Rise of the Tomb Raider Critique 

I love that quote. "Gameplay is king, but story is queen and her throne is right next to his."

Your "fix" is not a fix. Its a different game. One that i actually want to play.

Why didn't Lara take a camera with her to record all the super natural shit she encounters to prove her father was right? Wouldn't that make sense and make the game better for it?

Without fail, there are either things I forget to talk about or cut so the video doesn't end up two hours long: The knife and rebreather upgrades feel like padding--to give the player the illusion of progress. The knife shouldn't be necessary when Lara uses arrows for much more difficult tasks before getting it. The rebreather flat-out shouldn't work. Lara's lung capacity is apparently at the level of a 70 year-old chain smoker when it comes to swimming early in the game--until the ice river sequence when it's magically extended for only that part. If this had been increased, an upgrade could have been given that doubled this new acceptable length and still allow the gating of areas with longer diving sections. On the flip side, I like how Lara's equipment changes to reflect these upgrades. Her quiver gets bigger--the arrows bounce in it too which I thought was neat. When she gets the bow shooting skill upgrade she'll hold another arrow at the ready. All these little details are really good. I didn't speak much about level design. I think it's worthy of some praise--especially the larger areas. Having multiple paths around is fun. I think this could be taken further in the next game with unlocking more permanent routes over maps that you return to. This sort of thing could work well in larger dungeons. Surprisingly, I think the open-world-lite that the series has could take some lessons from Dark Souls of all things. I looked up the voice actress for Lara: Camilla Luddington. Fantastic job and someone who ISN'T Jennifer Hale no less, so I hope she does more work in other games. Charles Halford was great as Konstantin too, even if the character himself was lackluster. Lara really needs to stop saying "bastard" so much. The journal entries about hunting in the Geothermal Valley were good. The ones left by the assassin in the final sunken city section were fantastic--they made sense too, since he's leaving behind help for any who end up stuck like him, and he has downtime while recovering from his injuries.

After you complete the game you suddenly have all of Lara's therapy sessions.... for some reason. Turns out the therapist was on Trinity's payroll and Ana was using him to manipulate Lara. Also, Lara was told that Sam doesn't want to see her from her doctors. Sounds to me like they're on the payroll too. Again important plot points that are in audio logs, but even worse it happens AFTER THE GAME. And you have no notification that you have them, I just happened to stumble upon them.

I hate how the tomb raiding parts are optional while the action parts are mandatory. they basically switched the formula. should be called "action lady" not tomb raider !

Am I the only one who thinks it would have made more sense to have water based gameplay in the first game because it's on an island and fire based gameplay because it's in snowy mountains?

Honestly having worked on some games the main problem is the designers don't get these desicions. They are dictated from publishers, who often give gameplay directives that have no relation to the project due to popular trends. That's why a ton of features these days often seem shoe horned or forced, because, well they were.

Are you planning on playing/making videos on Shadow of the Tomb Raider? I feel like everyone forgot about it since it came out around the same time as critical darlings Spider-Man and RDR 2, and critical shitstorm Fallout 76. It’d also be nice to have a trilogy of videos from you about the trilogy lol

Really fantastic stuff. No idea how you have so much high-quality content coming out so fast but it's truly impressive. Can't wait to see what's next.

lol "arts and crofts"

"Gameplay is King, but Story is Queen" - coolest and truest comment I've ever heard to be said about games.

38:19 Can't believe Joseph predicted Shadow of the Tomb Raider's story.

"Are you interested in a deep, compelling narrative, with many twists, and a plot that keeps you guessing until the end? If so, then you should avoid this game like the plague, because it has none of that." Instant thumbs up. Just hearing that was extremely cathartic given how utterly awful the story to this game was. I mean, I get it, it's Tomb Raider, it's not meant to be some philosophical masterpiece, but it was still pretty bad.

Hearing you talk about the way the story of the game should've gone sounds like they really took your criticism seriously and incorporated it into Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Do a Critique of that game.

This was fantastic. Man even though I still love this game, I wish we got your version of the story instead of this. Great job dude.

I hated the pseudo choice after Constantine boss fight, I mean is there anybody who spared him? I killed thousand of people at this point and I'm supposed to not kill the main guy who antagonized me because "he's not worth it? "

I loved the first 30mins of this game, where you explore that Tomb in Syria. It felt like classic Tomb Raider and had a nice focus on puzzles and the lore of the tomb, with the improvements that were present in the last game. Imagine my disappointment then, when after beating that section, the game became yet another survival collectathon on yet another snowy mountain top. Having gotten really bored of the last Tomb Raider for this, I played another 30 mins before selling the game, not wanting to waste my time again.

Can we do a reboot of the reboot with you writing the story first and basing the gameplay around it? All of you're recommendations sounded a thousand times better than what the game ended up being.

"Gameplay is king, but Story is queen, and her throne is right next to his." This quote was the final push that convinced me to subscribe.

I'm surprised you didn't include my favorite scene in the game, during the nonsensical interrogation. When Jonah breaks free and grabs Konstantin's gun, Lara slams into the glass between them at max speed to shout "DO IT!" These two words are all it took for me to immediately love reboot Lara, a protagonist who has completely come to terms with the idea that killing people in self-defense is perfectly fine and that if you get the chance, you absolutely shouldn't take mercy on them.

I love it when a person can back their critiques by giving possible solutions to the problems and offering ideas of ways things could have been done better. As a whole I haven't felt that interested in the new tomb raider series, even though I absolutely love Uncharted but I think the reason for that is, Uncharted has much better written characters imo. Also I think Uncharted is able to get away with its unbelievable set pieces because Drake recognizes the insanity of his predicaments. I think the new Tomb Raider tries to be more grounded and as a whole more serious but I find the dumb actions of its characters and its insane set pieces to break any consistency in the tone. I think if these games focused more on exploring tombs and made exploration the main staple of the series, I would like the games better. The introduction of an evil faction really doesn't interest me, and neither does the large emphasis on combat.

The new dlc 20 year celebration with two hours of exploring croft manor, a dlc where your hunted by zombies in her nightmare. If you own the season pass you get this for free and all retro outfits and weapons. I think this makes the season pass worth it

I *love* your idea for the story alot more than what was actually there

Really hope you do Shadow of the Tomb Raider one day. Would love to hear your thoughts on it.

Something about the new Tomb Raider games bugs me on a principle level, and it's that they're really not Tomb Raider games. They're Uncharted games, instead. Lara Croft herself is my biggest beef, especially the way she's being advertised. I always get the feeling that the publishers want to beat it into our heads that this is a "better," more "mature" depiction of Lara Croft because... Well, because she gets beaten, stabbed, shot, burned and nearly raped, judging by the promotional material for the first game, but let's go with "because she's not sexualised." While that's true, she's also missing a huge chunk of her character, as well. Maybe not from the old-old Tomb Raider games, but certainly as compared with Tomb Raider: Legend. See, I like Lara in Legend. She's most definitely the master of her own estate, in charge of a team of specialists that she employs. She's provably badass, exceptionally knowledgeable and genuinely charming, equally at home wearing combat boots as wearing high heels. More than anything else, Tomb Raider Legend gives us Lara Croft as a grown woman, accomplished and capable. A Japanese Yakuza mobster has a piece she needs? Not a problem! Not only does she know the man already, she also has friends in places high enough to get a shot at him. An artefact she needs is in a far-off country lost to difficult terrain? No problem - Lady Croft has the resources to get herself there. Tomb Raider: Legend was itself a reboot of the Tomb Raider franchise, though sadly the followups of Anniversary and especially Underworld were... Not as good, let's say. And yet this re-reboot decided to go for an origin story, thus falling into what I like to call "an obsession with origin stories." I first noticed this trend with the Lone Ranger - a movie that's 90% content nobody asked for only to show us the actual Lone Ranger for a few minutes at the end and essentially sequel-bait. Rise of the Tomb Raider is the same, giving me a character I can't recognise as Lara Croft far too early in her life to be truly compelling... And doesn't even go as far as giving me the badass, confident character I was looking for. You'd think that's what the sequel would be about, but instead it's just more of the same damp, dreary narrative with Lara Croft kinda' sorta' seeming to have come into her own by the end. I'm sure whatever sequel Crystal Dynamics come up with if indeed there is one will similarly fail to give us a complete person until the very end, at which point we'll wrap up the story in wait for the next reboot. I'm really sick of this obsession with origin stories. I'm tired joining characters so early in their career that they fail to be recognisable or indeed even all that interesting, only to pretend to actually save that for the sequel. What's wrong with 90s approach to giving us fully-developed, fully-fleshed-out characters to play around with? Why must every story be about "coming of age" more or less? Why must they all feature what are - for all intents and purposes - wide-eyed kids learning about the harsh world for the first time? What, indeed, was wrong with Lara Croft as an adult, an accomplished archeologist and adventurer and a woman with a lifetime's worth of experiences behind her? Or, to spin this the other way, why even use the Tomb Raider license in the first place when the resultant games will be all but completely unrecognisable as Tomb Raider games in plot, setting, characters or gameplay? There's nothing fundamentally wrong with the new Tomb Raider series (aside from failing to interest me in the slightest, but that's subjective), but there's equally nothing "Tomb Raider" about it. Why bother call it that, aside from disconnected brand recognition? It'd be like me creating a reboot of Soul Reaver and setting it in modern times because I don't own the Vampire: The Masquerade license.

I'm loving your game commentaries. Glad I found them. I've watched a couple of them now. Very professional, well written, interesting view points. Good stuff. also, great suggestion for a "Blood Dragon" type of experimental pure tomb game. I've been playing this series since the first one came out and I really loved the TOMBS. I get they have to compete these days but yeah, more tombs, please.

As always, absolutely amazing video: I never knew anything about any Tomb Rider's story, and the fix you applied convinced me immediately. The fact that you are a writer makes incredible sense, considering the way you look at things and the past work of yours I've experienced. Your consideration "Gameplay is King, but Story is Queen, and her trone is right next to his" is something unfortunately really hard to implement in the industry's mindset, I feel, but a sentence I will take with me in the future, and quote quite copiously :).

The audio is fine but I gotta say. I'm still loving this series. Keep em coming!

As a native Bulgarian speaker, i can assure you: That is exactly how you pronounce "Baba Yaga". You are not pronouncing it wrong :)

Hey Joseph. I accidentally stumbled over your video on The Witness earlier today and absolutely loved your analysis of it. I almost never play video games (with the exception of the first three Tomb Raider games for nostalgic reasons, which funnily enough you disliked, and some occasional platformers), but your videos about them are so interesting and well-made (and with lots of well-timed humour) that I've been watching them non-stop since. Love your channel! :)

i've watched like 3 of your super long vids and havn't felt bored on any! i love your input!

I just finished Rise a few hours ago and instantly came here when I had the chance to hear what your thoughts were, and I think I agree 100% with everything you said. This game had so much potential - I really enjoyed the exploration, tombs and animal fights, and the combat/stealth was mostly pretty good, but they all fail to come together really well, or develop much further. The tombs always ended once they got interesting, and the exploration ended up resulting in lots of slow climbing under a limited, pre-determined pathway. It's made me realise how much I love the way Breath of the Wild used similar concepts to these. Optional tombs (shrines), climbing (completely open-ended in Zelda), survival elements, wild animals, etc. Breath of the Wild really made me feel like an explorer, a survivor, a puzzle-solver (even though I agree lots of the shrines are pretty weak), but Rise of the Tomb Raider just left me feeling a little empty, and wanting more. Like, you get an ability for the arrows where you can shoot them into walls and trees and climb on them! That should be a super fun, multi-purpose ability. Same with the grapple hook/wire thing. I should be able to scale any wall, take shortcuts, maybe even sequence-break like a Metroidvania, but I can't. It's an automated rope swing and a sometimes-useful ledge grabber, and that's it. Such a shame. I really, really hope the series gets more complex and less hand-holdy as time goes on. Make it more like Zelda or Metroid, and I think dropping the gritty realism might help a little if we're supposed to believe all of the set-pieces and supernatural elements. I'd personally love to see dinosaurs come back, with Lara being stuck on a tropical island and surviving against them. That's a dream come true, for me. Anyway, great stuff as always, Joe. Glad to be a subscriber and Patron.

I just don't understand why it has to be such a serious, sad story. Why can't Lara just go and look for treasure because she can and wants to?

I loved that you pointed out the opportunity to learn the environment before attacking enemies because when i played the game the first time i felt the exact same and i was so pissed when i never had that chance again!

"Corporate culture simply doesn't make masterpieces. We've learned that over and over again in the movie industry, why should we expect games to be any different? What we need is a culture shift where a game can be one man's project. Hollywood occasionally makes good movies because they follow the auteur theory - i.e. that the director is an artist and the picture is his art (as opposed to the director just being a hireling of the studio exec who greenlit the project). He gets a producer to supervise him, and writers and artists to work with, but overall (for good directors) the final decisions are left to him. Whereas in the vidya industry the people actually making the game don't have anywhere near as much power."

What recording software do you use? I'm thinking about doing an indepth review of Diablo 3 for my channel, but I can't find a good one to work...at all, like not even with that game, just work. XD

Your analyses are fantastic. I haven't even played any of the games you review, but still love them :)

Found your channel off the Witcher video which I am eagerly looking forward to parts 2 and 3. I am also very curious as to what you thought about Shadow of the Tomb Raider. I think it improves on some of the things you touch on but then fails at others, curious to see your thoughts and your critique on it.

I also found the beginning snow area where you hunt the soldiers extremely fun as well. I was severally disappointed that the rest of the game never capitalized on that at all.

22:20 - "Imagine if a racing game paused for a few seconds and took control away from you every time you took a corner." Well... This *kinda* sounds like the upcoming Need For Speed. At least how they showed it during E3. Assuming it still counts as a racing game.

The longer I'm thinking about it, the more I'm aware that (no offense) a random guy in the internet has a better grasp about story-telling than entire department full of people who are literally in story-telling business for their lives. And all the idiocity of the "plot" surfaces with double power, because it's the classic case of too many elements for the sake of the elements themselves, and not telling the story. I wish the game was how you describe the fix for it. It would FINALLY allow the franchise to get back on track and the next game finally being a "proper" Tomb Raider in the sense of having all the elements of the older takes on Lara, while in the same time having own identity. Sort like it's done in American comics book industry, where you have different itterations of the same character, all similar, but all with different background and different quirks of their personality. Instead, the game is just another part of a soul-less reboot that exists solely because the copyrights for the franchise switched hands and the new publisher decided to make a reboot, throwing in all the popular-at-the-moment elements and planning to make not just an origin story game, but stretching it up to 3 games. What for? And why really bother with pretending it has anything to do with Tomb Raider in anything else than the title? I remember when a decade ago I had nothing but contempt toward Legend, the first reboot of the franchise. But over time I've realised where the company was going, what was the general idea for the franchise and so on. It was clear there is a direction in all of this and people who are making the game care about something else than just using the title they've inherited for money-making (even if that's still their main, secondary and tertiary motivation). Now I've just see a game that exists solely to "look good" - with non-existing story (marketed in the same time as deep, engaging and taking itself extremely serious, which in my book isn't good for what is a pulp adventure series), barely any other gameplay than killing things and so heavily scripted at times it just feels like playing interactive movie and not a proper game. This game had a potential to change that. Instead it's more of the things from the first, but with slightly better graphics and even more nonsensical story that is even more serious than the previous one. What for? I understand the concept of making Lara compex character, but there is a massive dissonance between where the game wants to go with the story and what is actually happening in the plot. Lara comes out as flat and extremely one-dimensional in the process and the entire story makes less sense than TR2, THE most cheesy entry into the series.

I enjoyed the story section of this video very much! Learning about the complexities of video game writing is interesting.

Skill Up mentioned your channel, it is now one of my favorites. Great work.

I was hoping he'd do a full review including how comfortable his chair was

I bought the game with all of it's DLC for around $5...

I love quite a few of your critiques and having just finished the Tomb Raider Trilogy this morning, I came back to rewatch them again. I was wondering do you have any plans to do a critique on Shadow of the Tomb Raider as well? I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it either way.

The amount of effort you put into these critiques is incredible. Thank you so much.

Just finished it yesterday and completely agree. I do really love Lara's character, especially the way her moral compass 'grows' or is revealed throughout the game. There is one moment where Konstantin taunts you before he dies and you can walk towards him. I don't know what happens if you do but I walked away and it was a choice in a game that I really liked. I prefer choices like that to dialogue choices in games. There is something more impactful about it. P.s. How did the divine source get destroyed so easily? How did she know that would work. That was pretty weird. You'd think something so important and responsible for so many lives is destroyed like a peice of glass.

Story is queen... I must say, one very nice way of saying it and one I might use myself, as a game writer student.

Great job, man! Thx for your hard work & time you put into this review ;)

great critique I hope you do one for shadow of the tomb raider in the future

btw your jokes are on point lately. writing and delivery both. A++

God damn it man! They should have just copied MGS 3! Survival mechanics & Ambush combat... ffs!

I think at this point I've watched this video like at least 10 times. I love your content! I'm really bummed out that you never did a shadow of the tomb raider video. I didn't even see any thoughts of it on your twitter account. Have you played it yet? I'm really curious to hear your opinion about it!

Iv seen a couple of your videos now and i really feel the need to commend you not only for the effort put into making such detailed and in depth analysis, but for the amount of perspective it offers as a gamer. I can only say that if a lot of companies like IGN would take this approach to their reviews, that games today would be at a much higher standard and i wouldnt feel cheated out of a better experience so often. Ill get off my knees now, love the content keep up the great work.

It’s been some four and a half years, and I’m still wondering when you’ll talk about how comfortable your chair was while playing this game.

My focus with a game like this is both satisfying controls, and compelling/unique scenarios to use those in. It seems with this game even more than the first, they put a lot of effort into trying to craft a cinematic story that would sell well in commercials, and then just ended up failing and wasting all of that effort because of the various oversights you mentioned. I've not played this yet, but from the footage throughout it seemed there was very little outside of aim at the head and shoot. The swinging/platforming with slo-mo mid-air combat, and the ability to fire real-time while climbing, hanging, sliding, and ziplining, would have been great. Stealth sections where you have to plan your approach and nail your shots, otherwise you're fucked, I'd have loved that. And then more of that Dark Souls style dodge to expose a weakness mechanic that you get with the animals. I'm sure I'll enjoy plaything through it, as I did the last game, but I definitely still question many of their choices. Maybe on their 3rd attempt they'll be competent enough to allow fucking FOV adjustment.

While I admittedly have not played the game, I think this is a really good review. Btw, have you watched Mark Brown's Game Maker's Toolkit on Tomb Raider? He talks about how he thinks the climbing mechanics of at least the 2013 game have taken a step back in complexity from the original series. I was wondering about your thoughts on the subject. I know you don't want to compare the original and new games but I am still curious.

+Joseph Anderson: Seriously love your work. I've been going on a bit of a binge watching your content and find even if I intend to play a game your critique is so entertaining I rarely worry about spoilers. I had a moment of concern with this one before pressing play (haven't got around to playing it) but I was so engrossed that I couldn't care less, and this coming from someone, like you, who prefers experiencing a game with as blank a slate as possible. Interestingly enough, you're critiques have made me look at buying two games I had very little interest in, Prey - didn't know much about it, and Fallout 4 - I get put off by excessive hype pre-release (sometimes even after release) and tend to put off a purchase indefinitely until calmer minds prevail. In otherwords, thanks for such great content, keep up the good work, and I'll be looking at buying one of your books. Hopefully as good a read as your critiques.

Have you ever played the Silent Hill quadrilogy? Those probably have among the best video game stories. I think you should try them out if you haven't, I'd love to see you analyze those. I still play them to this day, and I'm studying writing at my college.

Great video, man.

I'm reminded of South Park The Stick of Truth when it comes to the audio logs. I think there's a clip that compiles them all (not even 2 min), and it's perfect.

Damn the little you said at the end on your revision of the story is such a much needed fix that the story needs...

cant help but feel they are missing a trick and not having tomb raider be about the tomb raiding .... used to love the first games for the puzzles and platforming , when u actually had to direct your jumps and leaps .

I'll just add that from what I can tell, this game screams of shifted priorities. Lots of games start with neat ideas or cool concepts, and then those don't make it. Either dev time, producers, meddling, budgets, or QA get things shafted (bioshock infinite and Assassins Creed strike me as major examples of this, but i mentioned it with Dark Souls 2's light mechanic). I'm guessing that there was supposed to be some sort of survival mode mechanic in the main game, but it got shafted.

Excellent and thorough critique as always. The big game reviewers should really learn from your videos on how to be genuinely critical without falling for hype. Out of curiosity, what are your PC specs?

14:08 I remembered this when I was playing the second section of Reaident Evil 7 (after you free yourself from the chair). I had the chance to sneak around the small area looking for ammo, a weapon or just a way out. That is until Jack shows up and you have to hide, except that you know the area and hiding spots. It got better for me when I was still looking for keys or something to get out, and someone knocks on the window, so I went to look and the story progresses. All of this felt organic and that I was making the decisions, that I was surviving the situation. That never happens again on Resident Evil 7.

"the game runs but you wish it didn't" I choked on an ice cream

About the stealth thingy, i like your idea, but as a person that likes stealth, i feel like there should be a healthy mix between the two scenarios. What i would really is more combat and stealth combined in a sequence rather than segregated, but i don't know how to make it be good so i can't really expand on it. Now asking about something totally unrelated, have you ever heard or played The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky? I feel like it is kind of the opposite of "Gameplay is King", where the narrative and specially the world building takes a huge portion of the game, to the point where even as a fanboy, i think the gameplay is average. And would love to hear your opinion about it too, specially on what you think about the story and world building. It has 7 games but only 2 are translated on steam, although there is 7 titles, the two translated were supposed to be one game(it is really old so it had limitations) so there is a beginning and an end. Sorry if it is hard to understand. If you want i could try to explain a little better.

in your improved version you could still have a few mercs sent in to retrieve the source of a new or existing character spills the info of it to the world.

After seeing so many of your analysis videos I'd love to hear some of your thoughts of a game where story is king, and not so muchgameplay. A game like Silent hill 2 for example. Or if I may be so bold - the metal gear solid series.Anyway, fantastic work, this must take you ages but these are very interesting watches. Keep up the solid work!

While I loved exploring and ogling at the game's environments, I also felt underwhelmed by the story and somewhat bored by the dialogue. None of the characters were awful, really, but most of them were forgettable. Lara's beleaguered campfire ruminations didn't surprise or illuminate either, and some of the audio files and journals were examples of lazy storytelling, as you explain here. One symptom of mediocre writing is wordiness, and there was some stuff that could have been nixed without much loss to the story. And yet, what was left out bothered me even more. The most interesting character for me, by far, was Konstantin, since we see glimpses of his love for his sister, the strength of his convictions, and his confessions that he doesn't actually enjoy being cruel, but believes his actions are necessary. (Of course, if someone wounded your hands in your sleep, I think you'd notice unless you were heavily sedated.) There's also the further complication that he has an agenda separate from the rest of Trinity, and this made me think the game could have gone in different direction with him. I also found Jacob to be a vague and disappointing figure. The entire plot seemed like a case of Black and White Morality, with the player clearly meant to be rooting for remnants, when what it really could have used was a case of Grey and Grey Morality instead. I know Trinity is supposed to be evil because we see them murder prisoners, and because their Konstantin is a ruthless sociopath, but what really makes Trinity in the wrong? Could their superior at the Vatican have knowledge of the undying army and want it contained/destroyed, not because he considers it blasphemous, but for the good of mankind? Lara herself speculates about the possibility of using the Divine Source to end suffering and death worldwide (though I wanted to ask her what made her think it could do this), and I'm not sure I understand Trinity's reasons for wanting to claim it. Do they want the same thing? What if they did? It all reminds me a bit of the morally myopic plot to Star Trek: Insurrection, in which a community on one planet holds the key to immortality and perfect health, and we're supposed to identify with them because the Federation would rather relocate them and use the planet's resources to benefit the cosmos at large. What if Jacob turned out to be evil, as suggested here, and he was secretly manipulating Lara into helping him to further his dark ends? What if the remnants turned out to be evil cultists themselves? What if Lara had convinced Konstantin of his sister's treachery and he did a Heel-Face Turn and helped her fend off the rest of Trinity? And what the heck is the Source anyway, and why didn't it affect Jacob as it did the deathless army? Or are we supposed to stayed tuned and given Square Enix our money so these questions can be answered in the next game? It also compounds the other issue I had with this game's story, and that was the obvious and overwhelming anti-religious theme of the story. It bothers me a bit that when the hero is a supposed prophet, the only people we see praying or speaking about God at all are obvious villains, and that these people are supposedly funded by the Vatican. Upon listening to every (spoken or recorded) monologue about this or that sin being justified if you're doing God's will, and exploring challenge tombs filled with the aftermath of botched exorcisms, I felt like the writers were bludgeoning me with a brick while saying, "See? Religion is dangerous because you can use it to justify atrocities!" It also bothers me that the prophet taught what is essentially an anti-prophecy about the unknowable nature of the divine. It's like Rhianna Pratchett's version of Thus Spake Zarathustra. I suppose you could argue that the remnants represent the "good" aspects of religion, but the teachings of the immortal prophet appear to be secular humanism, agnosticism, or perhaps deism. They don't speak much about god at all, there is no place of worship that I could identify in their camp at the geothermal valley, and no one is named Jacob's spiritual successor. Granted, Jacob utters a rather psalm-like prayer when he heals Jonah, but it seems to be undermined by his admission to Lara in the same scene that the source is not divine. The prayer itself could just as easily have been a charade. It's like Michael Moorcock's obvious anarchic biases (the only rulers he portrays sympathetically are reluctant rulers), but with religion. There are NO positive examples of religious faith anywhere in this game's world. Of course, I could just be reading too much into this. Perhaps the prophet's ruminations merely reflect his regrets after creating the undying army. Perhaps the remnants do practice an ancient and heretical splinter faith from the Orthodox church. Perhaps the power seat of Trinity isn't in the Vatican after all, but they are more like the Illuminati instead, infiltrating and allying themselves to various people and institutions who have no idea they're being manipulated. What's disappointing to me is that the game doesn't really make the answers to any of these questions clearer to me, and seems to end on exactly the same note as the last game, with more or less the same promises.

The biggest sin of this game is how comically easy it is, even for a big release meant to be accessible to casual players. This is a game where I struggled trying to decide what upgrades to get because they either seemed worthless (trying to alleviate inexistent problems) or things that would make Lara even more unfairly overpowered. To me the core of the Tomb Raider games has always been the process of arriving to a new location, taking in the environment and discerning the way forward. This was clear up until Underworld, with the opening level giving you that massive room with the kraken that you had to explore to find what exactly did you have to do to solve it. Even after the reboot I still look at the games the same way, and judging by what others thought of it and the demand for more tombs gameplay I'm not alone. The combat being so safe and easy doesn't do a lot to change my opinion. So it really aggravates me when the game tries is hardest to boycott its best moments, either by having Lara tell you the solution or constantly suggesting you to use the cheat vision. I decided never to use the survivor senses or the map when I started the game, only to soon encounter collectibles that were meant to be found by using them. Whenever I entered a tomb or what seemed like a puzzle section I always tried to examine it from afar, to avoid triggering Lara's hints, imagining how it would play out before I did anything. I spent a good while staring at the astronomical mechanism trying to guess how it worked and how I would have to interact with it, thinking back to similar sections in the Prince of Persia games (a series that took elements from Tomb Raider for its own reboot, while TR itself borrowed heavily from the original Prince of Persia; a similar relation to that between Uncharted and Tomb Raider). All of this was my own effort to make the game more engaging, but in reality you can go guns blazing wrecking everyone in the combat sections, and then use the survivor senses and interact blindly with objects to fly through the "puzzle" sections as well. Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, being the successor to the Prince of Persia games, had some really nice tomb raiding segments where you went into secret catacombs beneath Rome or exploring temples, alone, in silence, the way it should be. It's bizarre that an Assassin's Creed game could be a better Tomb Raider game than the actual thing is nowadays.

I love your videos, & re-watching this again in light of what the third game ended up being, your ideas were so much more creative & I’m disappointed Crystal Dynamics couldn’t approach even a shadow of what you suggested here, pun intended.

always glad to see you pop up in my subscription feed, I should probably get around to donating a couple bucks.

Really looking forward to the dragons dogma video, you probably have a very strong opinion on it and im excited to see what you liked/disliked about it.

Audio is fine, video is great. *presses thumb up*

Damn, hit a lot of points which I wouldn't have thought about ! Good Job!!

When you said TR from 2013 was all about fire and 2015 is almost all about water I realized that next installment is circling around light (or it was air?). It seems each has their own dominant element so you can tell from which game some puzzle was, based on that element.

I find it incredibly ironic that most of the non-plot related suggestions that you had for future games were standard in the Tomb Raider games that came before 2013. I highly recommend anybody who wants bigger better puzzles check out Legend, Anniversary, or Underworld. I'm sure the games earlier than that have great puzzles too, but I can't stand the controls. Also if you want more animal enemies than people with guns, Anniversary is the way to go; I'm pretty sure Lara only kills like one human in that game. Tomb Raider games have never had good plot though, the plot is always just the bare minimum to give a reason to raid tombs. In fact, just about every game follows the same structure; Lara searches for the thing all game, is sad about her parents a lot, finds the thing, and then realizes she needs to destroy the thing for the good of humanity.

I really wish they developed the story better and made something that made sense and used less supernatural elements.

I love how honest, and mostly non-biased you are. Other "critics", reviewers, and analyzers don't get into the small details that make all the difference in story, gameplay, and dialogue. I'm glad that I came upon your channel and you've helped me to choose wisely and decisively when puchasing games, and not waste time and money over ones that aren't worth either. Plus they're very interesting and educational to watch.

hey I'm a new viewer. I first watched your video on the perspective game. I really liked it. This is a good one as well. I haven't played any of the games you've done videos on but you explain things in such a way after watching sometimes I felt like I have. I play alot of gta 5. I have a question about the Jacob character. Do you know his last name. Is it Sheppard any chance. or does it start with a C by any chance? a C or an S? or was it ever even given? Anyway your contents great keep it up. you got my sub

that first snowy forest enemy patrol part was great! but then i hated the gunplay that i was forced into after that and just stopped playing.

Well this is a review and a critique. You can be pretentious as you like and try to separate yourself from a review but the two are often the same, or rather it's better to say that all critiques are reviews but not all reviews are critiques.

Hey man, love your shit, what recording software do you use?

13:45 if i may make a recommendation for a stealth game, check out Mark of the Ninja. Being a 2D stealth game, it allows you to instantly learn the layout of the land, and be a true stealth badass

I wonder if the game was optimized for the Xbox due to the exclusivity. I didn't have any of those issues on the console.

I liked the 2013 Tomb Riader better for some reason. This one was pretty boring, imo. Maybe I'm just tired of the same ole', same ole'

After you mentioned that it would have been cool to mix climbing sections with action, i can't help but recommend trying the Uncharted series (if you haven't already). Would love to hear your thoughts on these games.

I know I'm late (I didn't play it until it was out for PS4, and it's months after that release, even), but I love your deconstruction of and suggestions for the story. I know it's too much to ask that game developers start watching all your videos, but hopefully, since commentary of the RotTR's story was almost unanimous in its critique, the next Tomb Raider will focus more on Lara as a character. I think the first game did this well - it could have been improved, but Lara shows compelling growth in the first game. I also wanted to write to say that your suggestions (in this and other reviews of yours) are impressive in how they demonstrate ways to improve the games without compromising what's already there.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider! I want to hear you TEAR that story apart. Like my God people got paid to write this “trilogy” which is honestly just 3 individual stories with the second and third being only linked by this “trinity” bs which isn’t even developed on well and Shadow also fails in so many other regards. I just played the game on Hard, I had high expectations hoping it would be a larger improvement on the series than the first->second one but NO game went backwards aside from the FEW guerilla stealth sections and the tombs which maybe I only found challenging cause survival instincts weren’t a thing and the environments kinda blended with the interactable objects.

Dude, "Shadow Of The Tomb Raider" is out. Please, make a review for it.

It's interesting how the second DLC, not out at the time of the video, really is some kind of only-puzzle dungeon, although it would have been nice if it had acrobatics-sections as well.

Remember how the entirety of trinity was killed off off screen in Shadow of the Tomb Raider? Yeah... That was great...

First of all I'd like to say what a fantastic video, your analysis is really spot on and hits every thing that bugged me about Rise, second I thought it was funny how much of a copy Rise is of Reboot, but what's really funny is the story is almost a literal a copy of Tomb Raider: Legend that was released in 2006, by the same developers. Lara's parents have a tragic backstory, Lara's mother goes missing, Lara's father goes crazy trying to find Lara's mother, general consensus of Lara's dad is he's nuts, Lara spends her life and also kinda goes crazy trying to prove him right and find her mother, Lara proves her father right and finds the proof he didn't and saves the world, the only difference is that Lara doesn't quite destroy the main artifact in the end, but in Legend the artifact was a weapon, and Lara wasn't nearly as melodramatic and asthmatic sounding as she is today so. TRL's version is definitely a bit more competent in it's presentation even though it's a shorter game, and no cliche evil step mom or recycled army of darkness. But I do like the flashbacks that we have of Lara's dad that wasn't present in TRL so I think they both have good elements to them.

"Gameplay is king" - yet the whole gameplay there is is a generic TPS. Not to say the genre is bad or something, it's pretty decent, but they did pretty terrible job with it. I can't remember a single enjoyable shooting sequence in both new tomb raiders, besides the one you mentioned at the beginning of Rise. Playing through the rest of shooting sequences, I was pretty much praying that it ends quickly and some puzzle sequence or story-relevant event begins. The worst case was the "junktown", or whatever it is called in Tomb Raider 2013. It featured something that felt like hordes of enemies, that I had to shoot alone. I will forever wonder how this many people were even at this island and who's idea that was to send them all there and how the fuck couldn't they just use the simpliest tactic of surrounding and waiting against Lara. Instead what happened is: I kept shooting them all repeatedly in the head with the bow for 20 minutes. That's it. It was the best feeling in the world when this sequence have ended. And that's the problem with both new TRs. TPS parts are mostly badly designed. And the only good stuff, the main enjoyment in playing it are story moments (which IMO are mediocre as well, but much more compelling than shooting still) and puzzle/tomb raiding stuff. And as long as the worst parts of the game (shooting) are given priority over best parts (story and puzzles), I can never call these really "good" games. Yes, they took my time, got me engaged from the beginning to an end. But I can't call that an amazing experience in the end, neither do I have any desire to replay it, even after years. The devs either have to improve their TPS part drastically, to the point of maybe revamping them completely, or working on better AI, or making stealth more consistent, reasonable, and at least, possible throughout every encounter, not just few of them. Or, they just got to scrap the TPS part and make it a minor part of the game, instead focusing on things that are already fun, but just deserve more focus and attention and actual quantity (since quality is already kinda there). Otherwise, this series won't ever really jump over "mediocre" level, at least for me. Especially taking into account that there is quite the competition in form of games like Uncharted or The Last of Us, which might not have certain part as good as TR has, but instead feature a much better mixture of game elements simply resulting in a better product. Maybe not terribly better, but still better and more overall enjoyable for the same price.

Fantastic video! I also really dig your draft for the improved story. While combat is not outright bad, I agree that the tombs with more complex puzzles could make for a much more unique and interesting experience - there are already plenty generic third person shooters.

I'm new to your channel. This video and your one on TR 2013 are the only ones that I've seen so far. You got yourself a sub. I played the Definitive Edition of the first game right before playing this one and all its DLC because I got them both for under $15. Personally I enjoyed them despite the flaws you pointed out, but I agree with all of your critics and consider them completely valid. Anyway, you seem pretty cool, I'm digging your channel, keep up the good work.