Red lights flash and a deafening siren rings as the boat is chucked from side to side. Water crashes through the open door sending the sliding down the hallway. The water starts to rise and I can not escape. I climb up to a window and try to smash it. The water fills the room and I scream with my last breath.
The Tomb Raider is born in this installment of the series. It is Lara Croft’s origin story and it balances story, character progression and action perfectly to create a thoroughly enjoyable game. Lara starts off very reluctant but capable and by the end of the game she is a force to be reckoned with.
The game is made up of exploration, battle, cutscenes and quick time events to really keep pushing you and progressing Lara’s story. You get to feel a lot of emotion from Camilla Luddington’s performance as Lara Croft. The first time you kill someone her reaction seems natural and perfectly executed.
You are searching for the tomb of a Queen called Himiko. It is rumoured that she can control the weather. Set in the Kingdom of Yamatai you are faced with many challenges ranging from human enemies that are going round the island killing survivors of boat and plane crashes on the island. You are secluded from everything off the island so you just have yourself and your crew who are scattered across Yamatai.
I really liked that your crew were scattered throughout the island and you met up with members every now and then to have a bit of interaction and new missions. Then, with legitimate reasons why she gets split up from them it makes it seem more like they weren’t stood around waiting for you to do everything.
Because you are alone taking on quite a lot of enemies I really liked that you could be stealthy and pick off the enemies before you approach an area. There was a mountain base where the enemies were operating from. As you approach there are about 6-8 guards stood outside so I used my bow to take them out one by one.
As you progress through the game you find new weapons, modifications to weapons and you can buy upgrades as well making each mission vastly different and allowing you to choose what you will use to take down your enemies. I really liked this because she isn’t just surviving on the island Lara is evolving and adapting to situations when needed.
Overall I loved this game. The recent movie made me want to go play it to see the differences but I fell in love with the game. The story telling and pace of the game was phenomenal. However, I liked the realism that the game had until we found out there was Oni who are large creature like beings that have huge weapons. I felt it was much better handled in the film with the realistic and relatable side of things but the overall game was incredible.
GameCritUK 