Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend (Xbox 360)

The lowdown:
After the disappointment of Angel of Darkness, the Tomb Raider series has gone back to basics with a new developer and even a new Lara. Combat is back to being only around a third of the game with everything else centred on platform jumping and puzzle solving. To help this, there's a canny new movement system that allows Lara to jump onto and grab objects at an angle, so there's none of the awkward grid based movement of the earlier games. This is also the first Tomb Raider to have a proper physics engine, with lots of the puzzles revolving around movement and the use of Lara's natty new magnetic grappling hook. The graphics are also excellent, and with input from the original creator this is a long awaited return to form.

Most exciting moment:
The realisation that this is actually a proper update of the original game, as Lara leaps around cliffs like a mountain goat, with graphics and controls that aren't still stuck in 1996.

Since you ask:
The new voice of Lara is provided by Keeley Hawes, who also plays Zoe Reynolds in BBC TV show Spooks.

The bottom line:
Lara Croft is back in the first decent new Tomb Raider game for a long time.
Harrison Dent

.::GRAPHICS::.
It looks incredible, the textures are faultless, incredibly realistic, organic, impossibly high res (looks superb on HDTV), rich, deep and varied. The environments are well designed, well laid out and look so organic you'll wonder how they did it. Lighting, shadow and reflection effects are realtime, incredibly realistic and beautiful. Water is just astonishing, the most realistic I've ever seen. Lara looks simply gorgeous, and is very well animated, as are the other characters, enemies etc.

.::SOUND::.
The soundtrack is high quality, atmospheric and evocative. At times powerful and orchestral, at others gentle and vocal, it never fails to trigger the right emotions and feelings for the location and situation. If it often repeats itself, I haven't even noticed. It becomes part of the whole experience so much to hardly notice it is there, which I think is a mark of excellent sound design. The voice acting is thankfully the right side of stilted (unusual in videogames), and as a Brit, doesn't seem too overstated. (They often lay it on far too thickly and it's just ridiculous and annoying to us Brits).

.::GAMEPLAY::.
The first game in a very long time to drag me into the experience to such a level, it at once invokes memories of such classics games as Mario 64 (don't ask why) Zelda, Prince of Persia and Luigi's Mansion. The puzzles are imaginative and devious according to a perfectly balanced learning curve. The variation of gameplay types between PLATFORMER, PUZZLE, DRIVING and THIRD PERSON SHOOTER also seems to strike a perfect balance, always seems to blend seemlessy into the level and always seems right. The levels themselves are long, well designed and never too frustrating to make you even think of putting it down. Exploring Croft Manor is also an aesthetic joy, whilst finding the rewards and solving the puzzles therein is an addictive experience bound to get your brain working hard.

.::OVERALL::.
I am very impressed with this game and recommend it to anyone. The extras such as unlockable costumes, object models, character profiles etc is a nice touch, and sure to keep you playing long after the levels are completed (which probably won't be too long - I expect to have the main game finished in a couple of weeks, say 24 hours play). The only negative I would put against it is that the Save feature is a little odd. Even with Autosave turned on you still feel you need to save progress as there is little if any feedback. Even when you save the game, and then select Quit, it warns you about losing progress, which is a little disconcerting. Aside from that, this game is completely wonderful and may find it's way into my all-time top ten.


very good Lara!!!   May 21, 2006
megamarble (South Yorks, UK)
8 out of 8 found this review helpful

Tombraider is great. It's how i remembered the first tombraider to be before the series started to go downhill. I agree it isn't terribly long but there is a nice mixture of puzzles, acrobatics, and fighting. The presentation is also good. All in all a return to form for Lara


Where's the rest?   October 11, 2006
Mark Staunton (Staines UK)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful

As the title indicates, this is not the longest game in the world. There are only 8 areas to battle through and the prospect of repeating them all, but doing them within a certain time, is tiresome. Not only is it short, but it's also very structured and you will never (?) fail to work out where you need to go next.
The graphics, movement etc. are as you would expect from the 360, but the playability is not up to scratch. Whilst, accepting that anything was an improvement on Angel of Darkness, this has several other shortfalls.
There is little to be gained (the odd outfit and pistol bonus) from searching for the bronze, silver, gold icons (weren't the hidden secrets in the earlier games miles better ??)that can be found in each level. From a weapon view the fact that you can only carry one weapon apart from pistols is annoying. That said, there is not much to kill. The odd person, and the random jaguar and that really is about it!! No birds from above, snakes in the undergrowth etc. A lot of time is just spent wandering through the game and solving rather obvious puzzles. Additionally, the some of the end of level fights are tedious.
In summary, I would pick it up pre-owned of you are a Lara fan, and avoid it if you are not! There are far greater games out there that would keep you entertained for longer.


Buggy! Buggy! Buggy!   May 23, 2007
B. Bagnall (London, UK)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful

Please be warned, there is a very annoying bug in this game that, when triggered, can stop you from finishing. It occurs about half way through the England level and occurs when you face the sea monster boss (after visiting King Arthur's tomb). There are plenty of websites with guides that will help you avoid this bug because, if like me, you trigger it and you have used only one save slot then you CANNOT finish the game. Eidos are aware of the problem but cannot fix it so check out their site (and there are other sites that point out the bug - just Google it) for advice on how to avoid it.

Very irritating. The England level is about three quarters of the way through so I'm not prepared to replay the whole game just to finish it (as Eidos suggest).

Apart from that, the game's very good and I was quite enjoying until the bug cropped up.