The Tomb Raider curse?

[migo]

I was rather surprised by the change from Tomb Raider Legend to Tomb Raider Underworld. Legend on the 360 while essentially being an upgraded PS2/Xbox port actually looked quite a bit better than Underworld, which given when it came out should have looked a lot better. That's not quite as bad as there seem to have been changes made simply for change's sake, and a lot of the challenges are either tedious (press Y to swat away spiders) or appear contrived (the hand and footholds she climbs along look like they're from a climbing wall, not natural, and while at least Legend lampshaded some of the absurdity of them, some of the stuff looks like it's there purely for the sake of challenge. That's to say nothing of the horrible camera angles and weak collision detection - sometimes if you press A Lara jumps to her death, and other times she just does nothing.

This reminds me of the decline in quality of the Tomb Raider games, Tomb Raider 2 was rather disappointing compared to 1 in much the same way. Is that going to be something that plagues Tomb Raider, each subsequent iteration worse than the last (for a particular dev anyway)? It makes me wonder what Lara Croft & The Guardian of Light will turn out like. I had originally thought that it might be that Toby Gard only worked on Legend as he did on Tomb Raider 1 before leaving, but it seems he's been on every Crystal Dynamics Tomb Raider project to date.

What happened, is Eidos better off giving Tomb Raider to a new dev after each one is finished with it?

 

[Frontastic]

Really, do you think? I thought Underworld looked very good. Ok a bit 'darker' where as Legend looked quite shiny but the overall look seemed much better to me. However, I do agree with pretty much everything else you said. The only saving grace of CD has been that, while the gameplay was erm, bearable, the story was quite interesting. There was a point in Underworld when I remember thinking "I haven't had a cutscene in a while and this level is dragging" which is a very bad sign for a game.

I still really love the old games, they're more played for challenge than fun but quite good. Anyway, it wasn't Core's fault what happened to Angel of Darkness, Eidos forced the release before it was finished, hence the negative reception. Even playing it now, you get the sense there was a good game in there somewhere.

Guardian of Light looked awful at first but now seems like it could be fun. It's only trying to be a silly, arcade, action game and looks to be doing a good job of that

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

Huh, this is the first I've heard of this curse. I wouldn't compare the new Tomb Raider game to any of the previous. This one has based itself around a co-op perspective and is an arcade game in essence. Look at it differently and you might like it more than if you looked at it the same way as a normal Tomb Raider game.

 

[Crunchy English]

Guardian of Light was generally liked at E3 and won a couple of awards. I'd say Crystal Dynamics isn't finished doing cool things with the series yet.

I agree that Underworld wasn't particularly good, but I did play it the whole way through. The ending was in fact the worst part, so I think I was left with a worse impression than the game deserved. On that note, and I always harp on this:

Spoiler

YOU HAVE AN ANCIENT GOD-WEAPON THAT FIRES LIGHTNING BOLTS! YOU DO NOT NEED TO THROW IT AT THE BAD GUY! SHOOT THE BAD GUY. WITH LIGHTNING!

Ahem, but I'm not qualified to speak to Tomb Raiders on the whole, I've only played about half of them.

 

[the_pleasure_is_mine]

I thought Underworld was quite good... I'm just not into Lara Croft games right now so I didn't play it much.

I'll definitely give GoL a try out.

 

[RatRace123]

Yeah, Underworld was a severe disappointment especially after Legend, which was my favorite out of all the Tomb Raider games.

 

[Frontastic]

I never understodd why so many people liked Legend. It was so short and easy.

 

[Paularius]

I quiet liked the new tomb raiders. I liked the Legend/aniversry/underworld game engines. Angel of darkness and older games tend to have the same blocky look and feel. I stll prefer legends to underworld tho.

 

[migo]

Really, do you think? I thought Underworld looked very good. Ok a bit 'darker' where as Legend looked quite shiny but the overall look seemed much better to me.

I think the scenery was great, I really enjoyed looking at it, and had it been done better (like context sensitive attacks to stamp or stab the spiders - shooting them seems silly) I think it could have been great, but the quality seemed to be a step back. Like the PS2 version of Legend looked decent and the 360 version was polished, while Underworld reminded me of the first 3D games that just looked awful. It almost seems like they were experimenting with what the next gen systems could do rather than release a polished game.

However, I do agree with pretty much everything else you said. The only saving grace of CD has been that, while the gameplay was erm, bearable, the story was quite interesting. There was a point in Underworld when I remember thinking "I haven't had a cutscene in a while and this level is dragging" which is a very bad sign for a game.

That was a feel that Legend always had going really well - with the banter and the camera there was always something going on, it was actually fun to play. Underworld was getting tedious. And having to repeat something 5 or 6 times because the camera angle changes just as you're about to jump and you miss the small ledge you want to land on makes it that much worse.

I still really love the old games, they're more played for challenge than fun but quite good. Anyway, it wasn't Core's fault what happened to Angel of Darkness, Eidos forced the release before it was finished, hence the negative reception. Even playing it now, you get the sense there was a good game in there somewhere.

Thing is, that's the sense I get with Underworld. Both the rushed bit and that there's a good game in there somewhere. Tightened up controls, better camera angles, polished graphics, it could be a much better game. CD seems to have a 1 Tomb Raider per year release schedule, and it doesn't seem like they have anything else going on (whereas they had plenty of variety before being handed the franchise).

Guardian of Light looked awful at first but now seems like it could be fun. It's only trying to be a silly, arcade, action game and looks to be doing a good job of that

I hope so, because I really love co-op, and if it turns out well I'll be really happy.

 

[migo]

I never understodd why so many people liked Legend. It was so short and easy.

It was polished. I prefer short and good quality to long and drawn out. Long games with 80+ hours of play time are great, but not at the expense of other things that make it good. Legend didn't overextend itself, while Underworld seems a bit too complex for the game engine to handle.

 

[Applejack]

I think Legend was big because it was the first good Tomb Raider in a while. Underworld was good too if you didn't mind the easiest combat ever. Maybe if the game didn't have that auto aim it would be more fun.

 

[migo]

I found combat to be rather tedious rather than easy - I could see tigers waiting in the distance with my binos, but couldn't try to pick them off at a distance. I had to wait for them to come charging at me before I could shoot them.

 

[Frontastic]

I never understodd why so many people liked Legend. It was so short and easy.

It was polished. I prefer short and good quality to long and drawn out. Long games with 80+ hours of play time are great, but not at the expense of other things that make it good. Legend didn't overextend itself, while Underworld seems a bit too complex for the game engine to handle.

I can understand that but I had Legend finsihed in little over a day. Good god I'm not saying I want an 80 hour Tomb Raider(!) but a 7/8 hour game is just not enough. Anniversary had the right balance I think. It was fun, not too easy, looked quite good and was just about long enough. There's was probably about 2/3 levels worth of stuff they removed from the original but hey. It also had the best controls, I will agree Underworld was a step back with the 'hold to shoot' mechanic. And I loved having the manual reload option in TRA.

That was a feel that Legend always had going really well - with the banter and the camera there was always something going on, it was actually fun to play. Underworld was getting tedious.

That is one aspect of CD's games that divided people, the constant chatter. I'm afraid I hold the opposite view and was cheering for the Doppleganger in the Croft Manor scene in Underwolrd. A bit of back and foth is fine and it gave an excuse for exposition (Lara looked a bit stupid in Underworld explianing everything to herself via recorder) but you need isolation for atmosphere, which the old games did really well. Although the huge caverns with no draw distance thanks to technical capabilities also helped...

 

[migo]

Fair enough, I could see that point, but with Underworld I felt half the extension in time was making corrections for errors. Legend would have taken a lot longer if you were constantly missing a jump because the camera angle changed so your former forward push on the analog stick became slightly off to the side.

 

[Frontastic]

Fair enough, I could see that point, but with Underworld I felt half the extension in time was making corrections for errors. Legend would have taken a lot longer if you were constantly missing a jump because the camera angle changed so your former forward push on the analog stick became slightly off to the side.

Haha, now that you mention actually, yeah. Legend's time trials were quite fun and could feel very fluid but I remember being grateful Underworld had none.