Update Two Hundred and Ninety-Nine: 8 April 2019

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

Oh, I had a LOT of fun with this.

I had placed the first reboot of Tomb Raider back when it came out on the 360 and liked it well enough, but I have to admit I was intimidated by this one for some reason. I wouldn’t have played it in a LONG time if it wasn’t for it being picked for me in a challenge, and I’m VERY glad it was.

First off, the game runs like butter, so smooth and soft it surprised even me. It made my computer run really hot, though, and it wasn’t SUPER quiet, but I had very little problems with it. Every once in a while it’d run out of graphical memory and crash, which was annoying, but the checkpoints are plentiful and the game autosaves (if you’re not playing on extreme survivor) every time you pick up a collectible, so it wasn’t a big deal. Everything is beautiful, the weather effects, the set design, the character animation—so much so that I was surprised! The performances are fine and Lara in particular has grown so much from the first game as a character.

This is a game that I actively wanted to keep playing. There’s usually only a minute in between ‘reward’ dopamine rushes—the collectibles are plentiful and EVERYWHERE—and it was really easy to be like ‘okay, I’m gonna just get the next little thing’ and then look up and a half hour has passed. Traversing the levels, both more linear ones and the couple wide open ones, was fun as hell and at a good, brisk pace. Even the bigger levels weren’t TOO big—they were just the right size to let you run around, but not TOO big they became a chore to navigate or you constantly got lost in them.

I gave a shit about the combat this time (HOW RARE THAT IS, YOU GUYS!!) and felt very rewarded by landing headshots silently from across a clearing. Going from Yakuza games to this, though, was kind of a rude awakening because Lara kills so many fuckin’ people. Going from old-ass been-in-prison-ass Kiryu pummeling dudes but them being largely fine afterward to 22-year-old bright-eyed sweet-voiced Lara skewering dudes and ripping out kidneys was a shock to the system, for sure. My girl’s got a body count. There’s tons of different options to explore, and I actually found myself using all four types of weapons (bow, pistol, shotgun, rifle) more or less equally. The alt ammo options also were great.

I would’ve been fine without combat, though, because my real focus? Tomb raidin’. The exploration sections and the challenge tombs were so FUN and so interesting. I loved clambering all over shit, getting my mitts on everything, listening to Lara comment on different things she finds (which I wish happened more!). The platforming felt smooth and had a great flow and rhythm to it. This whole game definitely hits the category of ‘joy to play’.

The DLCs are plentiful, and half of them (Endurance modes and combat-focused modes, mostly) are kinds of things I just plumb don’t care about, so I left them alone. The short story DLC was pretty good (though it introduced a couple of timing-related puzzles which can go straight to hell) though nothing to particularly write home about, just like the main story. They’re fine, but I could see the twists coming from minute one.

The REAL triumph, though? The real joy? The real big grin ‘I’ve feel seen!’ moment? A DLC story that’s essentially a walking simulator through Lara’s manor and you get your hands on NEARLY A HUNDRED relics and documents that expands upon her backstory and her family history, with some light puzzling, and Lara talks to you about her feelings about it.

Guys. That shit is MADE for me. And I loved it! My favorite part of the game by far. A++++ would snoop through a huge manor in disrepair again.

Next up: I won’t finish ALL my challenge games in time for the month, but I DO plan on playing them! I went out of order a bit just to place a less high-energy, shorter point and click between two behemoths. That means it’s time for—

See you soon!