Rise of the Tomb Raider is the latest story of Lara Croft’s adventure. Every gamer knows Lara Croft, since she is one of the most renown game characters in the world. Our favourite female tomb raider has conquered a special place in our heart since the reboot of Tomb Raider a few years ago. The focus on storyline, gameplay mechanics, crafting and survival ment that Tomb Raider raised the bar higher for other adventure games and its own sequel. Is it still a hidden jewel, buried beneath these high expectations or should this jewel be buried in an ancient tomb and never see the living daylight again?
This time, we have had the pleasure to review the game on PC. You can read the review on console here. The storyline hasn’t changed between the console and pc version. We still pick up the story of Lara Croft after her journey on Yamatai. She has just learned that supernatural forces behind myths aren’t always fantasy but a reality even if not everyone believes in them. This means that Lara Croft has to find some hidden truth about ancient legends, legends that haunt her family for ages. Legends that caused her father to commit suicide. Truths that hopefully give some answers to a couple of questions. What kind of supernatural forces exist in this world? Who and what is Trinity? Why did Trinity covered up the supernatural experience on Yamatai? Her search for answers leads her to Siberia, where she hopes to find clues for the lost ancient city Kitezh. This city is claimed to have the gift of the eternal life. In her search for the truth, she’s not only confronted with Trinity but also with these mystic guardians called the Remnant that protect their home from invaders of the outside world. The story goes much further and deeper than only tomb raiding, it’s more focused on Lara Croft’s destiny. She’ll have to face Trinity, savages, animals and the environment to become the person she was meant to be.
If you thought the console version is beautiful, wait until you start the game on PC. The environment and weather effects look super realistic. Character design, shader & lighting effects, sound and animation, it all fits perfectly into one bowl of “immersion”. The game runs extremely well, I haven’t had a single hiccups nor any kind of texture popping. There are some occasionally clipping models like the bow that is going through a hood,but they are minor. It’s all the more impressive if you consider the amount of activity around you. Rabbits and squirrels are running around, deers and bears are grazing. There are ravens and pigeons flying everywhere. There is even a day and night cycle, which has an impact on animals behaviour. This makes hunting and exploring so much interesting since you’ll never know what’s inside the cave or coming out the bushes. It may be a rabbit or it can be a hungry wolf trying to kill you. The character animations are fluent and the voice casting is very good.
The second most astonishing part of this game, is it ability to show emotion. Whereas other games (even my GOTY 2015, The Witcher 3) seemed to have the acting skills of Kristen Stewart, Rise of the Tomb Raider has the acting skills of Cate Blanchett or Meryl Streep. You actually feel what Lara Croft is feeling, and that alone is an accomplishment that few games have done before her. The animation is spot on, the dialogue and tone of it match with the situation, there are no awkward pauses between 2 sentences and NPC’s respond with dialogue that match with what is happening around you. I am a huge fan of The Witcher 3, but Rise of the Tomb Raider has done this so much better so this the new standard regarding emotion in games, in my opinion.
The rebirth of a classic
Rise of the Tomb Raider has a much more action-based gameplay than the previous game. Generally, there are a lot of overall improvements. You still use Lara Croft’s surviving instincts to get hints and to find animals, plants, helpful objects (ammo, loot, …) and interactive pathways. Animals and plants are used as crafting components, allowing you to upgrade your weaponry at the base camps. It’s still at the campfire that you will get the chance to upgrade weapons, craft new inventory and improve your skills with skill points.
These skill points are granted by levelling up Lara Croft. Our tomb raider receives experience for everything she does, going from killing to exploring and finishing quests. These points can be spent in 3 different talent trees: Brawler (combat), Hunter (scavenging and hunting) and Survivor (crafting and exploring). These campfires are also used as quick travel waypoints. So you can always explore a certain area, if you didn’t have the chance to do so or if you have unlocked the necessary equipment to advance further in certain tombs
When exploring ancient tombs, you might come across ancient techniques that Lara Croft can master, giving her the extra edge in combat. There’s also a very good chance you’ll find ancient coins. These are used as a currency for trade with other individuals that you’ll find throughout the game. It’s important to explore for different reasons since that will also help you to find different weapon parts. These weapon parts are used to create new weapons for Lara’s arsenal, such as new handgun, a new bow or even new uniforms.
The crafting and talent system help you play the game the way you want it to play. There is a choice of different long-range weapons (bow and rifles) or close combat (shotgun and pistols), but you are free on how to approach the enemy. Stealth or the more direct version with lots of explosions and close combat? It’s all up to you… but keep in mind that your choice isn’t always the right one. They really put some effort in improving the stealthy approach. You can use sneak attacks, confuse enemies with throwing objects, hide behind bushes or even trees, do aerial attacks, … You can even make different kind of “arrows” that’ll fit perfectly with your own play style. If you happen to run out of arrows during a fight, there is no reason to run back to your camp and resupply. As long as you have the necessary resources, you can easily craft new arrows. You can even turn can into grenades of smoke bombs.
There isn’t a competitive online multiplayer feature in this Tomb Raider like last time because they want to try something different. There are some challenges that Lara Croft has to overcome during your game’s progression and there are leaderboards that give you an overview on how well you’ve performed beside other players. These challenges are called expeditions. These expeditions give you an arcade like feeling: You’re able to replay chapters of the story but with a twist, in other words… you set up your own challenge. By completing challenges, you earn credit and with this credit you can get access to power-ups and upgrades. You can choose between 3 options: mode, level and difficulty. There are a couple of modes that you can play: chapter replay elite ( replay chapters with challenges and with your already upgraded skills), score attack (finish a level quickly and use your combo meter), chapter replay (replay chapters with challenges) and remnant resistance (help the remnant fight to take back the valley). If this isn’t enough, you can create your own missions in the last mode and customize objectives, time/ weather effects, amount of enemies & animals.
Conclusion for Rise of the Tomb Raider
Rise of the Tomb Raider fulfils all expectations. The game has an interesting storyline with its own plot twists. The quality of this game is outstanding, the open world feels realistic, the visuals are next level and the emotions have raised the bar for future games. Crystal Dynamics and Microsoft have the winning formula for creating a fun and challenging Tomb Raider experience. Their decision of rebooting the franchise was the best thing that ever could have happened and we are glad to experience it once more. It’s definitely a game that everyone should pick up and enjoy playing. The game has been released on steam and has been reviewed by a received copy of the game.
