Shadow of the cutscene.

I really wanted to like this. But the more I played, the more I was struggling to convince myself that the tedium was worth it. This really does play exactly like a PS2 game. I think that having 0 nostalgic connection to this game really hindered my enjoyment.

The biggest problem for me is the open-world. Possibly the most boring, lifeless, washed-out world I’ve ever experienced. It has virtually no reason to be this expansive when there is nothing to see or do. It looked horrible and was even more horrible to traverse on that stupid-ass horse. If they were going for atmosphere, it was completely lost on me.

The gameplay is extremely repetitive, which is obviously by design, but that does not make it fun. Your average fight against a colossus is 50% watching a cutscene and travelling to where it’s hanging out, 40% figuring out its weak point, and only 10% actually fighting the thing. In which the fighting is essentially a glorified QTE sequence.

I finally gave up on this game upon fighting the 10th colossus, the big ol’ snake. Which you HAVE to fight on the horse. I fucking hate the horse. Every other fight using the horse has been optional or it’s unavailable. The horse A.I is so unbearable and clunky that after a couple of attempts I could stomach it no longer.

This was a pretty good foundation for such a successful series. Looks very good for a game from 2007. The endearing characters help drive forward the story, which does enough to keep my attention, despite the lack of threat from a compelling villain (I can't even remember the dude's name). The soundtrack is excellent and adds to the ambience and atmosphere.

The cover-shooting gameplay was repetitive at times, but there are still a fair amount of mechanics to keep it from getting boring such as semi-destructible environments and being able to shoot while hanging off of ledges. Though the weapons functioned fairly similarly, I liked the variety and strategy in weapon selection such as picking up a weaker weapon that has more ammunition than a stronger counterpart when you know there's a big fight coming up. Being low on ammunition means you're constantly picking up new weapons. The enemy A.I is also fairly advanced, they can flank, blind-fire and even go prone. All of these factors allow the gunfights to have a good level of intrigue and challenge, especially towards the end, some of those were tough as nails. Meaning I had to strategise and think about my next move rather than go guns-blazing.

In contrast, the climbing is severely underbaked. This tedious exercise seems to have been implemented to show off the nice graphics and set pieces rather than serve the gameplay. Every mechanic involved with climbing is introduced within the first few chapters meaning it stagnates fast. What you can and cannot interact with within the environment is not easily communicated, leading to a lot of meandering and/or ragdolling down into a pit. Drake struggles to jump vertically but can do so horizontally like a superhuman.

Strangely, exploration seems to have taken a backseat as this is a very linear experience. Some more secret areas and puzzles would have been appreciated. I'm normally not one for collectables but I found myself eagerly searching for the treasures in each chapter despite offering no in-game benefit. Although I was through, I still missed 24 of the things.

I was disappointed to be limited to the uncharted island for the vast majority of the game. Although the variety of areas such as the jungle, castle, monastery and underground facility did alleviate this issue somewhat. There was also a complete absence of enemy variety, I must've killed around 500 pirates before a Wendigo showed up. They were a cool addition and functioned very differently from the pirates but came into play a little too late in the story.

The Jetski sections were terrible.

Though I have been quite negative, I did have fun with this game and presented just the right amount of challenge for me which I found very rewarding. I am excited to try out the more acclaimed sequels in the future.

This game, despite its flaws, has a decent foundation. The overall gameplay is pretty solid and introduces some interesting elements and concepts. Though, I cannot help but feel that there is a lot of missed potential here.

Firstly, some positives. Although this does lack the depth and care put into game such as Bioshock, its nice to play something weird like this with the good gunplay of the Call of Duty series. There's a decent amount of attention put into the world and the plethora of creatures that inhabit it, enough so that I think it could be expanded on in a satisfactory way in a sequel. The design of the creatures and the associated gory animations are great, though their A.I could be better. Its also mercifully short. I was really dawdling and it barely took me 7 hours to get through. I'm glad this wasn't stretched out unnecessarily, even so, it was a bit too linear for my taste.

Unfortunately, there was a lot working against this game. It was clearly trying a little too hard to emulate Bioshock, while lacking a lot of the meticulous thought and detail put into that franchise. The TMD came into play a bit too late and was wildly underutilised. A real lack of creativity at play with such an interesting mechanic. This lack of creativity was also clear in the other weaponry as well as the upgrade system, which were very shallow elements of the game. The underwhelming boss fights are juxtaposed with over the top cutscenes and music, they felt very half-hearted and probably should have been left out of the game. Finally, the sorry and characters were so bland and dull and forgettable. What a shame! I was glad for the option to indiscriminately murder everyone at the end.

Although I trashed this game, it sucks we won't be getting a sequel. As I said, there is enough here to make something great in the future.

Damn, this was some trippy shit. People have made comparisons to Twin Peaks or The X-Files (I can only vouch for the latter currently). Despite this, I was still very engrossed in the story. Jesse is one of my favorite female protagonists in recent years. All the abilities you learn really add to the exploration and combat. I've always been a sucker for psychokinesis, and getting to pick up and destroy everything around you is so satisfying. I couldn't help thinking of Luigi's Mansion 3 in a way (though, it's arguably more impressive there since the Switch is less powerful). It's also extremely gorgeous to look at. It makes me hate that Sony removed Facebook functionality. I have a lot of pictures saved.

As you can tell by the rating, it's not perfect. The difficulty can be very cheap at times. Certain enemies can take out huge chunks of your health and you'll have little time to recover. You could just want to explore, then a barrage of them will spawn in a room. One boss fight was so annoying, I ended up turning on immortality. The final moments feel pretty anti-climactic compared to what came before, but it leave things open-ended for a possible sequel (plus, I still got the DLC to play). There are notable framerate issues either from all the action onscreen or simply un-pausing the game. I figured it was just on consoles, but even the PC version does it. I didn't think that was possible.

And my biggest gripe, the map sucks ASS!!! Sure, it will highlight your next location, but it doesn't take into account whether there's a locked door or some kind of debris in the way. I had to look up walkthroughs on occasion because of it. Metroid got it right in 1994, so what's the excuse here? Regardless, I really enjoyed this one. I look forward to more from Remedy. Praying that the next game is Alan Wake 2.

Reaching the end of a trilogy is always exciting to me. Ideally, it's the conclusion of all the previous lessons learned and the moment everything gets tied together into one satisfying bundle. The PS1 is probably the console I think of the most when it comes to looking back at trilogies by single developers, simply because it had so many different ones during its life-span. Crash, Spyro, Resident Evil and even to some extent Final Fantasy. I think there is something special about seeing a game series in different stages of refinement, clearly being able to observe how a developer's ideas evolve over time. And yes, of course Tomb Raider went through that aswell. With the continued smash hit of TR2, Lara Croft was now without question video game royalty and Core Design was yet again given no breaks in pumping out another sequel for publisher Eidos Interactive. Setting aside the undoubtedly horrid working conditions at Core Design during the development process, I find it once again incredible how TR3 released only a year after its predecessor. And after my new-found love for this franchise was only reinforced by how much I enjoyed TR2, I was excited to jump into Lara's third adventure.

Sadly, as you can already guess from the rating, this turned out to be a massive disappointment. As the hours passed and the downward spiral of bad level design began, I became more and more miserable having to put up with everything Tomb Raider 3 was throwing at me. I was worn down and finally broken when I reached the end. I don't want this to be a rant about how much I hate this game. I still do, but there are so many fantastic qualities here that I can not even stoop so low as to call this a lazy sequel. Core Design really cared. It's just that all the visible care and love gets utterly crushed under the weight of unfair difficulty and a lack of polish, most likely due to razor tight deadlines along with an overworked staff. So let me go through the positives first before I start falling down the rabbit hole that has become my absolute hatred for this game.

Tomb Raider 3 has the best locations in the series so far. There is an incredible leap in art design at display here. Be it the opening trek through the jungles of India, the massive canyons in Nevada or looking out over the rooftops of Nighttime London. Levels feel lived in, in a way Tomb Raider 2 was still struggling with. The updated engine makes everything look so much less blocky, which the designers take full advantage off. I love the lighting, the colors and the great texture work. The atmosphere is so good, and I wish more games would take what Core Design accomplished here as an example. Really, in terms of atmosphere, TR3 doesn't miss even once. I love just standing in these maps and soaking it all in, ready to be pulled along into more adventures. It helps of course that the soundtrack is amazing aswell. There is a tone of ambiance to each location, of course classic series leitmotifs return and new tracks have been added that round everything out. It doesn't matter if it's discovering ancient ruins or if you find yourself face to face with horrifying creatures. It always fits, and I'm in love with the overall sound of TR3.

When it comes to the story, we find our favorite adventurer once again on the trail of a mysterious artifact. While on a treasure hunt deep in the jungles of India, she encounters a scientist named Dr Willard. He is looking for the missing pieces of a meteor that crashed down on earth millions of years ago, is responsible for having whipped out the Dinosaurs and starting the chain reaction of modern evolution. Supposedly these pieces also contain mysterious powers, once even being worshiped by Polynesian trips for their god like properties. And that's all we need to trot across the Globe. It's a dumb story even for the schlocky standards of classic Tomb Raider, but I still very much enjoyed it. The increased focus on cutscenes and Lara having more fun interactions with different characters helps the story flow much better than it did previously. This finally feels like a continues narrative and not just a semi connected sequence of video game stages. There is of course the obvious issue in how Lara has now been fully reduced to nothing more then what can only be described as a full on sociopath. More than ever before, she is an absolute bitch that cares about no one but herself and is willing to kill anybody that just so much as glances at her wrong. I'm still somewhat fine with her because the point was always to have an uncompromising action heroine, but previous games at least gave her some shred of humanity. The absolute girl boss attitude I fell in love is still present, but there is certainly a discussion to be had about crossing the line from girl boss to unlikeable cunt. This crosses that line way to often. TR2 is also guilty of this to a lesser extent, but toed the line in keeping her likeable much better in my opinion.

When it comes to combat, I'm happy to say that Core massively overhauled their approach to how you fight enemies. The fundamental controls are the same, but enemie encounters are spread out way smarter. Gone are the days of spawning goons right on top of the player.  There are often spots you can jump to that give Lara a clear advantage, and even late game foes can be taken down with just a bit of effort and only the standard handguns. And that's basically all I wanted to see, and I'm glad they at least took the time to improve an aspect of the series that desperately needed a revision. Croft Manor now has been expanded with a shooting range as well. This version of Croft Manor is for sure the best one. Many secrets to find and all the tutorials you could ever need. Lara's home is practically its own giant level now. Once again I fully recommend you play around in the tutorial not only because it's a lot of fun but because it will also helps in familiarizing you with the expanded move set. Lara can now crawl, grab on to certain ceilings in order to use them as monkey bars, and is able to use a short dash that can be ended on a quick roll forward. These added options are mostly used to great effect, but I will admit that the dash stays fairly underutilized. There are only very few spots where it's actually needed, and even then I find those challenges more annoying than anything else.

And that's about all the positives I can think of. For all the love I can express for TR3, it just wouldn't be honest if I omitted all my frustrations and all the reasons why I ultimately came away with the conclusion that this is simply a very bad video game.

Starting off with the basic structure: You're now allowed to pick between locations in between the opening chapter and the finale. What sounds cool on paper, turns out to be a nightmare in reality. The three places you can pick from: Nevada, the South Pacific Islands and London vary so wildly in complexity and challenge that you're most likely going to fuck yourself over if you happen to choose wrong. Pro-tip: Always start with Nevada. I didn't, and it screwed me over hard by the final stretch. Nevada contains the easiest and most enjoyable set of levels, and most importantly: There is a similar bit to TR1 and 2 where all your items will be taken away from you, as Lara is once again captured by armed guards. Unlike previous games there is a high chance you will not get most of your inventory back, meaning that if you happen to pick Nevada last, you might lose hours of collected guns, ammo and med packs. At that point, you are just stuck desperately searching for scraps during the final 4 segments of Antarctica. It's a horrible design decision that I despise with a passion, and they should have either ditched the level select entirely or put actual effort in balancing each locations difficulty. And while the South Pacific Islands are a mostly tolerable set of levels, London is where the game fully backflips into of pit of rusty spicks.

London is a confusing labyrinth of dark hallways that loop around in the most unintuitive ways. I got lost so many times just backtracking, not knowing what my goal even was, and finding crucial progression items in spots that made me scream in agony. Of course, one of the keys needed to progress in on top of a mining drill you just escaped from in order to not get crushed to death. It's not like every sane human being would see the section now occupied by the giant death drill as blocked off for good. Add to that weird angled jumps that shouldn't work, but sometimes just do, and hard to make out wall texture that are supposse to signal climbable surfaces. Trust me, you will run past those surfaces for a couple of hours before looking up a guide and then promptly feeling the primal urge to buy a gun along with a time machine in order to pay Core Designs studio a friendly visit back in the late 90s. All that misery and I haven't even mentioned the vehicle sections yet. Oh, the fucking vehicles. TR2 had the exact same issue, but the meaningful difference is again that this was limited to only 2 sections. We had a boat, that controlled fine, and a snowmobile that controlled like shit. TR3 on the other hand has at least one vehicle for each location. There is an ATV, a kayak, a weird underwater robot, a Donkey Kong style minecart ride and another boat. I don't know which one is the worst for me, but it has to be a tie between the kayak and the minecart. Paddling the kayak through the rapids of the south pacific rain forest is pure luck, as you can't really control it and are at the mercy of the game's geometry in order for Lara to not straight up smash into a pile of rocks and drown. The minecart on the other hand will make you randomly fly off the tracks if you happen to pull the break at the wrong time, that is if you even know where to fucking go in the nightmare labyrinth known as the RX Tech Mines. Either way, the conclusion is always: try to get somewhere, die, reload, repeat that step about 50 times per stage until you get that one lucky try that lets you progress.

I hate Tomb Raider 3. I can't recommend it to anyone ever. The final boss was a giant spider mutant that makes you run around in a circle for 40 minutes so you can pick up some shinny rocks. Watch the game end with Lara shooting a totally innocent Helicopter pilot in the face and a shot of her ass while the credits play. Fuck this game, I need to game something good next.

Excellent follow-up to the rest of the series.
I really enjoyed the hell out of this game, and getting to explore some of the larger world outside of the Moscow Metro was hella fun. I also really loved the group dynamics and the game did a really good job of making me care about Anna and her well-being. You can literally sit for hours and listen to the crew yap at you about their lives and what they think about the situation - which is something I've always loved about this series.
I will say that the ending is a little lacklustre in comparison to the previous two entries, but the overall journey was very enjoyable.