomb Raider did everything near perfectly enough to avoid any trash-talking on my part.

Like any piece of fiction about the trials of a wide-eyed hero, Lara faces obstacles and enemies that batter and bloody her through the course of the story. It gets so that by the end, she's nearly entirely covered in mud, blood and bandages as she faces off against the evil beings that are worshipped on the island. It focused on the growth of a character as they become self-sacrificing individuals.

I wish I had played this on release, because it would have made a greater impact being played just before The Last of Us. As Joel in TLoU, you play a man who had become hardened to his circumstances. He was used to the violence both around him and within him. He used violence as his way to objectives. As Lara, you are a character that learns to use violence to do so.

As it is, Tomb Raider's story of survival was engaging and felt like trial in several instances. Reaching the end was extremely satisfying and I remember breathing a sigh of relief once we were on the rescue ship.

If you haven't played Tomb Raider, I beg you to do so. I'll show up at your place and force you to play it. I'll watch and raid your fridge. I don't want to be creepy. I just want you to play this game. Play it. Play it.