Hands-on: Tomb Raider: Underworld

It will soon be time to get reacquainted with everyone’s favorite sexy spelunker, Lara Croft. With Lara’s new adventure Tomb Raider: Underworld releasing soon, Eidos and Crystal Dynamics decided to let loose a demo for 360 and PC late last month. Now that I’ve been able to play through the 360 demo a few times, I’m here to give my impressions of how the new TR is shaping up.

The demo opens with Lara on a boat off the coast of Thailand. After a cutscene that talks a bit about why you’re there, you’re put in control of Miss Croft. From here, you’ll take a quick swim to the shore fighting off a few sharks on the way and make your way up the cliffside through some caves. Next you’ll make your way into the jungle and to an ancient temple that you’ll work through for the remainder of the demo. The gameplay’s focus is mainly on finding a route through the environment and making the appropriate moves necessary to make it through the level. Lots of moves from the past two games are back, so, you can expect plenty of ledge shimmying, swinging on poles, hopping on top of columns, and swinging with your grappling hook. But they’ve augmented the platforming with plenty of new moves, too. For instance, by simply moving the left stick you can climb around on different outcroppings (sort of like those rock-climbing walls or how climbing was in Assassin’s Creed). You can also balance on beams and poles and bound between walls (think 3D Mario or Prince of Persia). The level design in the demo section was quite impressive. It was generally linear, but there were areas to explore and offshoots you could go off on to find treasures and health items. Some sections have alternate paths you can take to get places as well which is neat. The final section of the demo puts you in a large room and let’s you start what looks like it will be a large multi-faceted puzzle to get through that section, but cuts the demo off before you an really get into it.

Lara's new rock-climbing skills (plus the walljump shown in the image at the top of the article) add more depth to the platforming and exploration.

The game also has a bit of combat. In the demo, you’ll face off against a handful sharks underwater, a couple groups of tigers, and bunch of random spiders and bats. The combat feels a lot like the last couple games which is to say it isn’t very good. Basically, you lock on with the left trigger and shoot with the right. You’ll run around jumping and rolling to avoid the enemies and shoot them. There’s a new trick to getting headshots which is pretty good, but not all that much better than it was in Anniversary. You can also melee enemies and the addition of shooting while hanging on a ledge or on a balance beam is nice, but overall the combat just feels sub-par compared to similar games on the market.

There were a few other new features present in the demo. For one, the game allows you to adjust different things to help tailor the experience to your likings. Basically, you can make combat or platforming harder or easier or access hints or a map from your PDA for those that get stuck. The game also added a sprint button which should come into play during the game’s time trial mode. It acts as a dolphin swim of sorts to speed you up underwater, too.

Lara shows her passion for tigers and other wildlife throughout the demo.

It must be said that Tomb Raider: Underworld is really nice to look at. Lara’s character model looks great and they’ve added some new animations like how she braces herself when running into a wall or pushes brush away from her face when moving through the jungle. The environments looks fantastic as well. There were some glitches like a strange effect around Lara’s shirt in the opening cutscene and some clipping here and there, but it’s a demo. If they can polish off some of the rough edges, this game should look really good when it comes out. The music and voice acting featured in the demo also seem to be on the right track.

Overall, I came away pretty happy with the demo. New moves and less linear level design look to make platforming and exploration more enjoyable while the new engine really improved the look of characters and environments. The combat certainly isn't good, but with only a few confrontations in the demo to base my opinion off of, I'll wait for full game to really judge it. I think based on what I've played and seen, this could be Crystal Dynamics' best Tomb Raider game yet. In just a few days, we'll get a chance to see how Lara's latest turns out, with Tomb Raider: Underworld releasing on Xbox 360, PS3, PC, Wii, PS2, and DS. I should be back with a full review later this year.

Hands-on: Mirror's Edge

It’s nice to see original concepts in gaming and new takes on familiar genres. That’s what we have with Mirror’s Edge. And after getting my hands on the PS3 demo, I’m here tell you how DICE’s latest is shaping up.

The demo opens with a cartoon cutscene that introduces you to the story. I’m not sure this game wouldn’t have been better served with a Half-Life-esque story telling that kept you in first-person throughout the game, but I’ll hold off judgment on that part of the game until the full release. Now, I really want to focus on the actual gameplay. Mirror’s Edge is a game that you play from the first-person perspective, but it isn’t focused on shooting like most FP games. You play as Faith a female runner who has to make her way through the environment using different parkour and platforming moves. After a tutorial that teaches you the basic moves, you’ll be thrown into what is presumably the first level. Just like your typical FPS, the left stick strafes and the right stick looks. After that the most important buttons are L1 and L2. L1 jumps and generally moves upward (climbs up ledges, vaults over obstacles) while L2 generally moves down (slides, rolls when landing). You’ll use these commands along with a quick turn button (R1) and an interact button (X) to move around the levels. Chaining these moves together, you’ll be jumping from building to building, sliding under objects, climbing over fences, shimmying along ledges, balancing on pipes, and running on walls. Keeping your momentum is the key as you make your way over rooftops and through buildings to give a bag to your fellow runner Celeste. The controls are a bit odd at first, but once you get used to them the game becomes pretty addictive. It’s really fun to try and get through the level without having to slow down. There are some enemies in the demo, but the best way to handle confrontations is again not the norm. You’re better off avoiding or quickly disarming enemies (with triangle) and then just dropping the gun and moving on rather than shooting foes. The game uses a couple of things to help you get through the level. One thing is what they call runner-vision. This highlights objects in the environment in red to show you which way to go. I’m not sure this game won’t be more interesting with this feature turned off though. You can also hit the square button to activate slow-motion to help you navigate the environment.

Mirror’s Edge really has a pretty original look to it. The world the game is set in is very sharp and bright with tons of white and some vibrant blue and red accents amongst the tall skyscrapers. Things in the demo did look a bit jaggy, but nothing too bad. With focus on platforming in first-person, the game features some interesting animations where you see Faith’s limbs as you move about which DICE has a done a good job on. And it’s worth noting you stay in first-person when you roll which is quite strange when you first see it. If you’ve seen trailers of this game then you know that soundtrack is pretty catchy too especially the main theme.

Mirror’s Edge really is a breath of fresh air. As a big fan of platformers and parkour, it’s really interesting to see this type of game in first-person. Once I got used to the controls and perspective, I had a lot of fun trying to string together moves and find new routes through the level. Because of this the time trials that the full game will have should be great. If they can give you plenty of interesting scenarios and levels to work through in the full game, DICE could have a winner on its hands. Mirror’s Edge hits store shelves in the US this week for PS3 and Xbox 360.

This Week's Releases: Shooter Face-Off Edition

The great time for gaming that is Fall 2008 just continues to roll along this week. The focus here is on two big shooter sequels. Here's what we have this week:

My Game of the Week

Resistance 2 (PS3)-11/4, Gears of War 2 (360)-11/7 (tie)

Resistance 2

Do you hear that sound? Yes, it is in fact the sound of me copping out this week. I can't really choose at the moment between these two games. While I will not be picking up either this week (still busy with LBP), I will almost certainly have both these games by year's end. They both look great. Personally, I would pick up Resistance 2 first (which may make it my pick of the week... I don't know). But this is partly due to the fact that Insomniac is one of my favorite developers and I like Resistance's story a bit more. I really enjoyed the first game, but I'm not too happy with the decisions to not have local competitive multiplayer and move to a two-weapon load-out. I'm not much of an online player, but I really enjoyed playing 4-player offline with friends (still do actually). Not being able to do that (unless of course I got a wrong answer about it's inclusion on the Playstation Blog) or choose from a number of crazy weapons at once is a bit disappointing. Having said that I'm sure I'll really like the single-player and co-op campaigns and for those that are into online, there's not much to complain about.

Gears of War 2

Then, there's Gears of War 2. I really got a kick out of the first Gears. I mean I really have only played the co-op campaign, but it was still a lot of fun. I did try the local multiplayer, but one-on-one is pretty lame. But with Gears 2, they're adding bot support so that local will be more fun and adding the sweet new Horde mode. Plus, the campaign should be longer, so, I'll definitely be getting more value from this game then the first.

Despite a bit of complaining (games getting rid of local multiplayer is a pet peeve of mine), I'll probably get Resistance 2 first, personally, but I really think both of these games are going to very good and I'd advise either. If you only have a PS3 or 360, your decision is probably made for you. But until I play both, I can't say which will be better, but I'm guessing you can't really go wrong with either.

Other games of note this week include Tom Clancy's End War and James Bond 007: Quantum of Solace appearing on multiple platforms and the PS3 exclusive Valkyria Chronicles. Anyway, enjoy killing some locust or chimera if you guys get the chance. I should be back soon with some hands-on impressions of Mirror's Edge and Tomb Raider: Underworld soon.

My Legend of Zelda Jack-O-Lanterns

Well, I haven't managed to find my memory card with my Jak and Daxter ones, but as the title of this post says I have some new Zelda-themed pumpkin carvings to show off. I did two new Jack-O-Lanterns this year based around a couple of the main characters from The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker (one of my favorite Gamecube games) and it's sequel The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (probably my favorite DS game). I have one of Link's face and one of Tetra's face and I'm happy with how they both came out. Well, here are some pictures of the finished works (again captions refer to the picture above them).

A close look at my Link Jack-O-Lantern in the dark.

A close look at my Tetra Jack-O-Lantern in the dark.

A look at my Link Carving and pumpkin in the light.

A look at my Tetra carving from a bit further back, where you get a better look at the pumpkin.

My Link and Tetra Jack-O-Lanterns side by side.

I actually did them on Halloween night and here it is two days later and they're kind of a mess already. This is how it is with these type of carvings though. Tetra was a bit tough at times and due to her hair continuing down on either side of her face, after one day I had to start using a fork to prop up her face so it didn't just fall into the pumpkin. Her little curly hair thing at the top started falling down a day later, too. Also, since I started doing my own designs, I don't think I ever popped out a piece as big as Link's hair. That fact combined with some silly decisions I made on what parts to cut first (not sure what I was thinking) made it rather hard to cut out his hair without breaking another part (though luckily I didn't break anything). In the end, they both came out well without any mistakes. It's really satisfying that first night when you see your creations come together even if it is a bit sad to see them kind of fall apart the next few days. But I got plenty of good pictures, so, I'll always have them to remember my carvings with. Anyway, I hope you liked them and hopefully I'll be back on here with more at some point in the future.