Objectively, I know it's the worst PS1 Tomb Raider. But I have a big ol' soft spot for it. 10 year old me was distraught at the idea of Lara being dead so I was just happy to go on more adventures with her. The episodic structure is very reminiscent of III, which was and still is my favourite. It was also the first Tomb Raider that I managed to finish by myself (with extensive use of guides of course).

For a game that Core seemed to actively resent working on I think it could have turned out a lot worse. There's a lot of variety to the level design and it's the best that one of these games has ever looked. The engine is really showing its age by this point but its pushed to its techincal limit here. The idea of Lara's friends reminiscing about her life is fun but let down by the quality of the writing and some really baffling continuity stuff. Still, it gives the devs an excuse to put Lara in a bunch of different scenarios and keeps the game from feeling stale.

All that being said, its rushed and buggy as all hell. The blame for that really falls on Eidos. Comissioning this game is directly responsible for Angel of Darkness being an unfinished mess and the slow death of Core Design that followed. It's difficult to uncouple this game from all the stuff that transpired after it's release and maybe things would have turned out for the better if it hadn't been made at all. We'll never know.