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I’ve been a fan of the Tomb Raider franchise since all the way back to Lara Croft’s first debut in 1996. And not just because of the tiddies. I mean honestly, the way things started it’s kind of amazing to think there was ever a controversy over what was basically a triangular wedge. Mind you the marketing did skew heavily towards sex appeal and there were rumors of a “nude code” but…
I digress. After several sequels the series rebooted itself in 2013 as a prequel, featuring a younger and far less confident Lara as she took her first steps towards becoming the badass adventurer originally presented. Lara Begins, if you will. The sexuality was also dialed back quite a bit unless you have a thing for torture porn — which hopefully neither you nor the developers do, but I can’t deny there was a lot of wading through gore and dealing with graphic injuries. Someone watched The Descent.
Fortunately by the end of the 2013 game Lara seemed to have found her footing and become the badass. Unfortunately, the follow up seemed to reset all that and put her back in mopey, bumbling noob mode, which was also weird because now you’re doing all the badass things and stealth-or-not-so-stealth killing dudes by the dozens like a pint-sized (Frank Miller) Batman.
Now at some point it was clarified(?) that these reboot prequels would be a trilogy and at the end of the trilogy Lara would at last be her classic self again. So okay, 2018 comes along and the last in the series debuts with Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
And, alas, the scuttlebutt comes down the pipe that we’re still dealing with noobLara, wracked with guilt and parental issues — again in between murdering a lot of folks and animals — and that by the end that arc still isn’t really resolved. So I wasn’t especially motivated to want it at the time, but two years later the Definitive Edition was on sale and no matter how much I’m bitching about certain things the series does draw me back because I’m an exploration junkie and the games still do preserve the core of Tomb Raider that I liked in terms of exotic vistas and spelunking Lara’s way through ancient temples, puzzles and traps. SotTR absolutely delivers on that score and I find it immensely satisfying even if Lara’s introspection and dialogues still occasionally feel frustratingly lacking in confidence compared to her actions.
One other thing that stood out to me was how petite this version of Lara is, and I’m not sure I got that from even the previous installments of the prequels. Lara is very smol, as the kiddies would say — standing amongst a group of mercenaries that capture her near the start she looks almost like a child. As you play though I suppose I’d say this is considered more feature than bug, as there are a lot of small cracks Lara squeezes through that would have trapped or stymied someone of larger stature. If you are at all claustrophobic, this game may be very anxiety-inducing, especially the parts where you’re underwater. And even if this Lara probably isn’t any more than 5’2″ or so, she’s still a rabid little wolverine in combat that can wrestle jaguars and take down grown men twice her weight class.
I haven’t finished the game yet so maybe there’s still time to see her get back to that confident, quippy globetrotter introduced in 1996, but I’m keeping my expectations low and just enjoying the ride. Like I said, it’s definitely scratching my exploration itch especially in this time of pandemic where I rarely even get out of the house.
I should also give some special mention that even if the character’s evolution might be lagging, the controls are as good as they’ve ever been even with some new moves added. It’s all very intuitive, and I am extremely appreciative to whichever dev recognized that 1996 was 25(!) years ago and some of us aren’t as spry as we used to be. There are skill upgrades allowing for more reaction time and even some comfort settings in the game menus now allowing for options like just holding a button/key down rather than having to tap it rapidly, and my fingers and wrists are thankful for this and hope to see more games following suit in the future. Another feature I hadn’t seen before is that when you’re playing around with your graphics settings you can run a “benchmark” which basically goes through three separate rendered scenes to show you a preview of your detail vs. your framerate — and as someone who likes things as pretty as possible (but not so much that the game gets unplayable) it was wonderful to be able to tweak the dials to my liking before even starting the show.