What was so great about early tomb raider games?

[B-Cell_v1legacy]

Hello friends,

I have seen now people criticize newer tomb raider games. lot of them criticize it turn into uncharted clone and not a tomb raider anymore.

but lets look at older entries. those games people praise so much. Lot of my friends back in days were fan of them. mainly because one of the first 3D titles. sure these games have some puzzles but the gameplay in general suck, the camera and controls are awful. its almost unplayable. and after first 3 games. these games started to get negative reviews until crystal dynamic first reboot it as TR legend. and those games were not even good to begin with despite imrpoving controls and camera.

so my friends, what was so great about early tomb raider games?

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Am finding myself in the rare position of agreement. The nostalgia goggles are strong with this IP, perhaps as with all IPs that originate from many now adult childhoods. Going back to any of them doesn't work for me. There's literally nothing there that feels good or fun or interesting that hasn't been bettered by a multitude of newer titles. And the character is absolutely dull without its' attempt at sex appeal. No offense to anyone's childhood intended. People didn't have much choice back then.

 

[B-Cell_v1legacy]

People didn't have much choice back then.

many games of late 90s and early 00s were masterpieces still play great. games like Half life, Deus Ex, System shock 2 etc.

tomb raider on other hand is not. its gameplay has been crap since its first release. in reboot they improve camera controls but everything else they made it roller coster cinematic adventure.

 

[CaitSeith]

Tomb Raider was one of the most successful jumps from 2D procedural platformers (like the original Prince of Persia, Out of this World, Flashback, Blackthorne, etc) to 3D. The puzzles ARE the gameplay.

Comparing it to Half-Life is pretty unfair, as 3D procedural platformers were much newer than FPS (and the former required more skill from the player than the later, otherwise he will find it unplayable).

PS: If you dislike the first Tomb Raider games like that, you aren't my friend...

 

[Samos205]

I'm surprised you've played tomb raider since its a female lead

 

[Casual Shinji]

Isolation and a palpable sense of danger to climbing.

You can criticize the not great shooting and a couple of other control issues, but the fact that you were alone and trapped in some tomb or wreckage and you had to find your way out is something you don't find in games anymore. Games today are too obsessed with either giving you A.I. companions and/or creating very active or noisy environments. You very rarely have games nowadays where it's quiet, and it's just you alone.


And the climbing actually had tension, unlike now where you can auto-grab your way to safety. Lara had a weight to her, and everytime you jumped and grabbed a ledge (for which you actually had to hold a button) you felt that weight. There was timing involved and if you misjudged your steps you wouldn't automatically reach a ledge anyway, no, you'd fall to your death.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

People didn't have much choice back then.

I think this is it, for the most part. But we shouldn't sell Tomb Raider short, it was pretty much the inventor of the 3D platformer and combined it with puzzle solving and action gameplay. For the time it was a really ambitious game, hitting at least three different genres when most games just stuck to one, while also making a gorgeous (for the time) showcase of 3d graphics and inventive use of actual 3 dimensional gameplay.

Today, however, the early Tomb Raider games exist in the same place as the Half-Life games, in that they were really groundbreaking and had great production values for their time, but today are overshadowed even by high tier indie games. Their contributions to the genre should not be overlooked, but they haven't aged well.

 

[DeliveryGodNoah_v1legacy]

I'm surprised you've played tomb raider since its a female lead

Like most games he criticizes, I sincerely doubt he has.

 

[DeliveryGodNoah_v1legacy]

I don't necessarily find the original Tomb Raider games that fantastic, but I do understand their appeal.

What you're failing to realize here, is that yes, the controls were "bad", but it was by design for the most part.

The entire game was designed around how Lara controls because the way Lara controls was meant to give a sense of realism and weight. Her controls were literally part of the puzzle. Overcoming her human clunkiness was the challenge and the skill you built up while playing.

It's not like the developers made the game based around fast-paced movement with high action gunplay, and then just happened to mess up the controls. They gave Lara the movement and gunplay controls she had and then designed the levels and gameplay around that.

I'm not saying that it was all necessarily by genius design either, I'm sure some of the clunkiness was a product of the time from being such an early 3D platformer, but they did well with what they had and made a video game that offered a unique challenge in the platforming genre rather than just doing what everyone else was.

If you wanted fast-paced, tight controlled 3D platforming, you had Mario 64. If you wanted something more realistic and tense, you had Tomb Raider.

And don't you even for a second try to compare Tomb Raider to your precious Deus Ex and System Shock 2. The games are from ENTIRELY different genres and have absolutely no business being compared.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

Boobs and legs from what I remember

 

[Trunkage]

many games of late 90s and early 00s were masterpieces still play great. games like Half life, Deus Ex, System shock 2 etc.

tomb raider on other hand is not. its gameplay has been crap since its first release. in reboot they improve camera controls but everything else they made it roller coster cinematic adventure.

As a person who played 2 out of 3 examples of 'still good games' in the last little while... No they are aging pretty badly too. Even my beloved Deus Ex.

I would never want to try to replay Tomb Raider. But I was never excited about them in the first place

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

They were pretty garbage... I think you could hold them apart due to the fact it was somewhat competent 3D platforming in an age that was struggling with 3D in general.

 

[Satinavian]

Didn't play them then.

Basically because 3D was too new and most of the time still way too ugly.

 

[JohnnyDelRay]

Honestly I didn't see it myself either. Even as a horny teen at the time I failed to see the appeal of Lara Croft's exaggerated....assets. I gave the game a go, mostly because of what friends and magazines said, and the prospect of shooting things up with dual chunky USP pistols.

Much to my dismay, the game turned out to be a clunky platformer, which quirky controls had a learning curve, and frustrating combat. The kind that makes you just want to yell at your monitor "just turn around and shoot that fucking thing, PLEASE!" Even Resident Evil was more forgiving, to my skill level anyway.

Thus I was jaded early on, and when I tried to get back in on later iterations, was still never really impressed, the graphics and controls just seemed to be stuck behind the norm, and the gameplay never seemed to be all that gripping. I do quite like the reboots tho, having played both of the recent ones, and will wait for a price drop before getting into the latest. Although much of the challenge in the tombs and combat seems to have gone extinct.

 

[Dalisclock]

I played the first one and a little bit of the second game. I have some fond memories, despite the first game feeling really uneven and not getting very far into the second one.

I did pick up the Legend/Anniversay/Underworld trilogy on Steam and someday I'm gonna actually sit down and play them, because supposedly they're the best of the older games. If nothing else, I want to see how anniversary holds up to my memories of the first game.

 

[BrawlMan]

EDIT:

Because Tomb Raider was one of the first of its kind and set the standard for realistic 3D plaftorming. after Prince of Persia 3D fucked it up. Ironic, because PoP improved itself on platforming starting with the Sands of Time trilogy. That said, I never played any Tomb Raider after the original trilogy. I was not exactly a big fan of the games, and any new ones that came afterward I responded with mostly a meh. The fact that there better female characters before, during, and after her time did not help matters. Before anyone starts: Aya Brea, Claire Redfield, Jill Valentine, Sheva Alomar, Sherry Birkin, Tyris Flare, Blaze Fielding, Lady (DMC3), Chun-Li, Elena (SF III), Maogichi Saika (Sengoku Basara), and Bayonetta.

The new games aren't much better, because it literally copies Uncharted and throws it in to a open world. Lara never develops as a character, the plot is more convoluted than any of the old-school games, and all three games themselves aren't all that challenging compared to the older titles. For Christ sake, Lara is still becoming the Tomb Raider. Say what you will about the older series, but at least she was already a tomb raider since the first game.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

There's really nothing great about them. They aren't even that good. I played through all of them again just a few years ago. The remake of the first one is still pretty badass though. The entire trilogy (Legends, Anniversary and Underworld) is still pretty damn great.

 

[CaitSeith]

Because Tomb Raider was one of the first of its kind and set the standard for realistic 3D plaftorming, after Prince of Persia 3D fucked it up. Ironic, because PoP improved itself on platforming starting with the Sands of Time trilogy. That said, I never played any Tomb Raider after the original trilogy. I was not exactly a big fan of the games, and any news ones that came afterward I responded with mostly a meh. The fact that there better female characters before, during, and after her time did not help matters. Before anyone starts: Aya Brea, Claire Redfield, Jill Valentine, Sheva Alomar, Sherry Birkin, Tyris Flare, Blaze Fielding, Lady (DMC3), Chun-Li, Elena (SF III), Maogichi Saika (Sengoku Basara), and Bayonetta.

The new games aren't much better, because it literally copies Uncharted and throws it in to a open world. Lara never develops as a character, the plot is more convoluted than any of the old-school games, and all three games themselves aren't all that challenging compared to the older titles. For Christ sake, Lara is still becoming the Tomb Raider. Say what you will about the older series, but at least she was already a tomb raider since the first game.

Tomb Raider was released years before Prince of Persia 3D. I'm still surprised how hard PoP3D dropped the ball (almost as much as with Forbidden Forest 3D).