PROs:
✅ A more seasoned and “hot” version of Lara Croft.
✅ A beautiful world that is fun to explore, with an open-zones design.
✅ An enjoyable, cinematic story with great voice acting for Lara.
✅ Mechanically improved, with more gameplay features and expanded traversal tools.
✅ Stealth and enemy AI are a noticeable improvement over the first game.
✅ The “Baba Yaga” DLC is a great, worthwhile addition.
✅ The character model that inspired a lot of great “fan art/animations.” ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
✅ Still great thing that you can keep exploring game after finishing the story
CONs:
❌ The assisted climbing mechanics can feel clumsy and imprecise. First game felt much better.
❌ Combat feels trivial on Keyboard & Mouse due to easy aiming.
❌ The UI is cluttered with unnecessary elements like collectible cards and credits.
❌ A lot of the skills in the upgrade tree feel pointless.
❌ Guns have a weak and unsatisfying sound design.
❌ VR DLC Doesn’t seem to work (at least couldn’t get it work for quest3)
❌ Fair amount of game bugs
Comments:
I mean what can I add. It’s a sequel to casual story driven exploration game. Lara is now seasoned action adventurer so expect increased number of explosions and dopamine, Lara cute naivety is mostly gone and she grew to be much hotter.
The world design is a big step up. The game takes an open-hub approach, with large zones that you gradually unlock with new tools. This makes exploration very satisfying, though it presents a choice: you can either explore partially as you go or save all the collectible hunting for the end. I chose the former for a more diverse experience. The tombs are cinematic and beautiful to discover.
Combat is more action-packed but also quite easy if you’re using a mouse and keyboard. I switched from a gamepad halfway through because aiming at fast-moving targets was becoming annoying. On the plus side, the stealth mechanics and general enemy AI are much better this time around.
Didn’t touch any of challenge game modes nor co-op, but it exists for those who want jolly co-op.
In conclusion it’s a good game with a lot of more advancements on mechanics and much better world design. Although story feels a bit weaker with certain climbing awkwardness and some clutter content makes it a bit worse in comparison first game of the franchise. But overall it’s still enjoyable laid back tomb raiding exploration game.
🌟 Total score: 7/10 🌟
Game status:
✅ Finished
Reviewing info: How I review/rate & other info on my website through my profile. (desozone)