Prologue
The Tomb Raider series is one that began its life on the Sega Saturn. It is also what was responsible for the original Playstation’s success in the mid 90’s. Throughout the years it has gone through few development studios and many more changes in her looks and the logo itself. Every entry into the series usually adds more features to her abilities and new weapons. One thing has remained true upon the years. It’s an adventurous platforming, third-person shooter about British archeologist, Lara Croft. Underworld expands on the back-story of Lara and gives the player insight into her inner workings about her family. The game starts off at Croft Manor as its under siege in sort of a prologue mission. Once you escape and learn the basic moves of the game your treated to average level cutscenes. The gameplay is mix of fast paced shooting sections and some slow and somewhat annoying puzzle solving that at times is just no fun at all. The climbing and swinging is reminiscent of recent games such as Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. It’s not as fine tuned as the later game but it works pretty well. You get an Adrenaline meter in this chapter of the series that will let you go into slow motion and aim for vital headshots on beasts and goons you fight. It also features a new melee combat system where you use the face buttons to fight. Crystal Dynamics have also added interactive cutscenes called Adrenaline Moments. For example: you control Lara as she’s running down a hallway as a buildings about to explode. It adds to the feel of the game and fun factor. Read more