DAY 72 / GAME 72
Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light
I hadn't really touched a Tomb Raider game since Tomb Raider 3. But when Tomb Raider switched hands from being developed by CORE to Crystal Dynamics starting with Tomb Raider: Legend, I started to really enjoy the series again. So after two good runs with Legend and Underworld I was pumped for a third game, but when Guardian of Light was announced instead of another full game I was somewhat disappointed.
And so, I really put this one on the backburner. A couple years later I never heard anything particularly bad about it. At one point Tim Schafer was tweeting about how he was having a great time playing the co-op multiplayer. With all that I figured it was worth giving another look. I picked it up on sale on Xbox Live Arcade for under 10$ and I had more than got my money's worth.
Guardian of Light looks quite a bit different from your typical Tomb Raider game, but in most aspects it's still quite the same. It uses a fixed isometric view instead of the typical 3rd person camera that floats behind the player. You control Lara Smash TV style where one analog stick controls movement direction and one stick controls aiming, all on the same plane. The entire game revolves around armed combat and puzzle solving to progress through the levels.
Overall it's just great. There's something about the change of view that freshens up the series instead of taking away from it. I really enjoyed the variety in the available levels, weapons, monsters and environments. The whole game looks gorgeous. It uses the same engine as the previous two games and incorporates a ton of great physics including a bunch of puzzle components. (Rolling boulders, etc.)
Guardian of Light isn't a particularly short game, like a lot of other download-only titles. But it is still small enough that it caters well to multiple playthroughs and to people who would like a more casual Lara Croft game. I really loved what they did with it and went from lacking any interest in the game to loving it and begging for a sequel. What I've read suggests that this may be a series of games like this one titled Lara Croft as opposed to the typical Tomb Raider. I'm really hoping this is true.
Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light
And so, I really put this one on the backburner. A couple years later I never heard anything particularly bad about it. At one point Tim Schafer was tweeting about how he was having a great time playing the co-op multiplayer. With all that I figured it was worth giving another look. I picked it up on sale on Xbox Live Arcade for under 10$ and I had more than got my money's worth.
Guardian of Light isn't a particularly short game, like a lot of other download-only titles. But it is still small enough that it caters well to multiple playthroughs and to people who would like a more casual Lara Croft game. I really loved what they did with it and went from lacking any interest in the game to loving it and begging for a sequel. What I've read suggests that this may be a series of games like this one titled Lara Croft as opposed to the typical Tomb Raider. I'm really hoping this is true.
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