Are you actually playing the game?

Going through the various threads about Tomb Raider you get the sense that a lot of people are simply repeating incorrect assumptions that they heard or read somewhere. Are you actually playing the game?

Last time I looked at my percentage I was at 30%, but then I played for about 2 hours and ended up in a scene that was right out of The Descent. That makes two references to that movie so far.

Fired it up last night, looks greatttt and feels pretty OK for a Tomb Raider game. I just escaped the dude who tries to either choke or rape me, so I'm early on.

come again?

The part in the beginning where Lara pops out of the ground after escaping the cave collapse. That was from The Descent. The 2nd scene (spoiler to mention it) is very reminiscent of another famous moment from that movie.

Descent had famous moments?

Sure did.

@golguin:

Oh.

You know, the Descent..

@humanity:

LoL

havin good fun with this lara ,big fan of the series played em all so its good to see her back.

I've played around 3hrs and I'm really digging it. I understand the arguments regarding Lara not having much of an emotional struggle with killing dudes but I think it makes sense. Those dudes are trying to kill her and her friends. At that point you either start killing them or give up. Lara doesn't seem like the type of character to give up.

Man, really wanting to play this game but I need to bide my time and wait....

The Descent is one of the best horror movies in fucking decades.

They chose a great movie to pay homage to.

Too bad the sequel was crap, though. :/

I bought Tomb Raider and have it sitting on my coffee table, but I haven't started on it yet. Still up to my eyes in Fire Emblem.

Ive just completed the game. I think it took me just about 12 hours to finish it with 65% completion. Its a fantastic game and people should play it, ignore how the game was marketed (which was total garbage).

What gives you the impression that people that are talking about it aren't playing it?

I've only gotten about 30 minutes in and referenced The Descent as well to someone. Felt very reminiscent of that movie at the beginning so I'm glad others felt that way and I didn't pull it outta my arse.

And, yes, the sequel to that movie was so crap ;(

Also, the original ending of the Descent is better. If I remember correctly, they dumbed it down for the US audience. Is the part where she crawls out even in the original ending? I can't remember. I just know they show her still in the cave at the end and kind of play up whether the creatures actually existed or not.

There's another thread discussing the apparent 'narrative dissonance' where several users seem to just be restating what Brad and Patrick had said but are mixing those opinions with interpretations of the gameplay that just don't seem to fit. Some people have implied that the game basically becomes a shooting gallery as soon as Lara gets guns for example. I got the gun right after the part where Lara gets harassed and witness a bunch of people die. Throughout that section up to the point where I just got (maybe an hour or two later) the killing Lara took part in was based around just trying to get through an environment in one piece and the amount of deaths, though high collaboratively, was small in each instance (maybe 5 dudes at a time at the most).

Just recently I got to a part Lara got trapped and was almost killed through suffocation due to gas pouring into a room. Just prior to this, during a gun fight, she had pleaded with men who were shooting at her to stop and that 'you don't need to do this'. Now her life is being threatened again and, after leaving that room and blowing it up (you'll get how that happens when you get there it's not as silly as it sounds in text), the player is given the choice to shoot a man dead who is trapped under rubble. The same man who forced gas in the room where Lara was. I had her shoot him and after she did it she muttered 'go to hell'. Then she gets ambushed and finally I had a moment where I legitimately mowed people down.

I'm having a blast with this game. The action is hectic and fun. Lara can't take much punishment making the shooting scenes really tense. The cover system is really, really well done. For as many times as it could have gone bad (as you can't force her into cover) the system never seems to. The shooting feels great. The upgrade system is fun. I really enjoy exploring environments because the presentation is so good. Not only does it look great but the sound design is really good. The story is fascinating so far too. And the character arc feels completely justified. It's a cool experience for me because just as I'm getting more confident with the shooting and movement controls so is Lara becoming more confident in herself. It's like she and I are on the same wavelength. I'm really impressed by what they did and it is way better then I ever expected.

@jasonr86: NO NO NO! Remember she killed that deer and felt bad and then you kill like 5 million doods this game is REALLY hampered by this complete "dissonance!" Thats a joke of course.

What you wrote - all of it pretty much - those are my feelings exactly. I saw no huge gap, I think they actually did a really good job at pulling everything together and the game itself is mechanically really great - the platforming feels even better than Uncharted if you ask me. I actually felt kinda bad when either Patrick or Brad mention how "oh well once you play Uncharted then everything else just feels like cheap imitation." A horrible attitude if you ask me, but everyone is entitled to their own opinion. What is so great about Tomb Raider is the complete air control you get over Lara. Every jump you can navigate her and connect to ledges really well. Honestly, I'm very surprised how Crystal Dynamics were able to pull off all these game systems so well. The shooting feels great, the dodging is perfect, the platforming has just the right amount of floatiness to it. Kudos to that team, and I'm really excited to play the next TR game they develop for next gen systems.

Yes, and the game is fantastic.

I've played about 3 hours of it, and I'll play more after work tonight. It's good stuff.

I've played about 3 hours of it, and I'll play more after work tonight. It's good stuff.

I'm a couple of hours in and I really really like it so far.

I will say in Tomb Raider's defense about the 'narrative dissonance', that at least they gave her a scene or two of real grief over killing something or someone. Nathan Drake goes through game after game, shooting men in the face, and seems to only make wise-cracks. He's sociopathic, to say the least.

At least Tomb Raider is trying to add some character to Lara that isn't just playing it straight or making wise-cracks. I mean, it IS still a videogame, and concessions have to be made.

And I agree with pretty much everything you said. I love how it only takes a few shots to take Lara down, so you have to be really careful. And the cover system is fantastic, especially for a system where you don't snap to cover.

The game is fun. The writing isn't good and IMO they wasted a perfectly good characterization route for this new Lara, but I'm enjoying myself immensely.

Ummm yes...no, I mean I finished it and did all the challenges and got all the collectibles.

I think after playing it I do prefer the Legend/Anniversary/Underworld/Guardian Lara. I have always been fond of the stylistic character designs, and while I do like the way the new one looks I do prefer the more "fun" version. Keeley Hawes is also a much better actress, and I much, much, much preferred the way Lara talks in the previous 4 games.

I just finished the game now. I had fun. I didn't go out of my way to find collectibles nor tombs but I got a few of those as well. The shooting and gameplay is nice and smooth. I enjoyed the "puzzles" and navigating the environments related to those. Its not a bad game at all. Yes, the story is a bit odd and thin, but it kept me entertained throughout and that's what matters to me.

@cloudnineboya said:

havin good fun with this lara ,big fan of the series played em all so its good to see her back.

almost perfect copy

Once it goes on sale and all the PC Nvidia issues are fixed, I'll get it.

I'm just going to let this out since it's been bothering me while playing.

"I'm SEEEEWWWWW SURRRRRY" - Lara Croft

I so fucking sick of hearing her say that and it's driving me up the fucking wall.

Finished the game earlier, took 9hrs with a 72% completion rate.

Didnt care for the shooting in the game tbh but otherwise enjoyed it quite a bit.

Steam says 24 hours with a 90% completion. I did leave it idle for a couple hours here and there though so it would probably be more like 18.

It was pretty good. Right after the blood scene Lara even runs into dudes that are like the cave monsters in the movie.

Lara cauterizes the wound in her side, the one she got in the beginning of the game, right before she comes up with how to make fire arrows. I was under the impression from the quick look and podcasts that that was never explained. Well, everyone, it is. And afterwards she is even more 'Lara Crofty' which makes sense as she just used a fucking hot ass arrow to cauterize a wound.

Very true. Like I said in my opening post there is a lot of complaining about things in the game that are actually explained or general impressions that are simply wrong.

Remember how she supposedly gets injured in numerous ways and never reacts to any of it? People will have you believe that lie despite the whole sequence having her unable to climb and stumbling along until she cauterizes her wound.

Also, there is a bit of dialogue after she kills a guy for the first time where Lara is asked how hard it was, to which she replies "its scary how easy it was". Which brings into focus what catagory of personality she falls into. Lara=fighter not fainter.

Only 3 hours in, I got the red ice pick thingy so I can climb up rock mountains. I'm enjoying the game so far. My favorites things are the sound design ( they got the water sounds right! When you jump into the water it makes the right "thump" sound) and the UI, it looks really stylish. I'm really hating the QTEs, but that's because I'm terrible at them and every time I miss one Lara gets a pretty gruesome death.

Just finished it. 100%'ed the single player and might dip my toe in the multiplayer. Excellent game.

I've reached the point of no return so I think I can safely say I have no idea why Brad and Patrick were complaining that it wasn't an open world game like Far Cry 3. The game has plenty of huge open areas that let you go off and find collectibles. The game lets you go back to old areas to use new skills/equipment to reach new areas. I've never played an Uncharted game so all the set pieces in the game were amazing and you are actually in control of what's happening instead of seeing a cutscene. I didn't experience any 'narrative dissonance' as everything that Lara goes through is explained. We see her gradually stop caring that she's killing guys and every skill is explained as "training" she did with Roth in the past.

All in all it's pretty fantastic. All that's left is beating the game and then going back to collect all that stuff.

Why is every Tomb Raider discussion devolving into either slagging off Uncharted or Tomb Raider itself? I love the Uncharted series and I'm liking this game so far.

That said, the XP system seems pointless to me. It feels like its there just to stagger the stream of new abilities and I don't see much branching in there. I was hoping the character models you unlock can be used as costumes/skins but it seems they're there just for show.

Regardless, so far so good. I just hope the game will focus on the island's mysteries rather than just surviving a ship wreck.

Now i want to watch The Descent more than play the game.

Never seen it and it's more within my budget.

To be fair though she was jumping around and climbing fine until that point in the game when they decided that the wound had become too much for her. In fact when she started acting really hurt I didn't really understand why until she cauterized the wound. Then I wondered why she didn't act hurt prior to cauterizing the wound (besides just prior to cauterizing the wound).

The way I saw the situation play out is that the sequence (right before she's really hurt) made her injury worse. She did take several trees and tree branches right to the gut. Probably wasn't good for her puncture wound.

The timeline was essentially...

Got hurt and reacted to it.

Got used to the injury and carried on.

Injury got worse and required drastic action (cauterizing the wound with the arrowhead).

EDIT: And before anyone says that you can't do this and that with a specific injury lets not forget those medical stories of getting some foreign object jammed right through your body and not really getting injured because it missed all vital areas.

I suppose. But if that's the case they could have done a better job explaining that. I still think it's good that they addressed it at all. Especially since I was lead to believe it wouldn't be addressed.

I won't argue that the writing is good, but I am enjoying her character. And I think they do a great job of making it seem like she is doing things out of obligation to her friends rather than because she is good at it. Unlike Drake, things seem to actually phase her and it seems like things could go bad for her at any second. The broadcast tower is a good example.

I do think a lot of the ambient/incidental dialog is great (enemies yelling out "holy shit, she's a good shot" after making a headshot), and most of the combat scenarios are interesting, which I feel is a factor of it not being waves of enemies, but rather a small group. Really enjoying it, however something just popped up that may turn me against it. I guess I shouldn't be surprised by it, but I guess by virtue of it being a reboot, I thought it would be absent

The weird samurai monster and supernatural elements

I loved that at the end the villian asks how many men you've had to kill to stop him and says you're bother monsters.

@mildmolasses said:

My problem with her characterization is that they desperately try to push the angle of her being "changed" by the events. Problem is, she's already capable when she arrives at the island, so it's not even played as a "fish out of water" situation, where the city mouse has to suddenly live in a lethal environment. She also never gets called out on all that killing she does and apart from gaining some resolve and respect for her late father, the endeavor never really changes her that much. There's no reflection upon what happens, which is absolutely required when you are trying to write a story about trauma and how violence may fiddle with one's humanity. FC3 did that by making Jason's friends freak out when he giggles at all the carnage. Spec Ops has Walker degrade, until he's nothing more than someone screaming insults at his enemies. Hotline Miami turns off the music and reminds the player what was he doing in the frantic haze of killing and resetting at the end of every mission.

I agree, I do like the moments were her ability to survive and overcome odds is played triumphantly (like when she gets a grenade launcher), it's just that the game feels like they had two completely different concepts for the character arc and then just decided to put it in a cup, shake it and leave it mixed. I expected her to be more broken by the events both mentally and physically, until she no longer cares about anything else than surviving. But that transmission never happens nor is really highlighted - it's a similar problem the new DmC has, in that the main characters barely have real character arcs.

Shit, I wrote a lot about my thoughts on the matter in the Bombcast comments, I can forward you that if you want to talk about it more.

Mathias totally calls her on it in the end.

@barrock: Thing is, Mathias is criminally insane and fails to realize that it was far easier and more sensible to simply destroy Himiko's body than to idiotically look for a new vessel for her. He's the bad guy with no right to hold Lara and himself on the same moral ground. His calling out is deliberately set up to ring hollow, just like Lazarevic reminding Drake of the same in Uncharted 2.

Just finished it clocking in at 9.4 hours with moderate collecting, probably right around 76% or something.

I'm getting kind of tired at the end of action games where they just throw more and heavily armored dudes at you, but then again what else can you really do when you're just getting more powerful the whole time. I thought overall it was a really pretty and fun game. If you don't play it 100% with the Bow you're doing it wrong.

Well I haven't finished the game yet, so everything I'm saying is based on the first half of the game, so I need to finish it to see if my opinion changes. But as it stands, it never seems like she's incapable, but its more a matter of her dealing with a lot of shit all at once. But as for the dissonance, I feel like being bothered by the massive killing capacity of the player character would destroy my ability to enjoy any game whatsoever. No matter what, unlike other story driven mediums, games need an intense adversarial setup for it to work. Destroying everything in my path is par for the course, and I can't imagine games doing it extremely well (the games you mention at least dive into that territory) without devolving into a seriously niche genre. I'm not really looking for intense character studies, just a good time

Ok, I can't do counter kills with the arrow to the knee (hurr durr) and other counters. Anyone got a tip on that?