Box Copy
Sometimes a killer body just
isn't enough.
Climb, swim, and backflip your way through a maze of cryptic deathtraps
so realistic you can practically smell the decaying flesh. Unload an
arsenal of lethal firepower on any wild-dog, giant lizard or blood
thirsty mercenary that gets in your way. Your mission is the deadliest
one to date - the recovery of the fabled Scion, an incredible treasure
reputed to give its possessor vast power. Get ready to cross the globe
to take on impossible odds while exploring Incan ruins, Ancient Rome,
Egyptian Pyramids, and the Lost City of Atlantis.
- Explore 4 Massive
Worlds with over 15 levels
- Your arsenal
includes: pistols, magnums, a shotgun and uzis.
- Battle wolves, bats,
bears, alligators, raptors, and even a T-Rex in your quest for the
Scion.
Discussion
There have been many ladies of gaming; Samus Aran, Chun-Li, Princess
Peach, but truth be told the PlayStation never really had one in the
beginning. Sony tried to make Toshinden’s Sophia a mascot, but there’s
something about a bondage dressed, whip equipped leading lady that
doesn’t quite fit the proper mold. That’s when the world realized it
took more than just a hot blond to make a game. It took a hot brown
haired, fairly well endowed, dual pistol wielding no nonsense female
that didn’t know the meaning of the word stereotype.
Enter Lara Croft.
Eidos’ huge project took shape on the Saturn, PC, and PlayStation, and
what arrived in gamers’ hands forever changed the way games were
designed.
Here’s the premise – it’s you, what few weapons you can find, and a
whole lot of exploration of various caves, ancient enclosures, caverns,
and more. Along the way you’ll be ambushed and attacked by bears,
wolves, bats, tigers, lions, some freaky zombie looking things, and one
hell of a big surprise at the end of the game.
What makes the project work is that it wasn’t afraid to remove the
soundtrack from the game. You start of in silence, with only your
footsteps echoing in a long corridor. Music is played when you discover
a new area, a secret, or to announce specific boss-like enemies. For a
game that is pushing 14 years old as of this writing, it still gives you
that wide-eyed grin when the ‘secret’ music plays. Imagine the joys you
have finding secrets in modern games like Fallout 3 or Mass Effect – but
on a much smaller area scale.
Core’s true triumph in the game was their method in crafting the levels.
Many games will have nature-like areas, but everything is still created
using squares, rectangles and oddly shaped triangles. With Tomb Raider,
it feels natural – no ground is 100% even, no wall outside of a man made
structure is straight. There are nicks, dings, protrusions, completely
random rock structures, and more. You really do feel like your
exploring, since at any given time any of the aforementioned creatures
could be lying in wait for you.
About the only thing the game struggles with is control. Core game play
(ugh, that’s a pun) focuses on a lot of jumping. Lara’s jumping
animation is a bit sticky on the launch, so if you need to make a
running jump leap, every so often you’ll find yourself falling to your
death rather than leaping across. She also doesn’t turn on a dime – too
often I found myself the main course of a tiger because I either a)
couldn’t turn naturally fast enough or b) the ‘auto turn’ roll animation
jerks the camera so violently you forget where you or your enemy is.
Thankfully Lara has a small amount of auto-targeting to her, so as long
as you can keep a creature within a certain range of her peripheral
vision, you can still hit them.
I was fairly shocked at how well this game has stood up to time –
control issues aside, there really is that sense of accomplishment and
adventure as you solve the various puzzles and hidden areas. The sound
track is gorgeous once you’re able to listen to it, and the graphics
even holds up well in HDMI, so long as you’re playing the PSN Store
version (See trivia for both reasons).
One of the true legends in the PlayStation library, and one you
shouldn’t be without.
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Trivia
-
So...many...variants...see below.
- Available on PSN,
with good reason. The retail versions of Tomb Raider do not work on
the PS3 (at least the 60g version). All versions will allow you to
boot to the title screen, but once you choose the game, it will
crash before the opening cinematic plays.
The PlayStation Store version is the "Orange Burst" variant, but
with a small twist. I wanted to know how they got that version to
boot when the regular disc wouldn't. Turns out they separated the TR
data from the original ISO. The PSN version has no Launch screen
that would have had access to the two included demos on the retail
disc.
- Tomb Raider's entire
soundtrack and vocal recordings can be listened to by placing the
disc in a music CD player.
- Interesting note to
the above: The CD is named TOMBRAIDER but in iTunes, it comes up as
'Tomb Raider PlayStation Game Disc' and is filed under its composer,
Nathan McCree.
However, starting with the 2nd Variant, all the music tracks are now
suddenly just 'tracks' in their names. It goes back to the full
titled tracks with the SLUS GH variant.
- To say that Lara
Croft became an instant celebrity upon the game's release would be a
drastic understatement. Ignoring the aspect of fan boys controlling
a fully expressive buxom babe, Lara went on to create some of the
most bizarre media elements in gaming history. She has an entire
guide book dedicated to just her (yes her, not the games),
the game has had one of the longest running hoaxes with a 'nude'
code, as well as the source for a famous magazine hoax.
Even weirder, one of the live models that portrayed her, Nell
McAndrews ended up being really nude in PlayBoy magazine. Eidos
ended up trying to take Playboy to court to prevent the use of the
TR name being associated with the pictorial. Who says games aren't
art? :)
- There were two live
action movies loosely based on the games featuring Angelina Jolie as
the heroine.
- According to an
early article in GameFan, Tomb Raider was being developed as a PC
and Saturn game exclusively. From the way a later article was
written, it seems Eidos was trying to keep the PlayStation version
under wraps as long as possible to keep Saturn sales strong. Sadly,
Saturn only ever saw the original game, as by the time the first
sequel hit Sega's machine was on the way out.
- Lara was originally
going to be named Laura.
- The newer generation
release Tomb Raider: Legend was a remake / reboot of this one, with
some radical changes here and there.
- There's an amusing
double nod to the Indiana Jones movies. The Ark of the Covenant is
sitting nonchalantly in Lara's Training Home, while in a later level
you must out run a giant boulder.
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