As you might remember from my review of The Last Revelation, I
had never played a Tomb Raider game until a few months ago. After thoroughly
enjoying the most recent game in the series, I decided that the rest of the games
deserved a look as well, and besides, there just aren’t very few good games on
the Playstation left that I haven’t played. Even though this game was released
four years ago, it is plain to see why this game got so much attention when it
was released–I had no idea what I was missing. Yes, this game has some flaws
in graphical presentation, simply because this sort of thing had never been done
before, but it more than makes up for it in gameplay.

What’s Going on
Here?

Our heroine, Lara Croft, begins her adventure when a mysterious
business woman, Jacqueline Natla, contacts her with respect to an unusual artifact,
the Atlantean Scion. After a brief monetary discussion, Lara is on her way to
the tomb of Qualopec in Peru to retrieve it. Soon Lara discovers that there are
three separate pieces of the Scion, and she must travel through Europe, Egypt,
and finally Atlantis to reach her final goal.

I’m convinced that people
don’t play Tomb Raider games for the plots, because there’s only so many
variations on “Evil person needs something to rule the world. Hires someone
to get it for him. The assistant realizes, almost too late, the consequences of
his actions and must stop the evil person’s plans.” There are very few plot
twists, and to be honest, I pretty much ignored the plot since I was having far
too much fun simply exploring the many locations in the game. The plot does tie
the game together, so creativity aside, the story is satisfactory.

Overall
Plot Grade: B

How Did it Look?

As far as the game’s graphics
are concerned, there’s definitely a dated engine driving the first Tomb Raider.
The position of the camera behind Lara is automatic, so there are inevitably
some scenes when the camera’s view of the action is blocked completely by some
object or wall in the current room. Movable blocks seemed to have hollow “cells”
on their edges and corners, with flickering a regular occurrence. (I played the
Playstation version of the game, so these problems might not be as prominent in
the other platform releases.) As far as Lara goes, she appears to be more sharp
than curved, with minimal polygons representing her features.

These minor
faults, however, should not be held against the game. Tomb Raider was one
of the first third-person action/adventures, and considering that, Core did a
great job. Lara’s actions are extremely well-modeled, and even with a small number
of polygons, all of her motions look perfectly natural. In fact, all of the animation
in the game is very well-done. The attempts to visualize water and fire in the
game work, although they are a little bit primitive.

The in-game movies
are very well-done, with seemingly better quality than those included in The
Last Revelation. Yes, the characters move stiffly, and there’s not very much
detail, but the movies serve their purpose in telling us the story while looking
very slick.

Overall Graphics Grade: B

How Did it Sound?

I
was surprised by the lack of music in Tomb Raider. There are only occasional
snippets of music, which either serve to warn you of some monsters ahead or reward
you for reaching a new area of the game. Both of these work very well–there’s
nothing like walking through a small passage into a gigantic room filled with
wondrous architectural structures, with a groundswell of music urging you to explore.
Other than these tonal moments, playing Tomb Raider is a very quiet experience.
The sounds that the various monsters make are somewhat unrecognizable (instead
of hearing a sound and saying “there’s a lion up ahead,” you will instead
hear the sound, see the creature, and say, “if I ever hear that again, don’t
forget that there’s a lion around”), and your weapons don’t sound very realistic.

Although it’s above average, the voice acting could still have been much
better. I know there are good actors out there who would kill to have a part in
one of these games, so why can’t the developers find them? Perhaps it’s a social
stigma, or perhaps the actors are simply not paid enough … I know it’s possible
to have great voice acting (see Fear Effect or System Shock 2),
so the only real conclusion that I can draw is that if the voice acting isn’t
up to par, what other corners were cut in the development of the game?

Overall
Sound Grade: B

Was it Fun?

This is where Tomb Raider
shines. Little did I realize when I put the game into my Playstation that
I would not take it out for over a month. I spent hours and hours playing it with
the following conclusion–this is a true classic. Tomb Raider has more “game”
packed into a single CD than many other games with multiple discs. The different
areas are simply gigantic. Like the other Tomb Raiders, the game is divided
up into different areas, and these areas are subdivided into levels. These levels
start out pretty easy at the beginning but soon advance to the point where they
take a full hour or two to finish, without getting boring or repetitive. The goals
of each level are fairly consistent–find a particular object/key, figure out
how to reach a remote area, or escape with your ponytail intact. There’s such
a large number of variations on this theme that the developers have since made
three sequels, so this game is just the tip of the iceberg as far as potential.

No
matter how good the game’s concept is, it will always fail unless the controls
are easy enough to learn and use. Tomb Raider has probably the most intuitive
interface I’ve even used–granted, I used a Playstation controller, which is specifically
designed for games like this, but I found it so simple to move Lara around in
the game that after the initial training levels I was able to explore without
giving a second thought as to which button to push. Given the wide range of actions
that Lara is capable of (running around corners, grabbing narrow ledges while
jumping, jumping to the side to avoid boulders, etc.), this is a significant accomplishment
on the part of Core and should be applauded.

(Although it’s not documented,
I found an interesting move while playing the game that was very interesting.
While holding the “walk” button, I jumped up and grabbed a ledge, then
pushed up to pull myself up to the new level. Instead of the normal animation,
a strange flipping handstand took place that was very graceful and neat to watch.
If you get the chance, try it out!)

Overall Gameplay Grade: A+

When
it was released, Tomb Raider broke new ground in the third-person arena,
and it continues to do so today. If puzzles and exploration are up your alley,
I strongly recommend that you go out and get this game as soon as you can (although
I think I was the last person left on the face of the earth who hadn’t already
played this game). As far as “game for the dollar” goes, Tomb Raider
is tops.

Final Grade: A