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 games: tomb raider: anniversary
This week, raiding Lara’s tomb. While many of the icons of 90s culture have faded, retired, or otherwise aged in obscurity, Lara Croft has remained untouched and unblemished by the passage of time. In fact Eidos have decided to return her to the scene of her former glories by remaking the ten-year-old original with a modern game engine. Gone are the dodgy, blocky tombs of old, and this time, in Tomb Raider: Anniversary, Lara is sleeker and smoother than ever before. Fortunately, the pixel-perfect nightmare jumps have also been retired. Anniversary is built using the engine from the previous game, Legend, which makes things more believable and yet more forgiving. Leaping, grabbing onto ledges and generally navigating the complex and dangerous environments is far easier than it has been in past games. This is a competent modern platform adventure. Of course the past ten years have had some ups and downs, from the heights of Tomb Raider 2 to the low point of Angel Of Darkness, but it seems that the story is still not at an end. The last two games have a certain charm and robust nature to them – making Lara as interesting and characterful as she has ever been, while also delivering the exploration and environmental puzzle-solving that endeared us to the early games.  If there's a low point to this remake then it's only by comparison to the original on which it’s based. The T-Rex fight is a bit rubbish, and far more of a boss-fight slog than it was in the 1997 game. Looking through this lens I can't help feeling that this is a game that leans a little too heavily on nostalgia for a hype machine that’s long past its glory days. Lara might still be full of energy, but these days she has way too much competition for her acrobatic brand of archaeology to really stand out.
Jim Rossignol
Tomb Raider: Anniversary is out now on PS2 and PC.
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