I Don't Say This Very Often, But...Meh...

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	• Tomb Raider Legend PlayStation2 \| Eidos Interactive, 2006 average customer review:based on 36 reviews view larger image
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Lara returns with aplomb

It's always good to see a classic gaming icon makes a comeback, especially when she's a gorgeous lady like Lara Croft. It has been some time since we last saw the tomb raider making her rounds, but in Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend, it seems that she has never been away. In fact, with so much improvement in place, it won't be an overstatement to call this game the best Tomb Raider game ever.

The story begins with a young Lara meeting with a plane crash with her mother. Eager to solve the mystery of the accident, Lara begins a journey that would take her to several locales. And, as expected, each of these locations provides a festival of platforming and puzzles. Controlling the heroine, your task would be to navigate past these environmental challenges, and of course, taking on some baddies in the process.

The platforming sequences in the game won't be much of a problem for the seasoned gamer, especially those who've play a game or two of the Prince of Persia series. Apart from the usual climbing and jumping, Lara also makes use of gadgets like a magnetic grapple to forcefully open locked doors, and to reach to a faraway platform, for example. When taking on enemies, Lara can lock on to an enemy and fire shots at them, giving the opportunity for even a poor aimer like me to enjoy the combat. Her movements are also fluid enough to make the all these feel like second nature.
In addition, the puzzles in this game are mostly simple enough to crack, but some may require more logic than simply pulling a lever. Mastering the environment and its possibilities will therefore make your job much easier as you progress through the game. But, just in case you fall to your death, the game also has many checkpoints within a given level to allow you to save your progress, so you won't have to restart from the beginning of the level again should your game comes to an abrupt end.

With a limited number of levels, the game suffers in terms of play time. You can probably complete it over the course of a weekend if you aren't keen to collect all the rewards that are littered throughout the game. These rewards come in the form of gold, silver and bronze medals, and finding them will unlock special items. Some of them can be found in broad daylight, but the others, especially the gold ones, may require some serious exploration. You can also revisit a level after you complete it to play a time trial game for that particular level, and completing the level in a given time frame will also unlock rewards. These add-ons are probably include to encourage replayability, since the game is really rather short.

Graphics wise, Tomb Raider: Legend will satisfy even the greatest critics. The details are amazing to look at, and the game isn't shy to show them off right from the beginning when Lara was shown doing an Ethan Hunt cliff-hanging sequence a la Mission Impossible II. The environments are truly breath-taking to behold in that cut-scene alone, and it's not the only time you'll feel that way throughout the game. The audios are also an excellent example of how things should be done. The voice-overs are apt, the music is enjoyable, and even the sound effects are purposefully blended to complement the levels. All these add to a very satisfying playing experience.

Overall, Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend is a competent title to resurrect a franchise that has long been thought to be over the hill. It may not produce a long, epic adventure; nor does it throw too much difficult challenge in the face of the player. Its simplicity and great presentations, however, make it an immersive game to engage, and therefore, easy to recommend.

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Not perfect, but a lot of fun.

I'm somewhat surprised by the disparity in reviews of TOMB RAIDER: LEGEND. I've played through half of it so far, and I think it's a solid game. Not perfect, but a lot of fun.

I haven't played TOMB RAIDER since the very first PS1 game, so I missed the downward spiral of previous games.

The environments are great, and I think the controls are really good. I like the additional "second chance" grabs lifted from GOD OF WAR, and the interactive cinematics. In fact, I wish there were more of them. Every time I see an action cinematic I want to participate.

The puzzle solving is just tricky enough, and searching for the "gold rewards" on each level is -really- hard... but fun. Admittedly, I need the internet's help to find most of the gold prizes. I guess I'm losing my skills.

The motorcycle sequences are lame. I understand the desire to mix it up, but I'm not sure this was the way. If the driving controls were better, if the track environments were more exploratory, and if the shooting element was removed, I think it would be far more enjoyable.

I'm surprised that people are harping on the costume changes. They're non-essential, but they're fun enough. A harmless, entertaining addition, and I like it. Exploring Croft Manor, however, is a little tiresome. The climbing room was boring... I would've enjoyed more secret tunnels and riddle solving instead.

Three final gripes... 1) I wish the camera view were wider. I'm playing WideScreen on an NTSC monitor and I still wish I could see more. Another 10 degrees would've been perfect. 2) As I said, I'm halfway through the game... so it's feeling a little short. If it reported I was at the 33% mark, I would feel better. And finally, 4) I wish that Lara looked better. Given the models in games like Rumble Roses from -years- ago, I think Lara could've been a bit more refined.

In short, I'm glad I picked up LEGENDS.

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I Don't Say This Very Often, But...Meh...

This is actually my first real experience with a Tomb Raider game. Other than the first couple of games on the PS1, they all got pretty bad reviews, so I never bothered with them. Then I saw that this latest game got much higher scores than usual, so I played a demo to try it out. It looked good, so I rented the game since I had heard it was fairly short.

The game had its good moments, but unfortunately, there were a lot of bad moments in between. The controls were often very glitchy and non-intuitive, leading to Lara falling to her death way too many times. Combat was never much fun, but fortunately you didn't spend too much of the game shooting people. The vast majority of the time was spent on puzzles and trying to navigate from point A to point B. My biggest gripe was the occasional level where you had to ride a motorcycle. It ticks me off when developers feel the need to add driving into a game for variety, but don't spend enough time perfecting the controls. Had I felt like I had any control over the motorcycle, these levels may have been fun, but I didn't, so they were just frustrating.

On the plus side, there was a good variety in levels, ranging from actual "tomb raiding" to raiding a laboratory in Kazhakstan to mountain-climbing in the Himalayas. The story was fairly interesting, although it ended very abruptly, leaving an opening for the next game in the series.

I made it through the game's easy mode in just over 8 hours (which is probably longer than most people would take), so I would definitely recommend renting first. That way you can decide if you like the game enough to buy it so you can beat all the time trials and find all the trophies to unlock everything.

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only one problem....way to short..

so this game is way better then angel of darkness.but then again so was alot of other games..but anyways,this is a good game...great graphics..ps2 version is really good..the interaction of the characters together is funny,lara even looks way better more real then ever.the only problem with this game is well its way to short...you get into this game then boom its over..its like 24 the game just to short.you want a good game to get..get the new tomb raider game...you will like it and want more

A lost star for length

I feel short changed.

Well, so this is the new Tomb Raider....after all those sequels which were derided for apparently lowering the quality of the game every time (I actually quite enjoyed most of them, with only a few exceptions), Tomb Raider Legend has been lauded as the return to form. Well in my opinion, it's more like an expanded demo of a potential return to form. However it looks great, and as I started playing, I was hoping for the thrill of the very first game to come back to me. I played the original PS1 Tomb Raider game again recently and I couldn't believe how well it had aged. The levels were long, the explorable areas were huge, and the puzzles were multi-layered, often built out of smaller component puzzles. The game as a whole had a good solid length and satisfying difficulty curve. This is a game that is now a decade old, and I'm still impressed by it.

So how far have we come? Well, Tomb Raider Legend has definitely played true to the original spirit. It has enhanced the character of Lara Croft, as well as re-invented the control system. I'm very happy about the former update (Lara is still beautiful, upper-class and indomitable), but not so keen on the latter. It came as quite a shock to me to find that the definitive control system had been completely re-worked and, with no option to customize it, I was initially bewildered. X is now jump? Triangle is action? No walk button? No sidestep or sidejump? No backstep for those tricky jumps? It took some getting used to, and I'm not sure whether it's an improvement or not. The grid of jumpable distances and calculations that all TR fans will surely recall has been dumped, and instead Lara behaves like all other platform game protagonists...if you want to jump across a gap, just run at it and leap when you think the time is right. The game does the rest...in fact here it does a bit too much. If the gap is deemed as passable, the game will compensate for any small miscalculation on your part and make sure you end up on the other side. This seemed a bit odd to me, and I found that I missed the feeling of knowing whether I had accomplished anything or not. This new scheme also allows you to perform acrobatic tasks like jumping directly upwards from hanging off a ledge to another ledge about 6 feet above, which is surely physically impossible! As are sideways and backwards jumps from ledges and poles that magically dump Lara safely on another ledge or platform if the game deems that that was the way to progress. Does this sound picky? I know that in the past Lara could do cartwheels while firing her guns, and do a backwards somersault to land on a platform higher than her own head, but I didn't seem to mind that as much! I think it's because the game does not present enough physical challenges anyway that I felt further hand-held throughout the exploring phases by this new scheme.

Another thing, is that the weapons mode is a real let-down. The old auto-aim has been replaced by a targetting mechanism that only stays locked on target intermittently. This is very obvious on the final boss, where Lara's aim is constantly lost when she runs to dodge any long range attacks. I would have liked a way to lock-on, and then strafe while firing, but this is seemingly no longer an option - unless I missed it. But in bizarre opposition to the boss fights, regular gun fight sequences are incredibly easy, you only have to run around wildly firing non-stop and the enemies will all drop. I never came out of a hugely out-numbered fight (say Lara against 6 or 7 goons) with damage more than about one medipack's worth, and that's when I wasn't being the least bit careful.

I've got still more gripes - you can't stockpile anything. One additional gun at a time is all you get, and a maximum of three medipacks!! Thats just criminal. Mind you, with the game this easy, arriving at the last boss with 20 stored medipacks would be a pushover! Oh well, Lara's previously bottomless rucksack was always a bit far-fetched, I suppose.

Ok, I've left the worst till last, and that is undeniably the games length. I finished it in about 4 days, and that's unheard of for a TR game. Short levels, few puzzles, not enough secrets, not enough booby traps or variety of enemies. Every level is like a taster for what the development team are obviously capable of. They just needed to make them all 3 times as long. At least. The levels look great (time for some praise at last, now!)...they are leafy and organic, dank and spooky, or full of ruined temples as and when required. I could have done with some larger and more awe-inspiring architecture, though, and the sense of immense scale has not been maintained. I don't recall many of the towering structures and giddying drops that made climbing so perilous in the earlier game. Fans of TR1 will surely recall the Atlantis level - a constant climb through a kind of giant floorless shaft ending up on a platform where the boss appeared - one slip off the edge meant a fall down through the entire level to a final sickening thud on the floor. There's nothing like that in this game, and I think what I miss the is the sense of realism you get when you can see where you've been climbing from and it's dizzyingly far down. Tomb Raider Legend doesn't play with layered or cyclical environments, and all the levels are pretty standard: start travelling from Point A and keep going as far you can and you'll get to Point B. There are two motorbike riding leves but they are very arcadey and almost impossble to lose.

Tomb Raider Legend is a wonderful taster, passed of as a full length game. A lot of care went into design and execution, but it's still a bit glitchy (although with nothing like the game-halting problems of Angel of Darkness, thank god!). I look forward to another game from this team, and let's hope it's a biggun next time.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend brings back the gaming world's sexiest and most intrepid adventurer. Follow Lara down a path of discovery as she travels the globe to remote, exotic locales in search of one of history's greatest artifacts that unleash unwelcome figures from Lara's mysterious past. Use her skills to explore vast, treacherous tombs, riddled with challenging puzzles and deadly traps. Physics, Water and Fire systems bring the perilous environments of Lara's world alive, and challenge the player to improvise solutions to obstacles. Jump into the future of adrenaline-fueled adventure.

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