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Tomb Raider

Started by Abnormal Palm, July 23, 2019, 10:12:13 PM

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Bazooka

Quote from: Abnormal Palm on July 24, 2019, 11:16:18 PM
It is certain that Croft is a powerful role model for young women because of its physical strength, calm character and feminine chest. This genre of women can also be a hero.

She can also leap and roll very well,and shoot a a shark with a harpoon gun without flinching, something Ive not seen a humanoid accomplish, a strong role model for women worldwide.

Golden E. Pump

There is something magical about the atmosphere of the first game they've never been able to recreate, other than about five or six levels for TR2. Despite the fact that there are much bigger areas in the new ones, some of the caverns in TR1 felt like they could swallow you. The Sphinx level springs to mind. The draw distance limitations really helped.

That being said, I think my all-time favourite TR level is Temple of Xian from TR2. It's enormous and the way it all functions just get you back to the start of the level is amazing. It's really tough, very varied, hard as nails and yet colourful and epic.

Poobum

Much more solitude in the first one, TR2 just lobs enemies at in you in waves. I absolutely love the levels on the Maria Doria, they're brilliant to just exist in. Claustrophobic, spooky, great ambient sound track. The scale of The Deck is immense. Of course conceptualy it's all ridiculous, running around a sunken wreck at the bottom of the sea, but I think the way it's executed gives it a sinister, escheresque unrealness that your brain at once does and doesn't understand.

I'll definitely jump into TR2 once I've finished with this. I did give it a brief go and got battered by some baseball guido and some Rottweilers. Quite jarring coming off the cavernous isolated beauty of TR1!

Thursday

Quote from: Poobum on July 30, 2019, 05:57:04 PM
Much more solitude in the first one, TR2 just lobs enemies at in you in waves. I absolutely love the levels on the Maria Doria, they're brilliant to just exist in. Claustrophobic, spooky, great ambient sound track. The scale of The Deck is immense. Of course conceptualy it's all ridiculous, running around a sunken wreck at the bottom of the sea, but I think the way it's executed gives it a sinister, escheresque unrealness that your brain at once does and doesn't understand.

I remember having a guide that was free with a magazine, and when they got to the floating island the writer basically just wrote a thing saying

"This level is so weird and confusing, we don't really know how to write instructions that you'll understand... so, just try to find these things, and watch out for this"

They were right to an extent that it is a very confusing level... but... other magazines managed it.

biggytitbo

I tried playing TR3 on retropie the other day for some sweet abstract London action and it was completely uncontrollable using the d pad. I could have swore it came out with dual shock controls but clearly not. Which was the first one with analog controls?

Bazooka

Quote from: biggytitbo on July 30, 2019, 09:26:14 PM
I tried playing TR3 on retropie the other day for some sweet abstract London action and it was completely uncontrollable using the d pad. I could have swore it came out with dual shock controls but clearly not. Which was the first one with analog controls?

Angel of Darkness on the PS2 I believe, TR3 never had the dual shock controls, in fact I played it on the PSP circa 2009 and it there is a section where you out run a boulder and its impossible unless someone helps you by smashing the shoulder button with their nose.

Poobum

Got my PS2 out about a year ago to raid some tombs, and has using the d-pad on PS1/PS2 controller always been painful or are my fingers just wimps now?

Thursday

It was all we knew back then. Men were men and fingers were fingers. Proper no-nonsense hard bollocked fingers. Not like the fingers you get today.

Poobum

The edges are so sharp and hard :( We were a braver people back then, the supple rubber sticks have ruined us, now we will fall like Rome.


samadriel


Just some 90s stand-up flashback

H-O-W-L

I fucking hate me the new Tomb Raider games because they tried to make Lara more "realistic" and "empathetic" by making her a hyper vulnerable meat sack to be tortured and graphically murdered a thousand different ways. Go watch the river spike death (or any death from TR2013/ROTT/SOTT really) and compare it to how say, Anniversary or Legend dealt with the same sort of death sequences. Revolting really.

It's like the developers became intoxicated by the stench of all the wank rags teenage boys soaked with spunk at the sight of a mere woman and assumed that Lara, herself, was some kind of bizarre Dead or Alive sex puppet that existed purely for the players to stick their knob in, virtually speaking, rather than a legitimately powerful and capable woman who was designed somewhat saucily (and whom's sauciness was toned down to a more respectable level in the later games). Lara herself was never really a sexualized object in the games-- she dressed in costumes that were quite racy and possibly tasteless but she herself was always the most capable character in the story, and not just because of the (stereotypically male) player's involvement. She was still, plot-wise, very good at what she did even if it was morally bleak.

It buggers the shit off me because you have guys like Bond or Nathan Drake, incredibly indomitable, strong, good-looking men with murderous skillsets and adventurous lifestyles, being acceptable in games and movies and what have you, and then they take the female equivalent of that (Croft) and shit all over her and make her relatively simpering in comparison because she happened to also be a bit saucy and not a nun. A fucking insult really.

They couldn't just tone down her racy outfits, they had to gutter the character and turn her into shit.

madhair60

That's true of the reboot but I'd argue the sequels massively tone it down to the point of non-issue.

madhair60

I think the reboot games have a massive, massive list of problems that doesn't quite put me off playing and enjoying them, but they are full to the brim with AAA bullshit. I think the standout example of why they piss me off is with the caches of gold and jade you find lying around everywhere - you hit them with your pickaxe and get money. Fine, but every single one of them goes the same. You stand in front of it and the prompt to press Square appears, then Lara does a cod animation where she hits it with her pick. Right, fine. Then the prompt appears again, you press Square and she does a different cod animation. Grand, but it's not over. One more prompt, one more push, and she breaks through and you collect the gold.

So let's review. That's three button pushes to trigger what are effectively cutscenes, and you will do this... well over 500 times, if you're playing properly i.e. actually trying to get the unlocks and stuff.

Why in fuck's name wouldn't they just make it a single button press? For what actual reason? You need this "realistic" pickaxe mining process with three animations, but the money just randomly appears in your balance anyway with no picking-up animation. So they go faux-real for the boring bit but the important bit that matters, where you pick up the gold you just mined, that's when they go "ah, suspension of disbelief, mate". AAA games are so FUCKING STUPID

biggytitbo

The main issue with Lara in the two sequels and especially Shadow of the Tomb Raider is she's become a cold, dead eyed monster.

Thursday

Agreed with HOWL there. I feel like Legend/Anniversary/Underworld have been almost wiped from people's collective memories now. Although it might just be that a lot less people were playing them at this point.

But they did add personal/emotional motivations into the story for Lara, toned down the outfits and the design of Lara herself (there might have been a few tacky extra costumes, but still) And that worked well. But she was still a fun, confident, smart character. Like a comic book character basically. The story worked fine for what it was, added a bit of tension and intrigue, gave Lara more depth and made her more sympathetic, but didn't have any delusions that it was anything other than a video game story designed to tie all the levels together.

But then 2013 comes out and people are like "WOW! NOW LARA IS A REAL EMPOWERING FEMINIST ICON" even though she spends half the game crying, getting beaten up and getting help from male characters.

I mean I'm not saying those thing automatically make it bad, and you can't have any of those things, it's just a bit weird, and surely it's an example of the "empowerment through abuse" trope that would now be heavily criticised.


And Rise of the Tomb Raider, is all her being willing to risk the end of the world to find something about her Dad or something.

biggytitbo

Hmm not sure about that, Lara is a right dick in those middle games, and a character void in pretty much all the games pre the new trilogy. She also wears an outfit in Underworld so skimpy it verges on the pornographic, way more that the original games.

I think the only game she's a genuinely real, empathetic person is the 2013 one, and maybe Rise to a lesser extent. They just replaced the superficial 90's sassiness of the early games with making her a proper psychopath in the new ones.

Famous Mortimer

Legend is my favourite of the lot, if anyone was interested in the opinion of someone who's played upwards of two Tomb Raider games.

biggytitbo

Legend and Anniversary are great yeah. Underworld is a bit of a turd though.

Twed

I lost track of Tomb Raider after the first one but the latest Retronauts podcast is a very good interview with the composer: http://retronauts.libsyn.com/retronauts-episode-238-nathan-mccree-on-composing-tomb-raider-tunes

madhair60

Quote from: Twed on August 16, 2019, 04:35:46 PM
I lost track of Tomb Raider after the first one but the latest Retronauts podcast is a very good interview with the composer: http://retronauts.libsyn.com/retronauts-episode-238-nathan-mccree-on-composing-tomb-raider-tunes

I don't care for the podcast but I love the text features.


Sin Agog

Quote from: Thursday on August 16, 2019, 09:37:14 AM

But then 2013 comes out and people are like "WOW! NOW LARA IS A REAL EMPOWERING FEMINIST ICON" even though she spends half the game crying, getting beaten up and getting help from male characters.

Doesn't her mentor get hobbled right away, while the other dudes squabble or hang about the boat, and the director fellow slimes it up with a sun cult?  The most together fellow crew member was another woman.

Poobum

Gritty reboot syndrome innit. The charm of Tomb Raider was blithely murdering your way through illogical yet awe inspiring locations. At no point during fighting a T-Rex whilst inside the great wall of China was I thinking, how would a real human relate to this? What would their emotional state be? Confused and terrified I imagine. I'd personally question my own personal reality before settling on denial, because who can you tell? Who would believe?

I would say gameplaywise the new ones are great, well in regards to navigating the landscape, the far too over ubiquitous cover combat sections can get verily to fuck. If the games stuck to it being you against a monumental evironment it would be a much better experience, but we have to have mass murdering, cause you have to shoot people in games. I suppose you could say the rape island setting is a commentary on women's place in the world because aren't they all living on islands of rape?

The settings are aweful, ruined WW2 bunkers, all collapsed concrete and twisted steel, and a confusing and ugly shanty town full of explosive barrels. They just don't quite compare to the wonder of a giant underground sphinx, or a an ice temple full of yeti. The second one I can barely remember, apart from soviet ruins and about half an hour of interesting gameplay in the Baba Yaga DLC. Haven't played the newest one, will wait till it's a 20 quid all inner on the xbox store. I'm guessing from the trailer it's racist and will require wiping out an entire race of amerindians, but done with the heavy heart of a white person who just knows better.

timebug

Played the first three, lost interest about a third of the way through Number 4, as it just seemed to have got 'clever-clever' and a bit up itself! Was given 'Anniversary' but have yet to find the time (or the inclination) to try it. I believe it is meant to be the first game (basically) with added bells and whistles? Will maybe get around to it.Sometime.

biggytitbo

Shadow attempts to rectify the lack of tombs critiscm by making most of the game set in various Incan tombs and elaborate cities of gold style ancient contraptions. The writing is terrible but it plays pretty well.

Bazooka

Quote from: biggytitbo on August 17, 2019, 10:07:24 AM
Shadow attempts to rectify the lack of tombs critiscm by making most of the game set in various Incan tombs and elaborate cities of gold style ancient contraptions. The writing is terrible but it plays pretty well.

I'd agree it is better than the previous new gen one, but you still spend most of the game mashing square. Thank fuck you can skip all cut scenes, no idea what the story was. But it has some decent puzzles, all involving the rope arrow of course.

biggytitbo

I still prefer Rise, I think it's the best of the new games. More interesting environments than the first one, lots of good challenge tombs, Lara isn't a full on psycho yet and the plot, writing and acting are actually quite good. I find the third one seems to go backwards slightly from the super refined controls and gameplay of Rise, and actually feels a bit clunkier and janky for some reason.