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My co-admin Terenete went to Reboot InfoGamer Expo in Zagreb. Check out more photos here. 

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Achtung!
The following text contains some
spoilers (though I did try to make it as spoiler free as I could) and my own (OMG!) personal (OMG!!!) opinion (OMFG!!!!) on the
game.

As a classic fan,
I was obviously hurt deeply in 2005 when Tomb Raider Legend came out. The new
biography that pushed Lara closer to the Tomb Raider films (which I can’t stand
btw) made me cringe. Tomb Raider Anniversary and Underworld though were on the
right track but when I thought she would finally focus on travels and artefacts
rather than her mother, a reboot happened.

I liked Tomb
Raider 2013, overall, that is. Since I read Lara’s biography in the manual for the
original Tomb Raider I always wanted to play as her during her early days when
she survived a plane crash. TR 2013 was a right start for a new lineage of Tomb
Raider. Yes, there were a few things I wasn’t happy about (and most of them
kinda were carried on into ROTTR) but overall it was a great game.

When I first saw
the gameplay footage for ROTTR at E3 I was moved. I had huge hopes for this game
and I was not disappointed. The locations, puzzles and tombs are absolutely
amazing. Enemies are a little bit too stupid though.

Lara looks great. Even
on Xbox 360 she looks fantastic.

I can only imagine how gorgeous this will be
on PC (not long to wait now). Unfortunately, if locations give us the original
Tomb Raider motifs and feels, Lara still has her ponytail and not a braid; it’s
those tiny things like the colour of her eyes and her hairdo that make Lara who
she is. Maybe in the next game she will opt for a more practical braid than
ponytail.

Those of you who are
butthurt by people’s outcry for a braid and defend the ponytail with ‘oh they would have a ponytail in classic
games, they just couldn’t coz of technology’ are wrong; PS2 could easily
support a ponytail yet in the Angel of Darkness she has a braid. I’ll stop
there, coz I made myself a promise to stop arguing with ‘fans’ like this as
they will defend any single decision their favourite developer makes without
realising that it is normal (and in fact it is important) to be critical about
games (or frankly – any media) you like. Imagine if they would change 90% of
the plot in the Lord of the Rings, think Tolkien fans would approve coz it has
“Lord of the Rings” in its title?

Same goes for her dual
pistols and her outfits.  I do have a
good feeling that in the next game she will be gearing up as a proper Tomb
Raider so that’s when we probably will see her wearing great “Lara’ish” outfits
and shoot from her iconic guns.  The
ending implied that anyway. Until then we have a wonderful puzzle game called
Lara Croft Go to fulfil the need of the 100% original Tomb Raider dose.

Don’t get me wrong
though. Rise of the Tomb Raider has a lot of motifs and links with classic Tomb
Raider. In fact, this is as close to the classics as Crystal Dynamics has ever
been (excluding TR:Anniversary; that is a heavily based on the original Tomb
Raider motifs).

Yes, the game has a
LOT in common with TR 2013; game mechanics and even some sound effects remain nearly
identical. That doesn’t mean that those who didn’t enjoy the previous game
won’t like this one. It has so many improvements that will completely grab you.
Huge locations offer you tons of fun exploring them. There’s no open-world but
you don’t really need it for such a game. I liked Tomb Raider 2013 and I
welcome some of the mechanics that remained in the Rise of the Tomb Raider.

There’s a blonde
haired character in the game called Ana, (or Hannah if you’re Camilla
Luddington) and I don’t even think it’s a spoiler thing to say as I’m sure
every Tomb Raider fan will know – There’s no such thing as a GOOD BLONDE HAIRED
female in Tomb Raider games. I suppose binary opposites in characters’ looks
and personalities can be allowed for simplicity of narrative.

There’s a number of
optional challenge tombs which make this game stand out from its predecessor. I
managed to play the demo of the game at EGX and actually wasn’t so impressed
with the Prophet’s tomb as all the puzzles revolved around water level; however
the number of tombs and the broad selection of puzzles do indeed make this game
an absolute gem in Tomb Raider series. While the main campaign will take you
about 9 hours (depending on the difficulty settings) a huge number of
collectables will make you play this game for many more hours.

The Xbox 360 version
has very decent graphics but there is a number of bugs, some of which will require
you to reload the game. The last locations are particularly poorly tested, but
Nixxes will probably fix these soon as they already released a patch that
improves the graphics, implying that they will still work on the game.

Locations are simply
stunning; even on Xbox 360 they make you want to stop and look around. Siberia
reminds me heavily of Tomb Raider II: Golden Mask while Syria simply returns to
the classic Tomb Raider atmosphere. Unfortunately, Syria is a bit short and I
really wanted to explore it more.

Microtransactions
aren’t necessary and I don’t see anyone actually spending money on these
(unless you’re really bad at collecting coins). I am concerned though that they
will become a trend and the devs will make them much more necessary for future
game.

And then there’s Laura’s
voice… or as Ostercy in his preview for Tomb
Raider 2013 wrote “We’ve
been introduced to an American actress born in England who is either
not very good at an English accent, or who is deliberately putting on a bit of
an American accent because that’s allegedly how the inhabitants of modern
cosmopolitan London speak”. Thankfully, the game has a fully dubbed
Russian language version; the irony is that I learned English because of Tomb
Raider but now I have to play it in Russian in order not to risk dath whilst looking for answers to the kwestins. In fact, CD decided to keep
over 90% of Lara’s soundbites from the previous game too, so all them forced
grunts of Britney Spears trying to sing death metal are still there; Russian
actress is great though, no complaints there at all! The accent does sound as
forced as ever but it is not as bad as it was in the previous game. Ostercy, if
you read this please update us on what you think! I personally think the Queen
of England would tell Lara to ‘tone it down, love’ XD

The amount of mocap used in this game is
impressive and it does make the characters move more naturally, but this is
where MOVA Tech actually looks incredible and bad at the same time as it
captures overacting too so even simple dialogue between Lara and some other
character turns into a South American telenovela or
pantomime.

And here comes the
exclusivity bit. It is a big shame that the Tomb Raider community, already
heavily segmented by Core, Crystal, comic books and film love/haters, is now
even further divided due to the exclusivity deal.

Unfortunately, I can’t
enjoy this game fully. You see, every time a new game would be out I’d be very
excited and talk to my friends as we all play it. Now it seems like I’m the
only Xbox owner; my friends are waiting for a PC or PS4 version. I feel uneasy
playing the game. I feel like whilst I’m playing it I’m robbing the pleasure
off my friends and every single status update on social media where I mention
I’m playing the game hurts them. It’s a very odd and awful feeling. Even my
co-admin can’t play the game. I’ve made so many friends online because of Tomb
Raider, many of which I met in real life and I now feel that the community is more
divided than ever. Very disappointing; and no, Xbox fanboys, writing comments
about OMG IT’S A TIMED EXCLUSIVE won’t help me feel better.

In conclusion, you have
probably read reviews from fans where they have wrote something like “it’s a
good game but it’s not Tomb Raider”, I think Rise of the Tomb Raider is a good
game and definitely IS a Tomb Raider game (at least to a significant extent).
If you liked Tomb Raider 2013 then you will definitely enjoy the Rise of the
Tomb Raider. If you didn’t – still give this game a chance, it’s definitely
worth it.

A few hours into the
game and I still haven’t heard SAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM, that’s already a good reason
for you to consider playing this game!

As for the most
important question – is it worth buying an Xbox One to play this game? This
really depends on your situation:

·
If you own
a good PC I’d avoid buying an XB1 and would probably spend money on upgrades.
You can get a used Xbox 360 for about £60 (or less) if you’re that impatient to
play it. PC version will definitely feature better graphics so investing in an
XB1 is not worth it (as long as you can run GTA5 on high details your PC should
be fine). You have until early 2016 to upgrade your PC. That’s enough time to
save up!

·
I suppose
the above applies if you have a PS4; get XB360 if you’re desperate and play on that
until it’s out on PS4 (with probably some additional and exclusive content as
compensation for such a long wait)

·
In all
other cases, I’d suggest getting an XB1. Then again, many people do not really
care about graphics and the Xbox 360 version looks OKAY anyway. They patched it
recently to add ‘wet’ effects too. I personally don’t like TressFX hair.

My heart goes out to those who can’t play the game just yet. Stay strong guys, there’s a light at the end of this tomb <3

The post Sit Back, Relax, and Enjoy Your Rise [of the Tomb Raider Review] appeared first on Tomb of Ash.

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Jill de Jong, the official Lara Croft model for the Angel of Darkness, sent us this awesome pic! This Tomb Raider overload was taken by Debbie Lash; the manager for look-a-like models at Eidos.

The post Jill de Jong appeared first on Tomb of Ash.

MORE PICS

Full on recap video is coming in future weeks. Watch this space!

The post PLAY Expo 2015 Photo Recap appeared first on Tomb of Ash.

Tomb Raider III sees a number of locations that are set in
London. One such level is Aldwych; an abandoned tube station populated with
thugs and rodents with whom Lara must fight in order to reach a small Masonic
Temple and advance onto the next level. Survivor Reborn and I recently visited
the real Aldwych Tube Station, located in the City of Westminster where Surrey
Street meets Strand. Once known as Strand station upon its opening in 1907, it
closed in 1994 due to lack of use. 

Piccadilly, o RLY?

Parts of the station and the running tunnels
were used during both world wars to shelter artworks from London’s public
galleries and museums from bombing. 

Since it had a low passenger flow, the
station had long been popular as a filming location even when it was open, and
has appeared as itself and as other London Underground stations in a number of
films (28 Weeks Later (2007), V for Vendetta (2006), Sherlock (2014) and many
others). In recognition of its historical significance, the station is a Grade
II listed building.

Andy Sandham, the creator of London levels in Tomb Raider
III was very interested in abandoned tube stations at the time and even though
Andy’s vision of Aldwych does differ from the actual station, the real Aldwych
doesn’t have escalators and its staircase is actually a spiral for example. 

Staircase in Aldwych

There are places where the level completely copies the actual station. Such places will make any hard-core Tomb Raider fan visiting the station grin with the thought OH WOW I’VE BEEN HERE.

Another significant difference is the Masonic Temple in the
game (or maybe there is one somewhere in the real Aldwych? Hidden from public
eyes). Andy “wanted to try and get in as much ‘London lore’ as possible in
that area” by adding such a temple to the station.

Both the level and the actual Aldwych have this earie
atmosphere. It featured in an episode of Most Haunted Episode 19:

The track and infrastructure are maintained in operational
condition and a train of ex-Northern line 1972 tube stock is permanently
stabled on the branch.  This train can be
driven up and down the branch for filming.

The ancient elevator is not in working order though. There
are in fact three lift shafts, able to accommodate two elevators each, but only
one shaft was actually finished and supplied with two elevators. The other two
remained empty. 

The physical connection with the Piccadilly line northbound
tracks remains, but requires manual operation.

The level features a secret platform that you can only
access with a flight mode mod, as the train will kill you as you approach to it
otherwise. The platform is empty and there’s nothing there really, it looks
like an unfinished bit of the level. Andy assumes “that must have been a test
area?” He did “spend a lot of time making little extra bits… although I presume
this was just a texture test I was doing?”

Notably one of the real Aldwych’s walls has been used as a
test area for tiles. 

 “The secret [of the unused platform in the level] is
unfortunately lost in the mists of my addled brain!” (Sandham, 2015). See our short video from the station:

Additional Media:

Andy Sandham Interview Part 1 and Part 2

Our photos from Aldwych Station

Special thanks:

Andy Sandham, Jonathon Cooper.

The post Exploring Aldwych – the Real Location from Tomb Raider III appeared first on Tomb of Ash.

I’m officially ready for Eurogamer weekend. Can you guess the franchise I like? 

The post 2015 – I’m officially ready for Eurogamer weekend appeared first on Tomb of Ash.

Weeks before my journey I had to upgrade my equipment since I wanted to provide a good quality
video recap of my experience as well as take lots of good photos. Investing in that equipment paid off as I managed to provide good quality media and my video
recap is currently in production so stay tuned.

Equipment is one thing but I also like to attend important expos covered in Tomb Raider. I devised a
plan to wear a different Tomb Raider t-shirt along with suitable jeans and footwear each day. All custom hand-painted! IE:

I took the responsibility of representing my communities very serious. I purchased an
unlimited data American sim card with the help of my American friend Tatiana. I didn’t want to rely on the mercy of public Wi-Fi.

And so I started packing. I actually got carried away and packed up to the limit of 23 kilos.
Most of the luggage was photo and video equipment, clothes and hair products (I can’t be on camera looking like Kesha).

After a night out in Manchester I went to the airport at 7 AM. I must say that I’m normally a very reticent
person, you really can’t get me excited about anything, but as I was sitting in the duty free of Manchester airport it started to get to me. I started thinking
about my past and how Tomb Raider games literally saved my life. While waiting for my flight I collected my thoughts into a post I wrote on the subject.

Finally I was airborne. I had to take a connecting flight at Washington Dulles. It was a long
long loooooong flight. Thankfully United has Wi-Fi on board so I was spamming people for most of the flight.

At LAX I was greeted by a driver who took me to the Hilton Hotel by Universal Studios. I briefly
took a shower and I, along with most of the ambassadors, left to explore the Universal City Walk in the epic quest for something to eat.

The following day we had a short briefing regarding our agenda. We were also given these amazing personalised gifts:

Later that day we went to the Walk of Fame, had our dinner and went to see Jurassic World in 3D at the
famous Chinese Theatre.

The next day was absolute madness. We had a 7AM start so we could go to the Xbox Media Briefing where the
first gameplay of the Rise of the Tomb Raider would be shown. We got on our bus and set off. The traffic in Los Angeles is terrible and the roads are worse. My
arse would personally recognise every single bump and give them names. After about an hour of driving (and therefore passing James, Chris, John, Lewis,
Hamid, Jake and hundreds of other road bumps) we finally arrived.

Upon arrival we were given glitzy Xbox necklaces that would flash in sync with various presentations.

I probably shouldn’t really describe my impressions of the gameplay as you have probably seen it yourself. However, it was a breath-taking experience to see it there and then rather than in front of a monitor. I also got goose bumps when I saw the German Shepherd in Fallout 4! It really reminded me of my late dog.

The new Xbox controller also looks amazing. Definitely will get it for my PC. I already had
my eye on HoloLens and the presentation totally sold it to me. As for getting
an Xbox 1 to play Rise…I have got an impressive gaming laptop (Microsoft platform),  I have a Surface Pro 3 tablet (Microsoft), I’ll be getting HoloLens (Microsoft). Not getting a console though.
I’m very loyal to my brands but as a PC gamer I don’t consider buying a console a reasonable investment. Though I still will be able to play the game in
November. More on this later!

Later that same day we had dinner and personal interviews with Brian Horton and Noah Hughes.

The day ended with a VIP demo presentation of the game accompanied by an ice sculpture through which
they poured Fireball shots. Brian Horton presented us further Siberia gameplay you can now watch here. That presentation was very fun. It was like a party.
Except after being up since 7AM we were all worn out by 10PM.

The next morning we went to the Los Angeles Convention Center (or Centre hmm). The Tomb Raider stand was impressively gargantuan, replete with a huge
mountain cave.  Inside that cave was a room where the gameplay was shown. We were the first people to go in. They also
showed us gameplay of Syria (something that was not shown to the general public yet). You can read my impressions on Syria here.

After we exited the cave there was a massive queue of people outside. We were then left to explore
E3 proper. Only then did I realise how huge the Los Angeles Convention Center is! It’s about twice the size of the Eurogamer expo. There were a few
celebrities there including Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. I even met Madonna and managed to interview her!

Most of the ambassadors went back home the following day. Those who remained decided to go
and explore Los Angeles while I decided to go back to Los Angeles Convention Center and take more photos and videos.

See more E3 pics here

I had finished with E3 by 4 pm and reunited with those few ambassadors who decided to stay for a few
extra days. We went together to Beverly Hills and Santa Monica beach, where we wrote Lara Croft on the sand.

To be fair, both of these days at E3 were very tiring. Since the Internet connection there was so
dreadful (even if you pay for Wi-Fi access) that I had to take photos, run to another
end of the hall where I’d get a weak 4G connection, post it on Russian Tomb
Raider community and twitter, and then run back so as to not miss anything. As
a result of this, I ended up with blisters all over my feet!

Next morning we had a short flight to San Francisco where we were going to visit the studios of
Crystal Dynamics.  Redwood City is very beautiful. The studios are on the fifth floor with an amazing lobby with lots
of Lara Croft figurines, awards and trophies. When we got inside we weren’t really allowed to take photos or videos as we were under NDA conditions.

I’ll skip the tourist bits as no one is interested in that stuff anyway. This is a Tomb Raider
related blog and not Trip Advisor :p

We headed back to Los Angeles and then went to Universal studios the next day.

My trip concluded at the Getty Museum. There’s this amazing installation where people can leave
messages of what they hope for, what they’re proud of and what they’re scared
of.  Of course I had to throw in a little bit of classic Lara there!

The gardens in that
museum look like they’re inspired by Scion!

My trip back was also an adventure. First of all I had too much stuff. I had to take two pairs of
jeans along with other items into my hand luggage. After a 5 hour flight to
Newark I checked onto another flight headed to Manchester. The plane was
taxiing for about an hour as there was a massive queue of other planes trying
to take off, and then something broke down and we were forced to go back to the
gate. All together we spent about 4.5 hours on the runway. It was like 35°C
outside and United’s crap of a plane had a broken air conditioning system! I
spent those 4.5 hours practicing my wit and swearing ability at United’s twitter
account. And when I finally landed I also brought hell to their desk at the
airport. Surely the delay is not their fault, but they should properly inspect
their planes. My seat was also broken and I had issues with their flights on
the way to LAX.

Anyways, that was a short recap of my E3 experience. As I said before I’m in the process of editing
a video recap together. Shelley Blond will be doing some voice overs for it and
I hope you guys will love it!

I’ve met so many interesting and famous people and I realized that I forgot to bring a poster for them to sign! Nevermind, technology to the rescue! In this case my phablet Galaxy Note Edge proved to be good in taking autographs!

Special thanks go to
Microsoft and Crystal Dynamics for making this happen. It was an absolutely
amazing experience and I’m eternally grateful for it. Also kudos to
Laracroft.ru, it was an honour to represent you guys and I loved posting all
the updates on your group.

PS. Someone absolutely amazing is lending me their Xbox360 so I am going to be able to play Rise of
the Tomb Raider! After I’m done with it I will be nailing Fallout 4 until ROTR
is out on PC so I’ll replay it with spectacular graphics.

Is it November yet?

Special thanks:
Jonathon Cooper and Terenete.

Transportation, lodging, and E3 badge provided by Crystal Dynamics and Xbox as a part of the E3 2015 Ambassador Program.

The post My E3 Experience appeared first on Tomb of Ash.

Siberia:

First of all I must say it looks fantastic. It certainly
reminds me of Tomb Raider II Golden Mask.

• ·       
  Snow will limit Lara’s speed. Player will have
  to consider the environment if they plan to retreat from the enemy
• ·       
  Camps are back. Fast travel, upgrades and
  crafting can be done here just like in TR2013
• ·       
  You will need various ingredients to craft
  things. This is very much like the crafting system they used for Far Cry 4
• ·       
  Lara will have multiple bows to choose from to
  please both stealth and action fans.
• ·       
  Lara’s health regenerates over time but you
  can craft “medipacks” from berries and cloth.
• ·       
  You can use medipacks just like in the classic
  Tomb Raider – no need to pause, just press the hotkey
• ·       
  You can craft various types of ammo too. For
  example, Lara can craft poisoned arrows from mushrooms.
• ·       
  She also can find a gasoline tank and craft some
  sort of bigger version of a Molotov
• ·       
  The bear guards an entrance to the Tomb. There will
  be a few bosses like him
• ·       
  Brian calls the bear “Mishka” or “Misha” which in
  Russian means “cute little bear”
• ·       
  Lara lost Jonah and some of her equipment at the
  beginning of the level.
• ·       
  Lara restores the abandoned camp, This is some
  sort of a tutorial to introduce you to crafting and collecting
• ·       
  There are wolves
• ·       
  There are “quick time events”
• ·       
  The Soviet base is the biggest location that
  Crystal Dynamics have ever created
• ·       
  The base is filled with side missions, crypts,
  documents, artefacts and, of course, tombs
• ·       
  Lara can use various items to distract enemies. For example, she found a walkie-talkie and threw it to cause a distraction
• ·       
  Lara listens to the broadcast from Trinity over the radio. This is how she learns about the organisation
• ·       
  Lara uses the environment to kill enemies (she
  can for example pick up a rock and smash it off their heads)

Syria

The location that was once referred to as Oasis has finally
been revealed. Lara goes to North Western border of Syria. It starts with Lara’s
guide driving them in a Jeep. A military helicopter suddenly follows them. Lara
learns that the guide sold her out (TR4 anyone?) but he gets shot by the
helicopter right away. The car crashes. Lara is obviously the sole survivor.

• ·       
  Lara is looking for a tomb of some “prophet”
• ·       
  There are some artefacts to collect. They look
  like little chests
• ·       
  Lara climbs mountains using her bare hands!
• ·       
  Lara has a voice recorder with her father’s
  notes on it. She listens to them where appropriate. This is very similar to Werner’s
  diary in the Angel of Darkness.
• ·       
  In order for Lara to translate a monolith she
  needs to increase her language proficiency. She does it by observing and
  reading various drawings on the walls etc.
• ·       
  Lara interacts naturally with the environment – she will touch
  walls as she goes by etc.
• ·       
  The camera gets “dirty” and “wet”

• ·        Tips are displayed on Loading Screens

• ·       
  There are LOADS of traps and puzzles to solve.
• ·       
  Lara can use environment to solve puzzles. IE
  she can flood the lower level to reach the higher level (just like Tomb Raider
  Anniversary, St Francis Folly => Neptune Hall)

Transportation, lodging, and E3 badge
provided by Crystal Dynamics and Xbox as a part of the E3 2015 Ambassador
Program.

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