Tomb Raider: Legend

Tomb Raider: Legend Review

For all the traveling Lara Croft has done over the years, she hasn't made her way to the Nintendo GameCube until now, and in a weird way it seems fitting that the adventurous archaeologist has waited until the console is all but history before making a visit. It has now been more than 10 years since the first Tomb Raider was released for the PC, PlayStation, and Sega Saturn, and while video games have come a long way since then, the Tomb Raider series hasn't kept pace. Problems such as clunky controls and a frustrating camera, which were excusable in the early games, have steadily degraded the quality of the series releases over time. The latest installment, Tomb Raider: Legend, finally brings the series into the 21st century while staying true to the spirit of the early games.

On your first play through, you can easily beat the game in less than seven hours on the default difficulty setting. You can then go back through and play again on a tougher difficulty setting, but it doesn't make much of a difference because the challenge in Legend comes from the puzzles, and those never change. Once you've figured out how to solve each puzzle, the only challenge left is to find all the hidden items in each level or to replay each level in time-trial mode. You can unlock new outfits, movies, models, and so on, but even with all that, you can easily see all this game has to offer in a single weekend.

Legend looks great on the GameCube, with convincingly dark and decrepit environments and plenty of detail and lighting effects. Lara looks excellent and moves fluidly, gracefully jumping and climbing about in a variety of treacherous, if familiar, scenarios. The game does suffer from occasional frame rate instability, and although it never gets unbearably slow, it never quite runs as smoothly as it should. The sound is excellent, with good music, plenty of ambient noise, and excellent voice work that lends a lot of personality to each character--especially Lara.

Tomb Raider: Legend is a good return to the roots of the series. The fact that there isn't much in the way of competition on the GameCube, and that the game is selling for a somewhat reduced price, makes it all the more appealing. It doesn't do anything new or different, but it has a great blend of action and adventure that will always keep you moving and interested. The problem is that it moves a bit too fast, and it's all over way too soon.

Gamespot