Tomb Raider GOTY

I loved the reboot trilogy when they first came out (despite some Denuvo-related issues with Shadow of the Tomb Raider at launch preventing me from playing it til they removed it), and the whole trilogy being launched on GOG felt like a great opportunity for a replay. I always remember Rise/Shadow being significantly better than Tomb Raider 2013, but after replaying it, I found it held up pretty well. It's a fairly bog standard third person shooter with a heavy emphasis on platforming and exploration, and some light stealth elements. Enemy variety is pretty lacklustre - it's mostly humans with a few wolves here and there - but it's chock full of bombastic set pieces. The inspiration it took from Uncharted (which itself took inspiration from the original Tomb Raider games) is plain to see, and that's not a bad thing. Movement and shooting feels pretty good, and there's a nice variety of puzzles and platforming challenges to overcome. Precise platforming can be a bit janky here and there, with Lara deciding to not reach out and grab platforms from time to time, but it doesn't happen often enough to be a huge problem. The optional tombs are all single room puzzles, and it feels like they could've done more with the mechanics they introduce. That's got to be my biggest complaint - I wish they had a bit more to them than just a single puzzle and you're done. As for performance, it runs very well, though the menus could use some work when using keyboard and mouse. Speaking of which, it's one of those PC ports that didn't take KB+M into consideration for button prompts, and instead of showing the key you need to press for QTEs (of which there are a lot), it shows weird icons like a hand or an exclamation mark. I failed a bunch of QTEs early on because I had no idea what the icons meant. I managed 100% completion in about 15 hours. It's mostly collectibles and upgrades and is relatively easy to go for. Overall it's a great game, and I had a blast playing it!

While the original kicked down doors and made it hip to use lead female characters, and had female empowerment, the series was getting repetitive with the jump platforms and the limited fighting. Tomb Raider 2 and Legend were probably my two favorite original titles, both had a nice balance between fighting and exploring but regardless, it was time for a new more life like Lara and well a reboot, which is what CD did. This game features a very average looking young woman who learns to become very self reliant and empowered as the story moves forward, and more of an adventure than just tossing torches and repetitive platform jumping. My favorite will always be Tomb Raider 2 but this is a close second, and they get props for modernizing her and revitalizing the franchise, even spawned a new film featuring what appears to be a more life like Lara, unlike those bad Jolie films, need to still watch it however before I say its better or worse. In short, this game is solid, controls are fluid with a 360 gamepad, and as always with CD games, one can tweak tons of graphic settings, like being able to turn bloom, I hate bloom, and motion blur, bleh. In short, great game, not perfect, but no video game is perfect expect for maybe New Vegas but only after downloading like 2 gigs worth of 3rd party mods. ;)

Summary: A reboot of the franchise that while storywise is nice, leaves a lot to be desired mechanically. Suffers from pacing issues where far too long nothing meaningful happens. PROS + The story is given more emphasis than in the original games + More collectibles and secrets than in previous games CONS - So. Many. QTEs. So many. All the time. Everywhere. Seriously, this is not what tomb raider is meant to be. - Less combat than the original games - Less platforming and puzzles than the original games - ENOUGH WITH THE QTES ALREADY!!! - Puzzles are too easy Subjective opinion: Would not recommend. I quite liked the original games, the combat, historical/mythological inspirations and puzzles were quite an excellent combination. However, I do not like QTE-fests like this has become, and I truly dislike that the larger story presences came at the expense of gameplay. The franchise deserved better.

First off, I want to say that I really enjoy this game. I think it's really great and cinematic. Sure, it has a lot of the typical 2013-era style QTE's, regenerating health, x-ray with the survivor's instinct, and all that stuff, but the graphics and exploration really made this game stand out for it's time. The GOG version is great cause it removed all the multiplayer garbage and the achievements that came with it, but in return, the actual achievements themselves don't actually unlock. I've killed and harvested almost 300 deers in the forest and have yet to get the achievement for killing and harvesting 10 of them. I really hope this gets patched because I really enjoy this, and want to have this version as my singluar version of it, but until then, I don't think I'll be playing it for now. For those who don't care about all the Galaxy stuff, jump right into the game. It runs well and looks great. I haven't tested it on Windows 11, nor do I care, and I am a bit salty that Square didn't include the Linux build of TR2013 in this, but there's always a catch when it comes to Square, eh?

It's a 3rd person action game, it's not a TOMB RAIDING game. It's not too bad, quite decent, but not really that memorable.