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Four articles appeared on LCO. Here's the first one:
Preview of Tomb Raider Legend
>From Dutch gaming magazine 'Power Unlimited'
Text by Niels Roodenburg and Jan Meyroos
Translated by Kramer
The last Tomb Raider game, Angel of Darkness, did spoil the reputation
of the once so successful gameseries. However, with a new developer at
the helm and the promise to return to the roots of the series, Jan and
Niels began with a positive presentiment on their review of Tomb Raider
Legend.
There I stood, on a Tuesday in July, playing the role of girl with guts
Lara Croft, in the middle of a jungle and that while I actually was
sitting casually in a chair in front of the television.
The warm light fell through the foliage on 'my' tight skin and I
saw wild flowers and long grass wherever I looked. A promising
soundtrack was preparing me for what would lie ahead.
In 99% of the cases, an Eidos-employee would now have taken the
controller from me to make Lara run down the path towards the cliff.
But then I would have seen only a glimpse of the well grown
environment, the little birds flying about, the smart lightning, the
eye-catching glow-effects, the stairs chiselled out in stone, the
blurred background and somewhere far away an enormous waterfall with
fitting rainbow.
Fortunately the guy of Eidos next to me gave me all opportunity to
admire all the aspects of the demo. So instead of a rushed peek of the
environment I took my time to examine everything carefully. I turned
the camera around Lara and began to investigate her new looks.
Here I noticed that the perfect looking Lara who was winking to me on
the titlescreen is identical to the figure that is running through the
game.
After a moment of staying put, Lara started to look around and
stretched out what made her breasts to wiggle a bit.
Those new breasts, a lot has been written about that already. And most
of the time about the fact that they are a bit smaller now. I can
assure you though that there's nothing wrong with them. Or as Jan put
it: "A C cup with a push-up bra, and nice and round also!"
Now I had hesitated enough and dove off the cliff and climbed ashore in
a new area where the first environmental puzzle was waiting for me.
A dramatically turning camera gave me a subtle hint on how to solve
this problem. Climbing was allowed already, some rocks took me high
enough to reach a dangling rope. After I jumped with the X button on my
controller I automatically grabbed and hanged on the edge of the rock
above me. Holding the button longer resulted in a well balanced
handstand and an elegant flip.
It may sound a bit ordinary but the difference with the previous Tomb
Raider games is huge. In 2003 we were already playing Prince of Persia
as fluent as a ballet dancer, but in Angel of Darkness we, as a figure
of speech, still needed to hold two buttons, steer upwards and press a
third button to perform a jump. That's old fashioned and way to
mechanic to make any fluent gameplay possible, especially if you are
used to better controls.
For Legend the controls have been changed hugely. Accordingly the
feeling of the game is much more natural. However, in this demo some
analogue movements seemed still a bit rusty and the timing for some
jumps could be too precise. But the direction the developers have
chosen is very promising for the final game.
Well, I was still hanging there on that rope and made swing right into
a strange looking rock. The whole thing started to turn. I had put an
imposing mechanism into process. The music began to play louder, chains
moved, wheels were turning, shapes and figures shove in and out. The
splashing water of the waterfall spread and revealed an ancient temple.
The first shock came in the deep in the dungeons of the temple. I was
just admiring the details of the decorations and vegetation on the
walls, the special atmosphere (things like light-effects with twirling
pieces of dust) and for example the fact that Lara is actually looking
at every object or interesting view she is passing. (We saw that before
in 'Grim Fandango' and 'Zelda: The Wind Waker')
What the shock was about? In that ancient network of corridors I met a
gentleman. A gentleman with a gun...
That was of course the chance to test the new aiming-system. Because
they finally dropped the idea of holding R1 to tab the square button,
didn't they?
The change isn't that big actually. R1 does now lock your view on the
lost baddie. That means you will still press that shoulder-button if
you are shooting around. But this time you don't necessarily have to.
And if you do, you have the extra advantage of being able to strafe
around your enemy.
Combine this with the possibility to slide towards the badguy, using
the circle button (if you hit him he flies up in the air) or making a
John Woo-like jump while shooting and circling around.
Now you have combat that is simple to perform and feel very powerful.
Also on this point Tomb Raider is hugely modernised and much more fun
then before.
The environments where I was rushing trough were remarkably changing. I
saw traditional tombs, temples and ruins. But modern settings like
enormous skyscrapers and in Tokyo and a factory in Russia gave a whole
other feeling.
The traps and spikes deliver obstacles in the temples and in the
Russian factory I had smoking tubes and steamy pipes I had to jump and
roll over. Again totally different was the Western-like goldmine
village in the background of something that looked most like the Rocky
Mountains. Here it looked more like a free roaming element had made his
debut in Tomb Raider. Lara could talk with bystanders and other
NPC's. A little sniff of GTA perhaps, or am I getting too euphoric
now?
The next moment Lara found herself in a moving train with on both sides
impressing mountains. Much more then Lara walking around in an empty
train I didn't see. But my imagination took me far away; will this be
the Wild West shootout in a moving train? Are we climbing on the roof?
Are we jumping and climbing from carriage to carriage? Is the train
about to derail and do we have to race to the front carriage to pull
the brake? Or maybe the train is just a moment of rest to take a
breather and chat with the other passengers? Wild guessing is always
fun.
Speaking of vehicles, Lara will at least have a very fast motorbike.
She lies completely flat on it while making her way past obstacles,
bridges and piled up boxes.
While driving, Lara can take out her guns and shoot. This suggests that
we will see a combination of race and shooting elements in the final
game.
The hand-to-hand combat from Angel of Darkness is dropped. In Legend,
Lara will have her famous twin pistols again, plus machineguns and
rocket launcher.
Also here the animations of the shooting and reloading looked superbly.
Four articles appeared on LCO. Here's the first one:
Preview of Tomb Raider Legend
>From Dutch gaming magazine 'Power Unlimited'
Text by Niels Roodenburg and Jan Meyroos
Translated by Kramer
The last Tomb Raider game, Angel of Darkness, did spoil the reputation
of the once so successful gameseries. However, with a new developer at
the helm and the promise to return to the roots of the series, Jan and
Niels began with a positive presentiment on their review of Tomb Raider
Legend.
There I stood, on a Tuesday in July, playing the role of girl with guts
Lara Croft, in the middle of a jungle and that while I actually was
sitting casually in a chair in front of the television.
The warm light fell through the foliage on 'my' tight skin and I
saw wild flowers and long grass wherever I looked. A promising
soundtrack was preparing me for what would lie ahead.
In 99% of the cases, an Eidos-employee would now have taken the
controller from me to make Lara run down the path towards the cliff.
But then I would have seen only a glimpse of the well grown
environment, the little birds flying about, the smart lightning, the
eye-catching glow-effects, the stairs chiselled out in stone, the
blurred background and somewhere far away an enormous waterfall with
fitting rainbow.
Fortunately the guy of Eidos next to me gave me all opportunity to
admire all the aspects of the demo. So instead of a rushed peek of the
environment I took my time to examine everything carefully. I turned
the camera around Lara and began to investigate her new looks.
Here I noticed that the perfect looking Lara who was winking to me on
the titlescreen is identical to the figure that is running through the
game.
After a moment of staying put, Lara started to look around and
stretched out what made her breasts to wiggle a bit.
Those new breasts, a lot has been written about that already. And most
of the time about the fact that they are a bit smaller now. I can
assure you though that there's nothing wrong with them. Or as Jan put
it: "A C cup with a push-up bra, and nice and round also!"
Now I had hesitated enough and dove off the cliff and climbed ashore in
a new area where the first environmental puzzle was waiting for me.
A dramatically turning camera gave me a subtle hint on how to solve
this problem. Climbing was allowed already, some rocks took me high
enough to reach a dangling rope. After I jumped with the X button on my
controller I automatically grabbed and hanged on the edge of the rock
above me. Holding the button longer resulted in a well balanced
handstand and an elegant flip.
It may sound a bit ordinary but the difference with the previous Tomb
Raider games is huge. In 2003 we were already playing Prince of Persia
as fluent as a ballet dancer, but in Angel of Darkness we, as a figure
of speech, still needed to hold two buttons, steer upwards and press a
third button to perform a jump. That's old fashioned and way to
mechanic to make any fluent gameplay possible, especially if you are
used to better controls.
For Legend the controls have been changed hugely. Accordingly the
feeling of the game is much more natural. However, in this demo some
analogue movements seemed still a bit rusty and the timing for some
jumps could be too precise. But the direction the developers have
chosen is very promising for the final game.
Well, I was still hanging there on that rope and made swing right into
a strange looking rock. The whole thing started to turn. I had put an
imposing mechanism into process. The music began to play louder, chains
moved, wheels were turning, shapes and figures shove in and out. The
splashing water of the waterfall spread and revealed an ancient temple.
The first shock came in the deep in the dungeons of the temple. I was
just admiring the details of the decorations and vegetation on the
walls, the special atmosphere (things like light-effects with twirling
pieces of dust) and for example the fact that Lara is actually looking
at every object or interesting view she is passing. (We saw that before
in 'Grim Fandango' and 'Zelda: The Wind Waker')
What the shock was about? In that ancient network of corridors I met a
gentleman. A gentleman with a gun...
That was of course the chance to test the new aiming-system. Because
they finally dropped the idea of holding R1 to tab the square button,
didn't they?
The change isn't that big actually. R1 does now lock your view on the
lost baddie. That means you will still press that shoulder-button if
you are shooting around. But this time you don't necessarily have to.
And if you do, you have the extra advantage of being able to strafe
around your enemy.
Combine this with the possibility to slide towards the badguy, using
the circle button (if you hit him he flies up in the air) or making a
John Woo-like jump while shooting and circling around.
Now you have combat that is simple to perform and feel very powerful.
Also on this point Tomb Raider is hugely modernised and much more fun
then before.
The environments where I was rushing trough were remarkably changing. I
saw traditional tombs, temples and ruins. But modern settings like
enormous skyscrapers and in Tokyo and a factory in Russia gave a whole
other feeling.
The traps and spikes deliver obstacles in the temples and in the
Russian factory I had smoking tubes and steamy pipes I had to jump and
roll over. Again totally different was the Western-like goldmine
village in the background of something that looked most like the Rocky
Mountains. Here it looked more like a free roaming element had made his
debut in Tomb Raider. Lara could talk with bystanders and other
NPC's. A little sniff of GTA perhaps, or am I getting too euphoric
now?
The next moment Lara found herself in a moving train with on both sides
impressing mountains. Much more then Lara walking around in an empty
train I didn't see. But my imagination took me far away; will this be
the Wild West shootout in a moving train? Are we climbing on the roof?
Are we jumping and climbing from carriage to carriage? Is the train
about to derail and do we have to race to the front carriage to pull
the brake? Or maybe the train is just a moment of rest to take a
breather and chat with the other passengers? Wild guessing is always
fun.
Speaking of vehicles, Lara will at least have a very fast motorbike.
She lies completely flat on it while making her way past obstacles,
bridges and piled up boxes.
While driving, Lara can take out her guns and shoot. This suggests that
we will see a combination of race and shooting elements in the final
game.
The hand-to-hand combat from Angel of Darkness is dropped. In Legend,
Lara will have her famous twin pistols again, plus machineguns and
rocket launcher.
Also here the animations of the shooting and reloading looked superbly.
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