TR1 is a masterpiece. 2 is great. And then it blows my mind how awful 3 is. I could write a fucking 5 hours YT essay on everything wrong about this game.Most of the game outside of a couple outdoor sections in Nevada and Antartica, are way too dark. This is especially obvious when playing with TRX because it's the same engine, same settings with all 3 games and once I get to TR3, even if I turn the brightness up to 150% and close my curtains I still can't see SHIT half the time. And don't bring up the flares, that's a moot point.On top of that there are so many sections that are so cramped that you can't see your surroundings even if you try to move the camera around. The game also LOVES to hide progression critical paths in the darkest places in some corner or ceiling you're never going to find unless you spend your time inspecting every little corner.And then there is the hanging, you can't look down so you can't see where you're dropping. That's on top of this mechanic being ANOTHER thing that slows the game down to a crawl, like the crawling. Has a SINGLE person walked up to a giant climbing part in 2 and thought "SWEET! This is going to be FUN!" ? But TR3 was like "hey that was the most fun, let's TRIPLE DOWN on that!"; but at least the climbing in 2 most of the time was done in sceneries that made it LOOK awesome.All the enemies are bullet sponges. Take the same enemy types from 1 and 2, and in 3 their HP was always buffed from between +50% to +300%. 3 shotgun blasts to take down spec ops dudes, 1 min of shooting for even the most basic dudes. The Raptors are the most egrogious example compared to their counterparts in 1, + 3 loves to make you fight them in places where they're hard to aim at.
Vehicles. I'm not even going to bring up the kayak in which you're fighting water current with delayed controls, or how the level design knows that but still puts trap everywhere that require you to know of the trap beforehand to have a chance to move in time. Instead let's make a comparison between 2's and 3's quad. Sure in 2 there were a lot of things that could kill you if you drove badly, but it also had stretches that let you drive at high speed and ram into enemies, long jumps on ramps in the middle of huge awe-some environments, you know, FUN. In 3 with the quad you're driving on eggs the whole time, it's like here is this narrow ledge and if one of your wheels is 1 pixel off you fall down a tiny slope, then you have this cramped 90° turn, driving down stairs trying not to tip the thing over, and then the only jumps don't require driving well at high speed but a just the handbrake boosting.The game is full of deadly traps you couldn't possibly see come, once you see it, it's already over. That's when the game isn't tricking you to look elsewhere too. And then there are all the trap jumps as well which are like "see this ledge over there? Yeah it's 3 tile accross, you can make that with a running jump! OH WAIT actually we put a the ledge 2 pixels higher I sure hope you used one of your save crystal before attempting what looked like a normal jump you've done a million times because now you're dead tee hee ;) isn't it fun how I got you good ". That's when they're even intentional because half of the time this shit comes from things that look badly testedWhich brings me to my next point: the glitches, so many places you can get stuck if you happen to move a certain way the devs didn't even consider. Or the enemies that you can see spawn out of thin air "it's not like the player would ever look that way trust me guys".
and you know what? all of this is just the TIP of the iceberg. If you get down level by level there are hundreds of things that range from bad to awful to just wrong.I can't think of a single series that went down so hard so fast, and the worst thing is, while 4 is less offensive, it still managed to be worse than 3. And then 5 was worse than 4. At that point I just stopped and anyone who kept playing this shit is in the same category as the people who are going to see the next Star Wars. So whenever someone says "98 was the best year in gaming!" and puts TR3 in there as an example, I say FUCK YOU, you're a retard and you don't know SHIT about game design.TR3 has ONE redeeming factor and it's Lost Artifacts which, while having some issues still, is overall really great and one of the best things to come out of the trilogy past TR1. The entirety of TR3 should have been like that.
>>128517692 also sucks fat cock. 1 is the only good Tomb Raider.
The museum in London requires such a huge leap of faith too. So you're in the Underground, okay sure. Then you drop down even further below the UG. Sure. Then you drop down some more, okay fine. NOW you're in a museum, like what the FUCK! and isn't it cool how the museum replicated the same traps that real egyptians tombs (by TR's logic) had? I'm sure all the visitors are going to have fun, that's if they manage to find the place tucked away 4 stories below the fucking metro of course.
>>12851837And then you drop some more at the end of THAT level without ever making up for all the previous drops only for the next level to be on the rooftop. So well thought up.
I get it, TR3 is a bit tough, it's certainly not the most self explanatory game in the series, but I'll wager it is the best of the first three... Provided you're on your second playthrough and already know what you're doing and how to progress. >b-but that's not fair, games should be good on their first time aroundAnd it is! It's a TOMB RAIDER game, finally fully fleshed out. It's a game and exploring tombs. You know, tombs? Dark, creepy, confusing and not friendly to outsiders? Making progress difficult to achieve is how you make a player feel excited about it. 3 is the culmination of the formula, with extensive use of flares to light your way (unless you're playing on PC, that version is much brighter), crawling around tight tunnels, paying attention to every little detail of the environment to proceed. A lot of it is very well made but there are sections that are very dickish.
The short reason as to why it started to drop off quickly was that the guys are Core Design kept just offering very generous royalties for the team to just keep making sequels. And I think by number three they'd already lost some key people.And there was always a "bang it out before Christmas" approach, even for things like Tomb Raider chronicles, which just felt like some kind of expansion pack to me and an obvious cash grab (even having supposedly killed off the character in "the last revelation" they still wanted to crank out more games.And lastly, it wasn't like the original team had decided, let's design a trilogy, they were just going game to game. And I think it's by the third time you will see the "I'm sick of this game now" kick in. If key people leave and the remaining team's heart isn't in it, it'll show.
>>12851881Allow me now to be completely fair about sections that aren't great. India doesn't really have any overly dickish bits for the most part, but hiding the shotgun in the very first ten feet of the level is a dick move for beginners, though not very egregious since you can beat all of India with just the pistols.The real asshole part of India is the mud pool in the temple. Walking through the middle should kill you, sure, but walking on either side should be safe, not just hugging the right wall, especially since it's not really well telegraphed. Aldwych alone has two dick moves. One of them isn't all that bad but the primitive graphics make it worse. You're supposed to explore the level and see the ticket gates closed, and when you find the coin you should add two and two together to realise you need to buy a ticket (back when it cost just a penny). The problem is that the ticket machines aren't very distinguishable, but even when you do realise what they really are, only one works! Second, hiding an item required for progress is fine, but hiding it behind a solid texture behind a hole in the floor is very much a leap of faith. The curtain IS shorter than the others which does hint at something being different, but it shouldn't have wall texture below the curtain, it should have been transparent for a click. I could go on, especially with the mine carts in Antarctica, but you can see I'm not just glazing TR3. It's still a good game, a HARD game but a good game, that just isn't perfect, but a game being hard to complete isn't a fault in the game's part. People in the 2000s made it through without without guides. You can do it too.
>>12851881>Provided you're on your second playthrough That's the thing though. This is my third playthrough. The more I replay 1 and 2, the more I enjoy them. The more I replay 3, the more I dislike it.
>>12851912tr3 did the... thing
1 is the best2 is good3 is hard and fun4 is a slock5 is better than 4
About a year ago I went through the original 3 games on PS1 and had a blast. I remember struggling with TR1 the most due to save crystals. I know 3 has them as well but maybe by that point I got good. Also, the remastered games on modern consoles is one of the few remasters that I think are worthwhile to play. Dunno what the general consensus is on that though
>>12851769Tomb raider 3 was heavy parroted by magazines back then, is good but not TR1 or TR2 good, but in letter pages months later magazines were told to step up their shit.
>>12851769Do you have thoughts on 4? I tend to agree that TR1 is still awesome. But the others don't hold up nearly as well
>>12851881A lot of games are like that too. Shit on first playthrough, but way better on 2nd
>>12851881>And it is!No, it's not. The trap designs aren't even dickish so much as amateurish, the kind of thing you'd find in user TRLEs that think unreachable boulder traps are funny. It doesn't help that the game has a completely retarded save system. Mean-spirited traps are more easily forgiven when they're placed just after a save crystal, but since the maps aren't actually designed around a logical difficulty curve, you wind up hoarding crystals because the player has no reference for how they're supposed to be rationed. People bounce off this game for a reason, it's not fun.
>>12852121TR4 isn't offensive like 3 but it's just bland and amateurish. The biggest sign of that is how much of the level design is all the copy pasted, symmetric and mirrored architecture.I also dislike Lara's model, it's like she got flanderized in a cartoonish way, completely disproportionate features with the giant head boobs and ass. When using TRX you can switch models on the fly between all 4 games which makes the difference obvious.
>>12852209*unreactableAlso, from observing, it seems like the only people who actually like TR3 are chronic cheaters, ie. PC players and emufags who are so used to save stating after every jump that the cheap difficulty means nothing to them.
>>12852374I played through 3 for the first time 2 years ago and did so on PSX.I ended up liking it more than 2.
>>12852282Usually I like sexualization, but I actually agree as far as TR4. She straight-up has see-through shorts and a thong underneath
>>12852374Played it on PS1 at launch, still my fave TR game, suck my dick.>>12851912The ticket machine you're supposed to use is the only 1 penny machine (1D on the sign, not 2D) but that does require you to know about pre-decimalisation British currency, so burgerfats btfo.The level does suck dick in general though, and Lud's Gate is worse.The mine carts are actually very simple and easy to first-time. Read the manual so you know what the buttons are, duck hazards, hit switches. The speed management is easy: there is a proper pitch for the rolling sound, and if you're going too fast or slow it will literally sound off. Keeping it in the right cadence is safe for all turns and jumps.>>12851837There's a big climb in the beginning and end of Lud's Gate, plus the implication that you enter the ventilation of SLinc's HQ at one height and exit at another (in Sophia's office).>>12851769>>12851772OK, so let's review.>LightingUse your pistols and flares in pitch darkness. Some areas should be shadowy. The level design is supposed to be labyrinthine as people criticised 2 as too arcadey.>Hanging and crawling are slowNo shit, zoomer. Pay attention more. Also, you can look down, don't know why you think you can't. They even have a nice shadow that marks exactly where you'll land.>Bullet spongesMaybe, but you have a shit ton more guns now including rockets for fast-reaction stuff. Combat has always been TR's weak point though to be fair. I've posted here several times about how I'd improve it, to no applause.>VehiclesIt's puzzley design, not action design. Also the TR2 snowmobile level is just as aggravating as Ganges, but more random because so many deaths will be AI/hitscan related.>DeathtrapsI had this out with some retard in the last TR thread. Almost every trap in the game is signposted, with a few bugs (no movement on the quicksand medipak in Coastal Village, possibly a texture error on a flame jet in Madubu?). You ARE supposed to look before leaping.
>>12852526Con't>>12851772>pixel perfect jumpsGuarantee you're doing the level wrong>GlitchesHardly unique to TR3, or even to TR in general.>>12851781>Lost Artifacts which, while having some issues still, is overall really great True>>12852465That's supposed to be the contours of her ass in tight jeans. PS1 low-res be low-res
>>12852529>That's supposed to be the contours of her ass in tight jeans. PS1 low-res be low-resYeah, I know. That's now what everyone be seeing though
Oh, but out of all the dick moments in TR3, honestly, for my money, the absolute worst is that one platform across the river in the 1st Nevada stage.
>>12852549There's a couple of misleading jumps that look closer than they are, I think, but nothing egregious?
>>12852585Fuck that thing.
>>12852585Yeah, to be fair that one's a real thinker.
Currently playing 3 for the first time through TRX. That India boss fight was pure horseshit. I'm now on the crash site level in the South Pacific, and I can't use the keys for the plane to progress, because the keyholes are too close to the walls and the animations freeze up from the collisions. Already had to use the fly cheat to bypass a zipline having a similar problem on the first level. Now I just want to try and use the trigger command to bypass the keyholes, but I need the IDs for them. I should sign up to Github and submit a report.
>venice level>come to an area with guards overlooking canal paths>aha this will be a game of oxygen management, I need to swim a route to suitable cover before I'm forced to resurface>guards just instantly drain your health the second your in range even while underwaterstopped playing the game right there, a decent game wouldn't have something that lazy and retarded.
>>12852756That Venice level is really retarded. I bet the rest of the game after that is not even that bad, but yeah, I also dropped the game at that level
>>12851827You've been saying this for exactly 5 years, and precisely no one gives a shit and you have changed literally no one's mind.
