Others say...

"Might have been good..."
Tomb Raider: Anniversary is a remake of a classic game. I suppose for fans of that classic game, it might be a great deal of fun seeing it with updated graphics and a new engine. However, if you're not a TR fan and are coming at this cold, you might want to try something else.

I haven't played the original Tomb Raider, but I have previously played III and Last Revelation. I didn't particularly enjoy either of them (in fact, the latter bored me so greatly I hardly got past the 3rd level), but the premise was interesting at least in theory. When I saw Anniversary (and perhaps more importantly, saw its price), I decided to give the series one more chance. After all, I'd heard from a lot of fans that the original was the best one by far. This has certainly been true of a lot of other game franchises, so I figured what the heck...

The game engine and graphics are both well done. Detail is excellent, and Lara Croft's character model is one of the better ones I've seen in any game. The areas look like real- albeit somewhat fantastic- ruins, and enemies look commendably intimidating. You can perform a wide range of stunts, as is to be expected from previous games in the series, and many of these will really have you watching with bated breath. One word of warning- if you're scared of heights, this game might not be your cup of tea.

The game is largely puzzle based, though it's interspersed with action sequences. Occasional cutscenes have some interactivity, but usually nothing more taxing than simple directional keypresses. For the most part, you'll be jumping off ledges, grabbing conveniently-placed handholds, and swinging from ropes or equally conveniently-placed monkey bars. There is a free targeting mode, but it's rarely useful for anything. If Lara sees a point of interest, a '!' symbol pops up over it. You can interact with simple objects, pull levers, and pick up ammo or weapons. Aside from that, there's not a whole lot of complexity to the game.

Where TR: Revelation fails- and badly- is in the control scheme. I'm running it on a Windows PC, and it's patently obvious that the controls were designed for a gamepad. Many of the combinations you have to perform are extremely unwieldy using a keyboard and mouse, and the mouse in general is underutilized. For example, locking on enemy targets requires you to face in that direction. You lock on with the right mouse button and fire with the left. However, when maneuvering you'll find you occasionally lose lock for no apparent reason. You then have to reorient on the enemy with WASD, lock back on, and get back to business. Additionally, the game necessitates keymashing to recover from certain conditions, such as mashing the left/right keys to get out of a grab. If you shoot enemies enough, they will perform a charge maneuver. In this case, time briefly slows (a la Matrix or Max Payne, though a bit less pronounced) and you can perform an 'adrenaline dodge' by locking on and rolling left or right at the appropriate instant. If you succeed in doing this, you can perform a head shot by timing clicks, and this will either instantly kill or badly damage the enemy.

This sounds like a cool feature, but it is badly, badly broken. I have played this game for several days now, have had countless opportunities to perform an adrenaline dodge, and have only been able to do it about 5 times. By this I mean just the dodge, not the headshot follow-up. It really is nearly impossible to pull off, and what's more is that you need to do it to kill bosses. Bosses are literally impossible to kill without this move, which is a horrible design decision on Crystal Dynamic's part. It turns a badly implemented feature into a blocker, and that's unfortunately as far as many people will get. Once again, I'm sure this is easier to do with a gamepad (and have read as much on various guides and forums) but it is insanely difficult to pull off on a keyboard. Keep in mind, this is coming from a veteran FPS player- I have better than average reflexes for a PC gamer, and I still can't reliably pull this move off. Ironically, I'm actually wishing my PC was a lot slower, since that might assist in getting the timing down.

The second major issue with this game, as with all other Tomb Raider games, is that you'll frequently encounter puzzles that make little or no sense, or offer very little in the way of clues. If you're not the type that likes to spend very long periods of time backtracking and looking around, you might end up frustrated very quickly. Additionally, the camera is strangely limited in sweep and angle, and you have very little control over it. This can make it quite difficult to reach certain areas, especially if you aren't good at remembering a room's layout. This is rather inexplicable, since mouse movement is essentially redundant. Why not map that to a free camera view?

The bottom line is that Tomb Raider: Anniversary is a nice looking PC game with a console control scheme. I've seen other console games ported to the PC, such as Demon Stone, and those suffer from the same issues. The big problem with this game is that it requires the player to do things that require very rapid or perfectly timed key combinations. It would be OK if this was optional to progress in the game, but it isn't. From what I understand, this wasn't the case in the original. Perhaps they should have stuck to that?

Due to its low cost and updated graphics, fans of the original or other series titles might like Anniversary. If you didn't like the previous games, this one most likely won't change your opinion. As for me, Anniversary has convinced me that Tomb Raider just isn't my sort of game.

"Save your money!"
I was expecting great things for this game since Crystal Dynamics was the developer for this game and was responsible for the great Tomb Raider Legend that I really liked. I played and enjoyed the game up until the Centaur boss level and after spending several days trying to figure out the move combo that would get rid of them, I gave up, and uninstalled the game. A few weeks later I reinstalled it, started at the beginning, and played right up to same level only to be frustrated again. I've played many a game recently, including Quake 4, Prey, Half Life 2, Half Life 2 Episode 1, Brothers in Arms-Road to Hill 30, and the great Tomb Raider Legend; all were fun and had frustrating moments as most games do, but those moments were eventually overcome, without the help of cheats or downloaded save games, and you continued on with the game. Not with this one though. I hear Crystal Dynamics has another Tomb Raider in the works. I hope they go back to Tomb Raider Legend for inspiration and dump whatever they did wrong with this one.

"Laura Croft fall down"
Too many tricks to figure out the game. The author needed to put in a save game button. The author will save the game but where he wants to save the game. Every new site requires a different trick to escape. You need help to complete this game the author gives no clues.

"Good, but not Great"
Anniversary is a good game, but not as good as Tomb Raider Legend. The controls are more difficult then Legend which made the game a bit more challenging and confusing. I couldn't remember how to crouch, or drop to a lower ledge, etc. I have only been involved in one major battle- with the T-Rex. I tried many times to kill it but I just couldn't, I downloaded game saves to get me past. With that said, I'm not looking forward to encountering more big battles. Another thing that made the game challenging was that the levels I've been through are set in dark areas, I often got confused where to go and the darkness didn't help. I needed a walkthrough to help me complete what I've done so far. My last complaint- Wolves and dinosaurs would just run towards you unexpectedly, like they came out of nowhere, they were also somewhat challenging to kill. For the positives- great graphics, huge areas to explore and climb, puzzles to solve. Overall a good adventure game, but I found it to be a bit hard.

"Lara Croft proves she still has it...and More! "
Less talk and more play! Tomb Raider: Anniversary puts the "Tomb" in "Tomb Raider." Even though Lara's looks may have changed a little bit, expect the controls to be the same as in Legend. But Lara has a few new tricks up her sleeve.
I must admit I was really skeptical of Anniversary only because it was using an improved version of Legend's engine. Don't expect this game to be like Legend! Although there are a variety of similarities with the original, I was reminded of elements from all the Tomb Raider games, plus things that Tomb Raider has never before introduced.
Locations: Peru, Greece, Egypt, the Lost Island and the Croft Manor. The graphics really make the settings come to life. They were all very impressive and beautiful. Even though Anniversary follows Tomb Raider I, I was reminded of the Tomb of Ancients in AOD, the sands of Egypt in Revelation, and more. The Croft Manor is back and still as lavish as ever. The layout of the mansion is virtually the same as with the manor in Legend, but expect more (i.e. you get to go outside).
Characters: Besides Ms. Lara Croft, the rest of the characters are forgettable. You will get so caught up in the objectives that you'll more than likely forget about Larson, Pierre and the others. This is due to less character-to-character interaction which took up a lot of time in previous games such as AOD and Legend.
Enemies: The enemies in Anniversary are extraordinary with graphics that surpass Legend by a long shot. The enemies are animals which always seemed more sensible to me than killing humans. Expect to see a variety of animals, big and small, hard to kill and not so hard to kill, but somehow still very easy to kill.
Combat/Inventory: The introduction of few new maneuvers includes Adrenaline Dodge (which I must admit was a little hard to get use to) as well as Wall Running, Perching, and more. The weapons are nothing new, dual Pistols with unlimited ammo, a Shotgun, dual .50 Caliber Pistols and Mini SMGs (does this sort of remind you of the arsenal of weapons Lara had in The Lost Artifact?)
I received the Collectors Edition which includes close to an hour worth of footage including the origin or Lara, galleries, soundtrack and more. It is really an interesting video to watch if you've been an avid TR gamer and I would recommend to any TR fan.
There are so many new things to talk about with Anniversary, but you'll just have to play for yourself to uncover them all! If you've followed Lara on her adventures over the last ten years, you will not be disappointed. This is what Tomb Raider is all about! It cries, "More, More, and More"