Rise of the Tomb Raider - Xbox One Review - Buy this game if you want to creep out your neighbours! - SPOILERS

Many moons ago, Josh reviewed the first instalment of Crystal Dynamics' Tomb Raider revival and spoke in detail about how much he enjoyed it. A few months later, I got my hands on it and loved it to pieces also, but will the latest episode hold its ground to its epic older sibling?

No.

In all reality, its a huge disappointment that has left me rather bitter. The previous Tomb Raider was an all-round quality game. Its visuals were impeccable, gameplay was fun, different and based heavily on survival and the story used that. It developed the origin story to one of gaming's most prominent characters that is loved the world around, whether its through movies or gaming. Rise of the Tomb Raider is a shit show.

Every single advert I saw brought huge attention to their review quotes, the Daily Star in particular said "Visually Stunning" and threw a whopping 5 stars its way. So, lets begin with that. First of all, its the Daily Star, so I don't need to go much further with that. Secondly, why are the visuals selected over everything else within the game? Well that my friends is because that is all this game has. Beautiful landscapes, levels, tombs and character details do not make a quality game, just great quality cutscenes. And trust me, you'll see plenty of those. In fact, so much so that you'll wonder if you're the one playing the game. Now, don't get me wrong, I play Telltale games and they're big, explosive adventures with a storyline so gripping, you can't help but feel like you've lost a little bit of your soul when you lose a beloved character, and the majority is a sequence of cutscenes with varying quick time events (QTEs) and doesn't have much in the way of raw gameplay. But this. This is shameful.

So, its "Visually Stunning" and hell, I can agree with that. Until it comes down to animations. When you move around the map, all is fine, its when you are involved in the action that it really falters. Running through endless hallways from a threat that can't hit a barn with a minigun from 30 yards is something you experience often and explosions miles away from you fling you whether you were near it or not. Say you're a little slow and something crashes through the wall ahead of you, instantly you're thrown into the wall as if it had actually hit and that is just poor planning. Like it or not, this shit happens way too often. Climbing up rock faces, boundaries are ridiculous and cause Lara to spaz out trying as she tries to work out which direction she wants to go and if you approach a ledge, you're lurched up onto it with a body that seems to be able to do the impossible. Not to mention the absolutely retarded falling mechanic which often freezes her mid-jump as she floats to the ledge that she may or may not decide to grab which results in a frozen corpse falling down the crevasse with a solid thud at the bottom.

On the topics of thuds, I've got to be honest, I would have loved a lot more focus on sound and music. One thing that should have been worked on is the voice acting. Sure, Camilla Luddington does a

good job as Lara. We saw that in the previous, but lets get to the brass tacks, I don't want to listen to a symphony of her moans and groans as she jumps across sections in what can only be described as a mass orgy porn flick. With little knowledge of what is actually going on next door, your neighbour may never look at you the same. Not to mention that any element of stealth is thrown out the window as the groans echo across the cavern like smashing a plate in a crowded restaurant.

What of gameplay? Well, as I said, stealth is something that honestly makes no sense. Its use in the game is to reinforce the survival aspect involved but also the fragility of Croft, however its of no use. Very few sections require stealth and when they do, you're tasked with killing everyone in the area rather than moving around and escaping the danger without turning into a one-woman army. Not forgetting the fact that you fart loud enough and everyone knows where you are, even if you've skulked off quietly in another direction. So, what happens next? Well, that fragile girl that is fighting for survival pulls out an AK-47 and mows down anyone near and crafts a menagerie of grenades and weaponry to kill them with varying degrees of brutality. Now I've spoken about character animations, but lets talk about her role as a historian. This "archaeologist" is armed from the get go but also has a distinct lack of interest in preserving anything. Everything she touches breaks. This so called archaeologist has broken everything to get one thing that, spoiler alert, she breaks! She kills hundreds of people, murders countless animals to get new crafting materials and destroys anything she touches. At Least Indie had the decency to kill Nazis. But lets not stop there! How about all that progression she made in the original game? She's forgotten it all. Literally everything has gone. It seems as if she survived, only to suffer a concussion when she got on the plane home and that really halts the immersion for a returning player. Perhaps if there was a bigger push towards weapon upgrades, progression and skills could have been done through that medium, not by erasing all previous progress.

Now we hit the real big issue, the story. Honestly it is a huge cluster fuck of sexual tension and daddy issues that make pornographic plot lines seem clever and highly under appreciated. Trident, a group of bible bashing Christians are after a tool for immortality that was created by Jesus. We track it down, they follow us, a twist occurs that was as obvious as an Afro-American at a KKK clan meeting, we find Jesus and escape together with the sexual tension so thick, you'd give Donald Trump a run for his money. So we are up against a bunch of clueless, delirious, religious nut jobs with a shit ton of money. Only to find out that this Trident force aren't done yet! We've got another one on route, just this time we might get away without the infuriating daddy issues that turned a survivalist into a drag.

Its not hard, I'm sure you've caught my drift by this point. Its not the Tomb Raider I wanted. Its not what should have been. You can't polish a turd and it seems like the graphics department tried their best to cover up the story that seemed apt for a teen novel. Including the removal of the rather enjoyable multiplayer scene, this game has taken a huge leap backwards rather than innovating and giving their loyal fans hope in a system of games that annualise the same thing year on year for inflated prices only to be slapped with a season pass on launch that costs an extra 50% that adds little to the experience in a game more baron than Katie Hopkin's soul.

6/10 - This is becoming all to common.

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel - Quicky Review

 

I'm rather disappointed by this new Borderlands. I was hooked from the day they released info on the playable characters and that Claptrap was actually one of them. Being my favourite character and all, I was excited to get my hands on it at this years EGX, only to feel that the game wasn't as smooth as I hoped. "Perhaps that's because I'm playing on a PC that has a really low sensitivity setting" I thought to myself. Alas, I was wrong. The game has an awesome premise. Jump back to the beginning with the introduction of Jack before he became Handsome Jack - The Hyperion boss.
My problems stem more from that actual gameplay and its lack of change. If something works, don't fix it seems to be what was going through their minds on creating this. The game has had many issues with it through the years and nothing has been done to really address these issues. One of this issues are the image and texture rendering. I run the most recent Xbox 360 and hasn't incurred any damage to give it reason to run slowly or have any issues but it was having huge problems loading in textures and left some areas resembling smeared feces. It was always something that bugged me with the previous games. Although they are quite old now and software was different, I just let it slide but when you have the huge increase of technology in consoles in preparation for the next gen releases, things like this shouldn't be happening more often that you find a hooker in the red light district. The style of the game is great and with them working with Telltale games to create an episodical based game is something that could really flourish but the here and now is rather disparaging. Its not just wandering about the map and loading in areas poorly, its also mid combat where the game cannot cope and begins to grind and drop frames rapidly, albeit momentarily, it is another common occurrence that severely hampers the flow of the action.

Now combat also had its fair share of problems. The slowness of movement does little to help with my play style and comfort but my main angst is with the balancing. Playing as Claptrap, a robot, you would think rigid aim with weapons would be something rather standard but aiming down the sights of a rifle will only aid you if you wish to hit anything a mile away from your target in an attempt to scare them off. As a character, he has always been funny and I will always choose him over anyone else, yet he seems extremely underpowered. Combined with his Vault Hunter.EXE power and skill tree it can all do more to screw you over rather than the ones you should be killing. From Claptrap to general enemies, you won't find anyone actually level with you for a fair fight. If the enemy is equal to below your level, you waste them faster than Charlie Sheen with some 7gram rocks and if the enemy is higher than you, run. Run like the wind. If you can't get into cover quick enough, get riddled by every single round they fire. Their aim is impeccable and enough to kill in seconds. The balance for everything is grossly disproportionate. Some bosses where hard as nails while the very last boss only took a pistol and a repetitive action to kill.

So, terrible balance, the accuracy of a blind man firing a 50.Cal and a piss poor skill tree that hinders more than benefits. What do we really have left? squat. Sure the story was quite good and a nice insight into who Jack was prior to going crazier and the process that unfolds but it does become a real pain in the ass when you feel you've reached an end only to be slapped with another thing that requires you to run back and forth for another hour just so you are at a level equal to the quest. Its not something that has sat very well with me. I enjoyed the first 2 but I'm seeing nothing exciting, innovative or game changing in a series that was growing in popularity so well. I'm thoroughly disappointed. With huge potential, came great disappointment. At the price of £30, its not too bad but I suggest, no, I implore you to get it when it drops into the 15-20 range to tide you over between releases that are going to be far better. 6/10.