Tomb Raider reboot: Lara's new look.

I've heard it tapers off as it goes on.

Sounds like the perfect game for a 75% off sale, then.

Its making a nice rental.

The problem is just...its kinda simple. They really just took Uncharted and went "Lets do that"

There's some puzzles and exploration a bit but not that much. Lara isn't nearly as entertaining as Drake, the melee isn't as satisfying and the QTE just stink. Even the puzzles are kinda ruined when the instinct vision just lights up everything important.

So it basically Uncharted?

Sweet, an Uncharted game for the PC!

Penny Arcade talks with Tomb Raider writer Rhianna Pratchett about the whole narrative dissonance thing, as well as other related topics about the game's marketing and PR

edited 6th Mar '13 4:46:16 PM by Nettacki

I agree with her that players shouldn't be thinking of the game's character as someone separate from themselves. Games like Silent Hill 2 and Metroid Prime just don't work if the player cannot relate themselves to the protagonist even a bit.

Most of the beefs I have with the game are gameplay, which I can't really blame Pratchett for.

edited 6th Mar '13 5:29:53 PM by Scardoll

I'm mostly surprised that PA actually liked the game. This seems like the sort of game they'd skewer. Gleefully.

Maybe they thought the game was good enough for them to overlook its flaws. In any case, this is just Part 1 of the interview. Part 2 is here: http://penny-arcade.com/report/editorial-article/tomb-writers-writer-talks-impalement-downtown-abbey-and-whether-were-revisi

I think she's saying that many players do, not that players should.

When I say what they should or should not do, I'm talking from what a writer is supposed to be aiming for. Obviously, players should be able to feel whatever the fuck they want to feel, but game stories that connect the player to the protagonist better tend to be better and more well-received.

There are obvious exceptions (The Sims, Starcraft), but these tend to be for the sort of games where you instead have the feeling of absolute control like rts games.

edited 6th Mar '13 8:11:41 PM by Scardoll

Yes, but she's not saying that. She's actually fairly ambivalent about protecting Lara as opposed to projecting onto her. Either way's a form of connecting with the player avatar, but I'd argue that the kind of connection you're talking about and treating as ideal (projection) is really overrated and kinda problematic in the interations we often see. I feel that it's the kind of attitude supported by industry group-think that leads to really lacklustre protagonists which can't alienate audiences in any way. Which includes being black, or poor, or heterosexually ambivalent (let alone queer), radically antagonistic, or generally belonging to anything that isn't a handful of pre-packaged archetypes that always get trotted out.

Industry abuse of projection "data" seems to flatten out anything remotely interesting or unusual about a potential protagonist. Treating industry standard "likeable" characterisation as a kind of ideal state of writing is a really disappointing paradigm.

Which may not be what you're saying, but there you go.

Nothings wrong with the idea of "projecting" yourself onto a character. It's the way the developers do it that's the problem. Mario, Donkey Kong, Link, Samus, Sonic, Bomberman, Megaman, Dante, Kirby, etc. are designed with the basic idea Scardoll was talking about, and they're gamings most beloved icons.

Which includes being black, or poor, or heterosexually ambivalent (let alone queer), radically antagonistic, or generally belonging to anything that isn't a handful of pre-packaged archetypes that always get trotted out.

And it's ridiculous that suits think we can't project on a character like that (Well, radically antagonistic generally is hard to project on, but that's more due to the role in the story). Metroid has a female protagonist; I am not a woman, but I think Super Metroid, Zero Mission, and Metroid Prime are all great and immersive games because you feel like you're Samus. Obviously, Samus is more of a blank slate than most, but characters in radically different societies and situations are still easy to project on.

Projection has nothing to do with a character being a blank slate or a character similar to the audience's; projection has to do with making a character that the audience connects to and sympathizes with and enjoys experiencing, and to think that we can't sympathize with other races, genders, religions, or societies is to underestimate the audience.

I should also note that even a character who is extremely unlikeable (Like Walter from Spec-Ops the line) can still be a good character to project on.

edited 6th Mar '13 10:29:16 PM by Scardoll

It's Walker, not Walter.

Anyway here is the creepiest review of Tomb Raider you will ever read.

One thing that really bugs me about this game is its just like Portal 2 in that you just look for white paint for where to go.

http://www.joystiq.com/2013/03/08/crystal-dynamics-1-million-playing-tomb-raider-two-days-after/

http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/tomb-raider-reboots-the-classic-series-sales-success-moving-1-million-copies-in-two-days/

http://www.gamespot.com/news/female-gears-of-war-protagonist-hard-to-justify-says-epic-6403996

One of these things is not like the other

I'm really on the fence about getting this game. I certainly would already own it if it didn't have so many goddamn QTE's. Too bad rentals don't exist anymore.

as I understand it, the vast majority of the QT Es end after the intro part of the game

Yeah, there's not really anything I would call a full-on QTE, though simple button-prompts show up fairly often, but I still wouldn't say there are loads.

I never minded QTE's in games, though they can be done horribly (Cough Cough, Ninja Blade and running down a hallway, Cough Cough).

Then again, I have pretty good reflexes, so that may be why.

edited 9th Mar '13 1:47:17 PM by Demongodofchaos2

2 things about the QTE I noticed.

1) Its always Y or Triangle, like 90% of the time. 2) The QTE have a shrinking circle that makes you think you have to time the shrinking white circle over the actual button like in Asura's Wrath, but doing that will make you fail it instead (Which poor lara learned about 5 times)

That's a lot of crabs.

Everyone seems to like the bow. And of course we are going to raid tombs! It's in the name!

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-03-26-tomb-raider-has-sold-3-4-million-copies-failed-to-hit-expectations

Apparently 3.4 million sales aren't enough for a game to be successful nowadays.

This industry is in huge trouble.

...jesus..thats just..I dont even know.

Granted, this is more a symptom of AAA games than all games.

when an indie game sells 100k copies and is a smash success, but a AAA game sells multiple millions and is a failure..

edited 26th Mar '13 9:55:00 AM by Midgetsnowman

3.4 million is a disappointment? Christ, how bloated was the budget?