Tomb Raider: Anniversary
PlayStation 2
Nostalgia Factor:
I remember being extremely hyped for Tomb Raider: Anniversary when it first came out. I was a giant fan of the original Tomb Raider, and I was just dying to see what a remake would look like with the technology of 2007. Unfortunately, I didn't end up liking the game. It changed too much. I was expecting a fresh coat of paint, along with a few gameplay tweaks - kind of similar to the recently remastered Tomb Raider games. Instead, I looked at Anniversary as a "dumbed down" version of the original. It was too forgiving. The puzzles weren't obscure enough. Too many parts from the original were just completely skipped over. It made things too easy. There was an added focus on climbing and acrobatic jumping, similar to what I had seen in Prince of Persia. There were also a bunch of QTEs. The entire game was not what I had been expecting.
I played the game. I made my way through it. I beat it. I traded it in at the used game store and got something else. I wouldn't play it again until now, in 2025. General consensus online is that this is a decent game. I was beginning to wonder if I hadn't given it a fair shake the first time around. I decided to come into it with an open mind and give it my honest, objective opinion.
Let's see how that worked out.
Story:
The storyline is pretty much exactly the same as the original Tomb Raider. Lara is hired by Natla to help find three pieces of the Scion, an ancient artifact. Once the pieces are brought together, it is supposed to give the user great power - or some shit like that. Anyway, you find out later on that the lady you are working for is actually an ancient Atlantean who had been buried but recently unearthed by nuclear testing.
This version of the game fleshes out the characters a little bit more. Natla's henchmen take more of a starring role. I like the Malibu's Most Wanted looking white boy in a durag. And the Barrett looking MF with the milky eye. That being said, I've never been too overly interested in the storyline in any Tomb Raider game. This one is no exception.
Gameplay:
This game is much easier to pick up and play than the original Tomb Raider. I could immediately see why some people may gravitate towards this game when given a choice between it and the OG Tomb Raider. The controls are explained right away in the first portion of the game. It takes place in a snowy area right before you enter the caves. It explains how to run, jump, climb, swing, etc. You get a much better idea how to play this game from its first five minutes than you do the entire mansion sequence in the OG Tomb Raider.
Gameplay is very fluid. It's not stiff or rigid like the original game. Jumping and grabbing onto ledges are easy to pull off. You won't be mistiming jumps and falling to your death nearly as many times in this game. The puzzles are also a lot easier to solve. Part of the thing that gave the original game longevity was the obscurity of its puzzles. Finding out where you were supposed to go and what you were supposed to do next was a big part of the challenge. I won't say that this game is "hand holdy" because it is not. But I didn't find myself getting stuck nearly as much this time around.
Overall, this was a surprisingly fun adventure for me. I expected to hate it based on my past experiences. But I liked it a lot more than I ever thought I would. It's a relatively short game, too. I don't know what my actual numbers were, but I can't imagine that this game takes more than 12 hours to play through. If you are looking for something fun and relatively breezy to play through, I can't recommend this enough. In fact, it is currently free on PlayStation Plus right now (depending on when you are reading this).
Before we move on, I want to talk about my five year old son's experience with this game. I fully expected to play through this game by myself. No one in my household likes Tomb Raider. Plus, I thought this game would be too hard for a kid who only has ever played Untitled Goose Game and Scrat's Nutty Adventure. But when I was playing through one of the levels (the dinosaur level), my kid came into the room and started watching it. He fell in love with the game, and immediately wanted to go back and see all the old levels and play through them with me. After we were done doing that, we forged ahead. And we made pretty deep progress into the game with each other. We ended up making it to the last Egypt stage before he lost interest, and wanted to go back and replay some of his favorite levels. He loves the dinosaur level, the Midas level, The Coliseum, and St Francis Folly in particular. I had to play through St Francis Folly like five freaking times in a row with him, because it is his favorite level.
But I was surprised with how well he did playing this game. He's never played anything as "advanced" or complicated as this. But he did surprisingly good with the controls. He was great at navigating as well, and helping to figure out puzzles. Although his interest in the game was short lived, I think playing this game did him some good as far as his development goes.
Graphics:
Even though this game is 18 years old now, I still think it looks pretty darn good. Obviously, it doesn't look as good as anything that would come out today. It's clearly a PS2 game. But I don't care. Never once did I think "wow, this game's graphics are really detracting from the experience." I think it looks perfectly fine. Lara moves well. The environments are beautiful. The whole game is very atmospheric overall. No complaints from me.
Sound:
The sound design has always been one of the greatest strengths of the Tomb Raider series. This game is no different. It really helps create an atmosphere for each of these levels, from dank and creepy caves to lush ancient temples. The music is good, too. I like how it cranks up whenever there is an intense moment. During more subdued game sequences, it helps sell the atmosphere even more. My son would often say "The game is creeping again" whenever the faint, creepy music would start playing.
Overall:
I have no problem admitting that I judged this game far too harshly when it first came out. I understand why I didn't like it as much. It didn't meet my expectations of what I wanted it to be. With all the changes, I was never going to like it. But I think I handled things the right way. Put the game down. Come back to it later. Set aside those expectations. Give the game another chance. Judge it on its own merits.
On its own merits, this was a pretty fun game to play through. I would have enjoyed this game regardless, but my son taking such a vested interest in it was the icing on the cake. He really enjoyed playing old levels over and over again, and finding all the secrets. Exploring every nook and cranny. That's something I never would have done by myself. It helped me look at the game from a new angle.
If you judged this game harshly like I first did, I implore you to come back with an open mind. This game deserves another chance. It's a top 5 Tomb Raider title for me.
THE GRADE:
B+
For a complete index of all my past posts and game reviews, click
>HERE<
No comments:
Post a Comment