This is a review of Tomb Raider, the 2013 release from Square Enix and developed by Crystal Dynamics. Over the years we have talked a lot about Tomb Raider in our house. You see, when my daughter was little I would drag her into Gamestop or whatever other computer/console game store might be in the area and we would browse around. Inevitably we would pass by a version of Tomb Raider with Lara Croft on the cover. I would (knowing the answer) ask my daughter, "Who is that?" Which alway prompted my daughter to point at the cover and say "Moms!". The reason being my wife looks similar to Lara, is fit, been known to shoot a gun or two and of course has really long brunette hair. I had not, however, ever really played any of the Tomb Raider games (only a few minutes on PC demos here and there over the years). We had seen the movies, though.
Now in 2013, with the reboot of Tomb Raider with the new console/PC game, I had my chance. Back in July I downloaded the game on Xbox during their sale for $20. The main story of the game is a young Lara Croft is on an expedition to find the lost kingdom of Yamatai which was ruled by Queen Himiko. The ship Lara is on crashes on what we later discover is the island containing Yamatai. There Lara is separated from the rest of the crew and must learn to survive and traverse the treacherous island to reunite with her friends and escape the island. An island that is full of murderous villains.
Overall, Tomb Raider is a 3rd person stealth puzzle shooter where you run, scramble, jump and climb your way through the terrain to find documents, relics, your way and other items that help move you through the story and about the island. There are multiple tools to aid you along with multiple weapons. Some can even be combined like shooting a rope arrow into an enemy on a ledge and pulling him off to his death. The game rewards you for using the environment and stealth to quietly dispatch enemies and punishes you for just wading in with guns a-blazing (after all, you are only one person against an island of whack-os).
This game is full of great moments, majestic vistas and tension. I really enjoyed the situations and challenges that the environment and opposition posed. The story is also interesting and well crafted. Camilla Luddington also does well to add depth to Lara in her voice acting. The two small issues I had with the game is that new interactive elements were often introduced right at the beginning of a fight, often requiring multiple tries at the fight to learn the new mechanic and get through the battle. Additionally, there is a lot of movement during combat where you are trying to track fast opponents while aiming (which slows down your movement somewhat) - I found this to be a bit nauseating at times. It is a similar issue I had trying to fight with a bow in Skyrim, so maybe it is just me.
For a first exposure to Tomb Raider, this game was really, really, really good. If you are unfamiliar with the franchise, this is a great jumping in point. I haven't tried the multiplayer options in the game, but there is the ability to continue with the game after the main story if you didn't complete all of the puzzles and find all of the objects before you finished it. This also allows you to collect more achievements as Tomb Raider doles them out a little sparingly until you are closer to the end of the story - mainly since they are collect X% of this or kill XX amount of that type achievements.
All-in-all, I am glad I picked this one up and it was the first Tomb Raider game I have played through. Tomb Raider (2013) gets 4 Mick Happies. Now I need to go spend some time with my "Lara Croft" and wonderful daughter.
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