Tomb Raider: Underworld

"Can't these damn tombs raid themselves?"

In 2003, after about 5 years or so in development, Eidos and Core released Tomb Raider: Angel Of Darkness. It turned out to be 5 years worth of monkey crap. What's funny, is that I remember the game came with a behind the scenes bonus feature where the devs talked like the game was the greatest thing to grace god's green earth. LOL indeed. Anyway, Eidos thankfully took lovely Lara and her franchise away from Core (who have since been disbanded) and gave it to Crystal Dynamics, the developers of the Legacy Of Kain franchise. About a year later they released Tomb Raider: Legend, and it was awesome. Another year later, they released the TR1 remake Tomb Raider: Anniversary, and it was MORE awesome. Now, Crystal D and Eidos have released Lara Croft's PS3 debut with Tomb Raider: Underworld, and…

Pfffffft!!!

STORY RAIDER

Underworld picks up right where Legend left off, with Miss Croft finding out that her mother, who supposedly died when Lara was a child, may be alive and well and trapped in Valhalla, the underworld from Norse mythology. Following various clues, Lara starts her search in the Mediterranean Sea, helped by her support team introduced in Legend, Alister and Zip. Of course, some old enemies with agendas of their own resurface and Lara is now in a race against time to find Valhalla and save her mother. Unfortunately, Miss Croft's latest adventure isn't too heavy on the storytelling, with only certain levels of the game advancing the story while most levels have Lara basically giving you a crash course in Norse mythology. Worst of all, the amusing banter between Lara and her support team throughout Legend is completely gone here. The game does eventually tie up all loose ends, but overall the story is not as compelling as I though it would be.

GAMEPLAY RAIDER

The main draw of pretty much any Tomb Raider game is the excellent platforming and puzzle solving that takes place in many exotic locations and ruins. Underworld continues this tradition, and roughly 75% of the game is purely acrobatics and puzzles. For the most part, Lara controls fairly well and just like the previous two games. Jumping, climbing, sprinting, shimming, and using Lara's magnetic grappling hook to swing and rappel should be familiar to anyone. The quick-time events that were included in Legend have been replaced here by something called “Situational Adrenaline”, where time slows down when Lara is put in certain dangerous situations and you will have to react in time to get Lara out of the situation. I must say that these were pretty cool, then again jumping from a falling ledge to another ledge in super slow motion always is. Lara will also have access to her PDA by pressing select. From here, you can use a fairly useless sonar map, check her inventory, and read her journal entries on various subjects as you progress through the game. There's also a nifty feature where Lara will give you a couple hints on where to go next in a level.

Underworld is divided up into 8 different levels containing a bunch of different chapters. The adventure will take Lara from Southern Thailand to the underground crypts underneath her own manor to the Artic circle. Like I said before, most of the game is made up of Lara acrobating across various environments and solving ancient puzzles, and in this respect underworld is fantastic. Unlike, say, a Prince of Persia game, Lara's death-defying antics usually require a more though-out process to complete. Jumps usually need to be set-up carefully to pull them off, lest you enjoy seeing Lara die hilarious rag-doll deaths (you don't…sicko). Most of the time you'll have to stop, think, and take a look at your environment in order to see the way you need to go, and when you do figure out the way to go it's very rewarding to pull off Lara's various maneuvers to reach your destination. Expect to be swinging off poles, climbing walls, walking on thin pieces of land hundreds of feet above the ground, and other craziness before the game is over. Lara will also get a chance to show us her moves completely underwater, where a couple of chapters (including the very fist one) take place. Controlling Lara underwater is just as easy as controlling her on land, which make these levels pretty damn fun. Finally, the puzzles in underworld are just as expertly designed as in previous games, and in my opinion some of them are the best of the series. Furthermore, Crystal D made a lot of these puzzles non-linear, requiring multiple paths to be taken to solve them, and allowing you to chose what order you want to tackle them in. most puzzles either involve pulling various levers to activate something or open a door, yet other require you to find an object and return it to a certain place. One of the cooler puzzles requires you to operate a huge ancient Mayan calendar in order to open up a path to ruins that lie underneath it. Fans of Tomb Raider (well, the last two Tomb Raiders) and Miss Croft need not worry when it comes to these areas of the game; it's still excellently well-designed.

Unfortunately, it's time to talk about the things that make Underworld the least of the Crystal D Tomb Raider trilogy. First off is the game's combat, while fairly fun in Legend and Anniversary, just feels sluggish and a chore here. Lara's main weapons are still her twin pistols with infinite ammo (where does she keep it all?), she is also able to throw grenades with R1, and she is able to freely choose her secondary weapon by going into her PDA menu. She is able to choose an assault rifle, twin uzis, a shotgun, and even a spear gun for the underwater missions. These weapons come with a full supply of ammo with the only downside being that Lara won't be able to pick up any extra if she runs out, unlike Legend or Anniversary. Anyway, combat controls remain the same, you hold R2 to lock-on to a target and R2 to fire. New to Underworld is Lara's abilities to fire at two targets at once and fire while hanging from an object. Chance are, most people will stick to Lara's pistols for the majority of the game, and for some reason Lara's fires them much slower than she did in the previous titles. Lara's dodging acrobatics, like rolling and jumping out of the way while locked on, also feel more slower and sluggish here, with enemies still able to hit me no matter what I did. Enemies themselves won't win any Nobel prizes either. While I fully expect the giant spiders, the bats, the tiger, and “supernatural enemies” to do nothing but charge at me, human enemy AI is really dumb. I shot a guy in the face multiple times with the assault rifle and he just stood there doing nothing. I also “enjoy” how when you throw a grenade on a human enemy, they flail about like little girls until they explode. Intimidating. Underworld also includes an adrenaline system you can use if you need to give Lara an edge in battle. Next to her health gauge is an adrenaline gauge that fills up over time, and it's activated by pressing R3. This slows time down to give Lara and her bullets an edge, but I just found it too make already sluggish combat even…sluggier. Lara can perform a pretty cool headshot maneuver (similar to the one seen in Anniversary) with a full gauge as well, by going up to an enemy and pressing square. This will cause Lara to slow-motion jump off her target and a red reticule to appear. You then must move the reticule over the enemy's head before Lara touches the ground and fire off a shot, instantly killing an enemy if successful. She also gets to use an awesome weapon in the last two levels of the game, but overall combat isn't as satisfying or fun as in the last two games, and thankfully it doesn't take up much of your time in Underworld.

However the biggest perpetrator in Underworld is the game's camera, which borderlines on being downright awful. Whether in wide open areas or in tight corridors, the camera will fight you almost every step of the way. It will lock when your trying to line up a jump, it won't let you look up or down when you need to, it will zoom in right on Lara for seemingly no reason at all, and all these problems are magnified during combat. The camera wasn't perfect in Legend or Anniversary, but it was passable. Underworld's camera system is one of the worst I've seen this gen so far, and most of my deaths in the game was because of it. Another special mention goes out to the levels that allow Lara to ride her motorcycle. However, these aren't the exiting chase sequences that were in Legend, oh no! Here it will just let you ride around in circles and off very small ramps…that's about it. One cycle sequence toward the end of the game in a corridor filled room teeming with “supernatural” enemies was downright pathetic. The camera was awful during these too. A shame.

TECH RAIDER

Underworld's environments look absolutely gorgeous. When you first take a look at the foliage-filled cliffs at the beginning of the coastal Thailand level, you will be floored. Textures are usually clean, the lighting effects are top-notch, and overall fantastic designs deserve a round of applause for Crystal D. I especially like the crypts below Croft Manor, which definitely give off a creepy atmosphere. However, that's where the praises end. First off, the character models are the exact definition of “PS2 graphics in HD”. They are not very detailed at all. Secondly, while the game maintains it's framerate at 30fps most of the time, there were a lot of instances where the framerate chugged pretty badly, especially during the motorcycle sequences. Thirdly, the game is filled with various glitches, from Lara repeatedly clipping and disappearing in objects in the environment to a freeze I got that made the entire screen turn black! Yeah, that one made me crap myself until I restarted my PS3 and everything was fine, and I researched and found out that it was just a issue with this game. The environments look gorgeous in 720p, but unfortunately that's about it in this category. Except for the cut-scenes that use the in-game engine, which I suppose are decent. Thankfully, I can't really complain about the game‘s sound. The DD 5.1 sound effects are good, the voice acting is good, and the music is pretty damn good.

LARA NEEDS A VACATION…

The game can be played on multiple difficulties and it does have a unique “PC”-like feature where you can tailor stuff like enemy damage and weapon damage to customize the game, but for the most part your replay value with Underworld will be your desire to collect all the game's hidden treasure and relics. After you beat the 8-10 hour game, you'll even unlock a Treasure Hunt, which let's you freely explore the game's levels with all the puzzles solved so you can pick up any treasures you missed. Your reward for finding every treasure in the game…nothing. Yep, while Legend and Anniversary gave you tons of unlockable outfits, Underworld laughs at you when you realize you just wasted your time. Without any trophy support and supposedly no add-on support for PS3 owners, this stings even more.

Tomb Raider: Underworld is both a success and disappointment. The fans will enjoy the still fantastic platforming and the exotic and atmospheric locals, but they will hang their heads in disappointment in pretty much…everything else. It's still worth a play for those fans however, put others may want to rent first…and hope Crystal D does Lara more proud next time.

KEWL
+Controls are good
+Platforming and puzzle solving is still fantastic
+Underwater levels are fun
+Environments look gorgeous
+Sound is good
+Uh…Lara is still hot, especially in a diving suit :)

LAME
-Combat is sluggish and un-fun with lame human AI
-Camera is pretty awful
-Character models are poor
-Various tech issues
-Motorcycle bits stink
-Pretty much no replay value

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 12/08/08

Game Release: Tomb Raider: Underworld (US, 11/18/08)