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'Action DVD Game' Game Review |
Tomb Raider: The Action Adventure - Review
A decade has gone by since the release of the first Tomb Raider. In all these years many games have followed to build an adventure series. Tomb Raider: The Dagger of Xian, Tomb Raider: The Adventures of Lara Croft and Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation appeared with regular intervals. At the end of the last episode Lara became M.I.A., causing conjecture about her premature demise. The subsequent Tomb Raider: Chronicles offered only reminiscences of previous adventures as told by her close friends and fans feared the worst. Four years later that fear was laid to rest: Lara was alive! Accused of murder, Lara has to evade the local authorities and prove her innocence, meanwhile solving the murder she was being erroneously accused of. Tomb Raider: Legend gave us insight into Lara’s past. It led us back to the roots of the Tomb Raider adventure: tombs. We unanimously agreed: LARA IS BACK! Little by little we learned more about the greatest heroine created by the games industry, making us yearn and hold our breath for the next adventure. |
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Well, we can breathe again! In November 2006, Tomb Raider publisher Eidos released a new game. Not just another Tomb Raider game, but a completely new experiment, based upon Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness. We at TombRaider.be proudly present an exclusive review of “Tomb Raider: The Action Adventure” on interactive iDVD.
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Upon playing this iDVD it’s quickly evident that developer Bright Entertainment wants to turn gaming into a team/family happening. Lounging cosily together in the sofa brandishing the remote control is getting to be a family tableau in the modern household. This is the trend Bright Entertainment aims to ride. Gameplay can be either solo or as a team. Players can take turns while scores are saved. Promises to be exciting, doesn’t it?! |
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Just as it does in Angel of Darkness, the iDVD story starts in Paris. After a heated discussion between Lara and her mentor Werner von Croy, the latter is suddenly and violently killed. Lara being the prime suspect, your mission in the first part of the game will be to keep her out of the local authorities' hands. At the same time you'll investigate the rights and wrongs of the murder case - the plot thickens and the game is afoot, exposing a secret society, a serial killer, arcane paintings, all that obviously intertwined with lots of occult stuff. |
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The story unfolds by having Lara discover documents and clues, talk to game characters and also through stylish FMV sequences. These video sequences actually show the gruesome details and atrocities, where parents might frown while their fascinated darling daughter or son thinks "Wow, cool!"
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Controls
The introductory movie immediately explains the game's navigation and controls. Instead of twenty different control keys, you get just five basic buttons: the four arrow keys and the centrally located OK (Enter) key. Their function becomes clear during the game. Each time a choice/action is required, the options with the corresponding keys are presented on-screen. The youngest can handle this game, provided they can read.
The opening levels appear simple, I only had basic decisions to make: have Lara jump, crawl or grab objects. At first sight the age requirement of 12+ seemed exaggerated. But the difficulty increased significantly past the fourth level. I often had Lara die on me because I made the wrong decision; you have to shoot enemies and you have to solve increasingly difficult puzzles. Remembering specific key combinations wasn't easy, and the further in the game, the more you have to remember. This seriously raises the game's level. It makes for an exciting adventure, giving you a real competitive thrill. It was far from easy though to reach each level's maximum score. Several times I earned only three or four points out of five, because of a wrong choice or failing attention. You really need to stay alert, think things through and keep concentrating. Otherwise you'll unwittingly drive Lara once more into damnation. Fortunately the abundant checkpoints avoid having to replay a level from its beginning.
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While playing Tomb Raider: Legend you were simply blown away by the phenomenal graphics. When afterwards, you return to an older version of Tomb Raider, the graphics do disappoint a bit. Because Tomb Raider: The action Adventure is based on Angel of Darkness, this also was a bit the case with this iDVD. The images sometimes looked a bit grained and less detailed. Furthermore the game plays very smooth without hesitations and other obscure bugs.
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You only get - each time you want to do an interactive action – a short loading-time of one second, as a result of which the picture stands still for a while. Also, I had expected a slightly more fluent game. You get a lot of scenes from the game itself, but I rather hoped you would get interactive action in animation sequences all the time. In that case, it would have seemed you’re watching a film, instead of always the typical not so smooth in-game-actions such as a sideward somersault.
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Because in-game scenes were used, they were obliged to cut pieces from levels, or sometimes even omit a whole level (such as hall or Seasons). Concerning the music, this iDVD is another treasure for the Tomb Raider fans. Music from the different previous Tomb Raider-games ensures wonderful memories and a real Tomb Raider atmosphere! |
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Conclusion
Tomb Raider: The action Adventure is in my opinion a fine alternative for the console game, a real family game. The inferior graphics and the not so smooth in-game scenes certainly don’t even out against this exiting competition game, for which you in fact must have a good portion of brains. A must for the fans and for other people who want for once something else then an expensive console game! |
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'Action DVD Game' Game Review
