Thread:The Demon In Me/@comment-2038153-20180628050623/@comment-3526639-20180628111349

As it stands right now, I'm under the belief that Shadow will tie up this timeline and leave us with either an ending of Lara looking to the future. It'd be nice if Sam came back, but I'm still in two minds about their relationship. On paper I don't have any issue with them as an item, on the other, there's so many people who say that it needs to happen for the game to have their work disregarded for such an asinine reason.

A more personal and lower stakes story can always work well, but usually speaking, they tend to be middle stories. As you said Empire, but also Rise was a much more personal story for Lara, but it also had very high stakes, which while hard to do, is very satisfying. Personally, I equate Rise to Captain America: The Winter Soldier in that regard, Lara is dealing with her past and coming to terms with who she is and her place in the world while also dealing with a potentially genocidal threat, much like Cap.

Also in terms of making it like The Last of Us, The New God of War or any of the Uncharted games in terms of character interactions, I just don't really see the point. Tomb Raider and Uncharted are already compared too often and too many people don't seem to understand that despite similar starts, they aren't even remotely the same. I do think some of the side characters come off as a little underdeveloped, but I think that in terms of character, Lara's self imposed isolation sets her apart from the more comparatively happy go lucky Indiana Jones or Nathan Drake. But there is a human side to Lara which can and should be explored, I think Top Cow did a great job of exploring the more personal side of Lara.

It's a very tight rope to walk balancing personal conflict and relationships with threats that are global in scale, but it can be done. But low stakes will be extremely hard to do for Tomb Raider, and having someone wanting to hurt Lara rather than anything else, works fine as a side plot, but the only way to hurt Lara at this point is through the few friends she has left, and I really don't want Lara to be setting out for a rescue mission, she should always start with intent of discovering something. The fact Lara was setting out to rescue her father in the new movie is one of the many infuriating reasons I refuse to see it.

So in summary, a more personal lower stakes story could work, but it'd need to be very carefully done. And the gameplay cannot be compromised by any means. Contrary to what David Cage believes you do not have to sacrafice in depth gameplay for Story, for example: Bioshock, Tomb Raider, The Last of Us, Uncharted, God of War, Batman: Arkham, Horizon Zero Dawn, Assassin's Creed and countless others.