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Review: Tomb Raider: Underworld is another solid effort to the franchise
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Several year ago, the Tomb Raider franchise was trying to overcome the debacle called Angel of Darkness and the stagnation of the Tomb Raider franchise. Then developer Crystal Dynamics took over with Tomb Raider: Legend, followed with Tomb Raider: Anniversary and restored the franchise to its former glory with updated gameplay and great story. Now they’ve returned with Tomb Raider: Underworld and a bag of cool stuff to go with it.
The story revolves around Lara and her adventure of solving a mythological mystery and finding out her mother is. It’s actually a pretty intriguing story that would work as a Hollywood film. From the start of the game, you’re into the story waiting to find out what happens next.
One of the most noticeable additions is Lara Croft ability to stay underwater and complete puzzles and missions. In previous games, Lara was only able to stay underwater for as long as she can hold her breath. There’s also a plethora of new animations and movements added to the game including the ability to shoot at two different targets simultaneously, perch on swing bars, the ability to rappel down walls and melee kicking for close quarters combat. The new additions make Lara so much more fun to control.
Just like previous Tomb Raider games, the puzzles are simplistic in nature, but sometimes it’ll take a moment or two to figure out. Some of them will have you on the brink of heading online to find out what to do, but if you take another moment, it’ll come to you.
The environments look just as good. The tropical environments are lush and colorful, while the underwater and ruins environments look better than any previous Tomb Raider game. There is however a camera problem that runs rampant through the game. At times, you lose control of the camera view and the game will suddenly go to a close-up to Lara’s face when you’re hanging off a ledge trying to figure out where to go next. When you try to move the camera, it goes to angles that don’t help you make that next. Many times, you’ll have to jump or move into an area blindly because the camera won’t let you see where you’re going. Sometimes you’ll die, and makes portions of the game very frustrating. There have been other complaints of framerate issues, pop-in graphics, some control issues, and even Lara getting stuck in walls, but our experience was minimal in those areas.
For any Tomb Raider fan, it’s no questions that Underworld belongs in your collection. It’s a great ending to the trilogy that started with Legend, and gives a good look into what the future may hold for upcoming Tomb Raider games. For who have never experienced Tomb Raider, where have you been? Right now would be a good time to jump on board.
Q’s Rating: 4 out of 5
GameSpy: 3 out of 5
Gaming Age: A-
Check out the trailer here:
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