Tomb Raider (2013 Game)

Tomb Raider is the 2013 reboot of the Tomb Raider franchise from developer Crystal Dynamics and publisher Square Enix. It is be the tenth Tomb Raider game, and the first in a new take on the series.

Concept
Tomb Raider explores the intense and gritty origin story of Lara Croft and her ascent from a frightened young woman to a hardened survivor. Armed only with raw instincts and the ability to push beyond the limits of human endurance, Lara must fight to unravel the dark history of a forgotten island to escape its relentless hold.

Story
(Contains spoiler: Read at your own risk)

Fresh from university and in search of lost relics, a 21-year-old Lara Croft journeys to an island off the coast of Japan, in the dreaded Dragon's Triangle, aboard the Endurance, a salvage vessel helmed by Captain Conrad Roth. Before anchoring at bay, the ship is split in two by an unforeseen storm leaving Lara separated from any other survivors and washed ashore.

As she finds herself on shore, she sees the crew of the Endurance and calls out to them. However, they cannot hear her because of the storm. While attempting to get their attention, Lara is knocked unconscious by an unknown islander. Later, she wakes up to find herself suspended by her feet in Scavenger Cove. Using her wits, she manages to break free by burning her bindings and falls into a pit where she is impaled on the left side of her abdomen by a piece of rebar. She yanks it out and attempts to find her way out while injured. During her escape, the same islander that intially captured her attempts to recapture her and possibly kill her. Lara later causes the cavern to start collapsing after lightning up some explosives blocking her way. She starts to flee from the cave, her captor catching up to her in a narrow passage. Kicking free, she escapes from the cave moments after her captor is crushed by the passage collapsing.

Soon after, she begins searching the island in the hopes of finding signs of the other survivors. While exploring, she finds the bag of one of the survivors, Sam, sprawled about in an abandoned area. She collects what she can of Sam's pack, including her video camera, a match box and a radio. After a slight mishap on her way to find shelter from the storm, she makes her way to an abandoned campfire, in hopes of keeping herself warm, and to find contact with the other survivors, but to no avail.

Endurance Crew

 * Lara Croft - 21 years old, in search of lost relics. In the beginning, she is portrayed as a naïve, vulnerable girl, but as the game progresses, Lara evolves from a victim of the island to being a hardened survivor.
 * Conrad Roth - The Captain of the Endurance. It was hinted throughout the game he was a long-time friend of Lara's parents, and acted as her mentor. He was killed by a tomahawk meant for Lara.
 * Sam Nishimura - A budding documentary filmmaker & Lara's best friend. She is a descendant of the Sun Queen, Himiko. In the game, she is kidnapped by Mathias, a long time inhabitant of the island driven by insanity, who believes the only way to escape is by transferring Himiko's soul to a new vessel.
 * Dr. James Whitman - A television host of his own show called "Whitman's World", an archaeology show. He would do anything to get fame and fortune. He was once looked up upon by Lara, but throughout the game, her admiration slowly evolves to suspicion and distrust when she figured out his betrayal. He is killed after being tricked into approaching a pair of Stormguard by Mathias.
 * Alex Weiss - The Endurance's Ship Technician and friend of Lara. It is hinted in his document that he may have a liking towards Lara, and is further evident when he sacrificed himself on the Endurance after triggering an explosion that prevented the Solarii from pursuing Lara.
 * Joslin Reyes   - Mechanic of the Endurance. She is called Reyes by the Endurance crew. She has a 14 year old daughter named Alisha. Even though she gets along well with Roth, she has a general distaste for Lara, as evidenced by few of her "documents" found on the island.
 * Jonah Maiava  - The cook of the Endurance. He and Lara are good friends, as seen by his fondness of calling her "Little Bird". Along with Sam, he believes Lara's claim about Himiko's curse on the island, preventing anyone from escaping.
 * Angus "Grim" Grimaldi- The helmsman of the Endurance. He had worked alongside Roth and Lara's father for many years. He was killed in the Shantytown after blocking a Solarii from targeting Lara, but at the same time, as the Solarii fell, so did Grim.

Solarii/Island Inhabitants

 * Mathias - Absolute leader of the Solarii Brotherhood. Has been stranded on the island for 31 years, leading to a loss of sanity. He desires to resurrect Yamatai's deceased leader, the Sun Queen, as a means of escaping the island. Responsible for the deaths of Conrad Roth and James Whitman. Killed by Lara at the game's climax.

Levels

 * Introduction
 * Coastal Forest
 * Mountain Temple
 * Mountain Rendezvous
 * Mountain Village
 * Base Approach
 * Mountain Base
 * Base Exterior
 * Cliffside Village
 * Mountain Pass
 * Chasm Monastery
 * Shanty Town
 * Cavern Entrance
 * Geothermal Caverns
 * Solarii Fortress
 * Summit Forest
 * Shipwreck Beach
 * Cliffside Bunker
 * Research Base
 * Chasm Stronghold
 * Chasm Shrine
 * Chasm Ziggurat

Gameplay
The game will start out with Lara having no weapons, food, water, or tools. As the game progresses, base camps become unlocked, giving Lara a place to craft new tools out of picked-up items. Base camps also offer a place for Lara to learn new skills in the "skill system" to unlock new parts of the island to explore. Fast travel will be available between base camps.

Combat is also going to be heavily emphasized, with no lock-on system. Instead, the game is employing a "free-aim" approach, keeping the HUD minimized.

A new feature to the series will be something dubbed "Survival Instinct." When activated, items of importance will glow, helping out stuck players. Puzzles will also be much harder than in previous games. The developers say that the player will need the elements of water, wind, and fire as well as friction to solve puzzles.

Gameplay Pages

 * Skills
 * Gear

Collectibles

 * Relics
 * Documents
 * GPS Caches

Multiplayer
Eidos/square-enix had a secret team in place in Canada, working on a multiplayer mode for the game.

Development
The game is the first in the series that to receive a Mature rating from the ESRB. The game is also be built on Crystal Dynamics's game engine "Crystal Engine".

General

 * Full integration with Steamworks to offer cloud storage for saves, multiplayer matchmaking, achievements, as well as automatic updates and new content.
 * Support for Steam Big Picture Mode.
 * Configurable mouse and keyboard support.
 * Gamepad support.

High-end graphics

 * Very high resolution textures with up to 16x the amount of data
 * Detail Tessellation to enhance the detail on many surfaces in the game
 * Higher quality shadows
 * High quality bokeh depth of field with near-blur
 * Tessellation algorithms used to smooth out geometry
 * Improved cloth, SSAO, quality wetness effects, and post-filter effects.
 * LOD quality is adjustable for better quality on higher-end machines.

Low-end graphics

 * Crystal care about TR fans being able to run on older systems, unlike many other games they still support Windows XP.
 * A lot of scalability options to suit a range of machines.

Minimum system requirements for PC

 * Windows XP Service Pack 3, Windows Vista,7,8 (32bit/64bit)
 * DirectX 9 graphics card with 512Mb Video RAM:
 * AMD Radeon HD 2600 XT
 * nVidia 8600


 * Dual core CPU:
 * AMD Athlon64 X2 2.1 Ghz (4050+)
 * Intel Core2 Duo 1.86 Ghz (E6300)


 * 1GB Memory (2GB on Vista)

Recommended system requirements for PC

 * Windows Vista, Windows 7 or Windows 8
 * DirectX 11 graphics card with 1GB Video RAM:
 * AMD Radeon HD 4870
 * nVidia GTX 480


 * Quad core CPU:
 * AMD Phenom II X2 565
 * Intel Core i5-750


 * 4GB Memory

Music
Crystal Dynamics has put an emphasis on music, wanting it to be of the highest quality. Sound designer Alex Wilmer stated that there would be different sound textures for all of the different areas of the game, and the music will react instantly to what is going on. The game's composer has yet to be released.

Trivia

 * In the trailers and demo, specifically the "Turning Point" and "Crossroads" trailers, Lara mentions a fellow crew mate named Steph. In the final game, however, she is not at all seen or mentioned, yet she is present in some concept art and the multiplayer mode.
 * In the "Crossroads" trailer, it is seen that Mathias holds a knife to Sam's throat, immediately presenting as a threat, wherein Lara immediately retaliates with her bow; in the game, however, Mathias instead presents himself as a fellow survivor, attempting to garter the trust of the girls.