The recent reboot of the “Tomb Raider” franchise by Crystal Dynamics has found success with their last two games. They have broken away from the traditional action/puzzle solving type games of old, and opting for more survival based metroidvania style. Sadly, the most recent iteration “Shadow of the Tomb Raider” has dropped the ball as the conclusion of the trilogy.
In her quest to dismantle Trinity, an Illuminati-esque organization, Lara Croft travels to Mexico on the heels of the leader of Trinity’s high council Pedro Dominguez. Lara rushes to get ahead of Dominguez and inadvertently triggers the apocalypse. Lara chases Dominguez to the lost city of Paititi and becomes embroiled in a revolution where the fate of the city, and the world, hang in the balance. After steadily developing Lara’s character for two games, “Shadow of the Tomb Raider” is a jumbled mass of clichés. It shows Lara being hot headed and brash in the beginning, and becoming understanding of how her actions affect others in the end. Everywhere in between, Lara is on either side and nowhere in the middle. There is no steady development, instead there are moments where Lara is filled with self-doubt and those short moments serve as a transition between her optimism and cynicism. Lara comes across as two dimensional and boring, despite a phenomenal performance by Camilla Luddington. “Shadow of the Tomb Raider” has similar issues with its narrative in that it is a jumbled mass of events. The plot develops so quickly that it becomes hard to find your footing. The player fights to settle into scenes while the game rushes them through. It felt lazy, like an attempt to justify larger action sequences that never came. The action sequences were fun, but were so far and few between. Gunplay is enjoyable, but shallow. There are many similar games that nail third-person shooting, and in this game it felt like an afterthought. Stealth is where things shine, but with so few chances to use it, one of the best features of “Shadow of the Tomb Raider” gets buried in mediocrity. With the lack of action sequences the game relies on its platforming for gameplay. Platforming is fun, but it’s nothing new. The one true standout in this game is the challenge tombs and puzzles. Puzzles have been a big part of “Tomb Raider” since the series inception. This game continues the tradition in wonderful fashion. The puzzles are that perfect mix of challenge and reward. Puzzles are accomplishable, but not easy. It’s a razor thin line to walk, and despite this game’s issues, it does this well. This game does offer an interesting approach to difficulty. It’s a dynamic system in which combat, platforming and puzzle difficulty are handled separately. When at higher difficulties the game removes hints to players for puzzles and removes visual ques that games typically give players regarding to what can be climbed. It is a unique idea that will probably seen again in the future. In the lead up to the game, focus was put on exploration and the game world. The sad thing is that the world is boring. The city of Paititi is dull and lifeless, and I never felt the need or want to explore the “wilderness”. The jungle, similar to Paititi, is bland. The game looks beautiful, but it’s wasted on this game. “Shadow of the Tomb Raider” falls into the typical trap of sequels. Too much was changed and the game got away from what made it so special. “Shadow of the Tomb Raider” is a mediocre game that gets lost in the shuffle when compared to the amazing releases of 2018. Score: 6/10
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Before their collapse, Telltale was able to launch the second episode of “The Walking Dead: The Final Season”
Episode 2: Suffer the Children begins where the first episode leaves off. AJ had just shot Marlon after he revealed that he had been giving members of the community to another group for protection. Despite Marlon’s actions the rest of the kids at the school fear AJ for his actions. In the end they decide to exile Clementine and AJ. Shortly after being brought beyond the safe zone, AJ and Clem run are attacked by members of the group Marlon was giving people to. One of the people of this group winds up being Lily, a character from the first season of the game. In their escape AJ ends up being shot. Clem returns to the school, seeking aid for AJ and warning them of an impending raid. That point marks the end of the first act of the episode. It’s a good start that sets up the action for the rest for the episode. Where things fall apart is in the second act. In this act Clem teams up with a few other kids from the school to get barbed wire from the greenhouse. The greenhouse had been overrun previously by walkers, so this would not be as simple a task as it sounds. The problem with this arc is that it is a simplistic approach to show how Clem mends fences after Marlon’s death. One of the people going with Clem to the greenhouse was Mitch. He was one of the kids who hated Clem the most. It gets the job done, but is superficial and could have used more time. The act ends right before a two week time skip and only last around a half an hour. The skip is used as a way to avoid the healing process between the group and Clem. It might have been better to skip this 30 minutes of content and just go straight to the time skip. The second act just slows things down with non-crucial info. It almost seemed as a way to kill time. This chunk could also have been improved by including Louis. Throughout the first half of the episode, Louis seems to be unable to decide how he feels about AJ or Clem. He will go from being kind to hating them all in the same sentence. Maybe giving him more screen time, instead of relegating him as a side character this episode would have been able this out instead of leaving it looking like bad writing. The end of the episode with the siege of the school is the standout of the episode. It fuels the further conflict between the group of raider and the kids and the action is pretty good. The episode ends with a few of the students being kidnapped, setting up the next episode. Episode 2 is the typical middle episode for one of these games. It acts as more of a transition point for a broader narrative. It is enjoyable enough and has its issues, but does its job. Now it is up to Skybound to take this game past the finish line. Score: 7/10 Insomniac Games has been an industry staple for a while now, with franchises like “Spyro the Dragon” and “Ratchet and Clank”. Insomniac is back not with an original game, but one based off of one of the most recognizable comic book series: “Spider-Man”.
In this interpretation of “Spider-Man”, Peter Parker is in his mid-20s and has been Spider-Man for eight years. Forgoing the typical origin story, “Spider-Man” drops players straight into the action. The game opens on Peter waking up, donning his suit and assisting the police in a raid on Wilson Fisk. This opening sequence serves as a tutorial for the various basic skills of spider man: web swinging, fighting etc. Once Fisk has been brought down, he claims that he was the only thing keeping the city in check. Without him, the cities various criminal organizations will tear the city apart in a fight for dominance. Shortly after Fisk’s arrest a new criminal power emerges. These men wearing demon masks begin to raid Fisk properties seeking resources for a coming war. These Demons set in motion a chain of events that will bring the city to its knees and force Peter to make the most difficult choices that any person will ever have to make. “Spider-Man” delivers one of the most fluid narrative experience in memory. The main story line flows together so perfectly that it is almost difficult to see when certain story arcs end and others begin. There is no fat to be cut out in this story. Either it is giving players character moments that give them a look into how the events of the game are affecting the cast, or scenes that push the narrative forward and it all pieces together so seamlessly. The writers at Insomniac have delivered on one of the best Spider-Man scripts ever. Each character written in a way that stays true to their roots, but still feel unique to this game. This is all aided by a cast of voice talent that each deliver a stunning performance. Even more minor characters are written and performed at top quality. There are sequences in the story that felt off. During these moments players leave Spider-Man and take control of Mary Jane Watson or Miles Morales. These are stealth sequences that show what Spider-Man’s allies are doing to aid him in his objectives. Wholesale, these segments are unnecessary. They are interesting and give players a new type of gameplay, but they are short and could have been removed without impacting the game. These sequences are interesting and well done, they just slow down the experience. On other side of the coin from narrative is gameplay. Like a mirror of the narrative, the gameplay in “Spider-Man” is nearly flawless. Despite a few quirks, Insomniac managed to keep combat and web swinging down to as few buttons as possible and still manages to keep a fair amount of complexity. Combat, for example, is streamed down to the square, triangle, circle and top two shoulder buttons. Combat flows extremely easily and racking up combos becomes second nature. There is a time that everything clicks and players master the systems. Keeping it to a smaller number of buttons actually make it easier to master. Web swinging is similar. Everything related to swinging and running are relegated down to the R2 button. Like combat, it is all about retaining momentum. A lot of Spider-Man games have players slam into walls and various other occurrences that break the flow and makes swinging a chore. This game keeps the player in motion. By holding down the R2 button when players hit a wall they don’t stop, they run up the wall and keep moving. Players have a great amount of control when in the air and it make swinging as natural as breathing. This is the first game to make player truly feel like Spider-Man. Outside of the main story, there are plenty of other activities to engage with. Sadly, most of these activities have the depth of a puddle. There are four different side activities that entail to fighting waves of enemies. Combat is fun and each of the activities involve a different faction of enemies, but there really is not much difference between them. Even though the enemies are of different factions, the enemy types are basically the same barring a few subtle differences, but the basic strategies are the same. Peter can collect backpacks that he has left around the city and take pictures of landmarks. There is a simplistic joy in completing these, but at their core are just collection missions. There are other activities that play off of other characters from Spider-Man lore that are never seen. These activities become busy work with a loose narrative explanation. For a game consisting of interesting villains, “Spider-Man” is full of unsatisfying boss fights. With the diversity in villains that inhabit the world of “Spider-Man”, it would make sense that each fight would unique with different strategies. In reality the boss fights all boil down stun/web up the enemy, then punch them until they fall down. It steals away all sense of accomplishment. There are fights with normal, street level enemies that are more challenging than these boss fights. These were chances to do something over the top and Insomniac decided to put these bland fights in there instead. “Spider-Man” is a phenomenal game with a few small flaws that should be a part of any PlayStation owner’s library. Score: 9/10 The minor flaws hold this game back from having that perfect score. Despite that, this game is amazing and one of the most fun experiences this year. |
AuthorI am A.J. Goelz. I'm a gamer first and a writer second. I hope you enjoy the content on this page and check out the rest of my content on YouTube. Archives
April 2019
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