Tomb Raider III: Adventures of Lara Croft

Tomb Raider III: Adventures of Lara Croft is a platform and third-person shooter game developed by Core Design and published by Eidos Interactive. It is the third instalment in the Tomb Raider series, and the sequel to Tomb Raider II. The game was originally released in November 1998 for the PC and PlayStation. The story follows Lara Croft as she embarks upon a quest to recover 4 meteorite stones scattered across the world.

Story
Millions of years ago, a meteorite strikes Antarctica. In the present day, a corporation called RX Tech excavates the site, and finds that the meteoroid rock has strange properties.

When the game begins, Lara Croft is searching for the artefact in the ruins of an ancient Indian temple once inhabited by the Infada tribe. She encounters a researcher working for RX Tech who appears to be insane. After parting ways, the researcher beats Lara to the Infada Stone, gaining supernatural powers. After killing him and taking the artefact, Lara is approached by Dr. Willard, the head of RX Tech, who explains the origins of the Infada Stone.

Thousands of years ago, Polynesians came across the meteoroid crater and found that it had incredible power. Using rock from the meteoroid, they crafted four stones, one of which is the Infada Stone. They then fled Antarctica, but, in the nineteenth century, a group of sailors travelling with Charles Darwin came to Antarctica and discovered the artefacts. The four stones were then distributed across the globe. Dr. Willard has been able to track the artefacts by using the diary of one of the sailors. Lara agrees to help find the other three stones.

On an island in the South Pacific, Lara fights cannibals and encounters a wounded soldier who tells her of a deity who lives in the hills of the island. Lara pursues the deity and learns from one of the cannibals that one of Darwin's sailors brought one of the artefacts to the island from Antarctica. Lara then infiltrates the deity's temple and faces the god himself, who has immense power granted by the meteor artefact called the Ora Dagger.

In Nevada, Lara infiltrates Area 51, where she finds Element 115, one of the four artefacts, in an alien spacecraft guarded by the government.

In London, Lara searches for the Eye of Isis, now in the possession of Sophia Leigh, the head of a cosmetics corporation. Targeted by Leigh's hit men, Lara learns that the corporation has performed experiments on humans in order to achieve immortality and eternal youth for Leigh's personal gain. The deformed subjects of Leigh's failed experiments, presumed dead by the corporation, assist Lara in exchange for a bottle of embalming fluid from the Natural History Museum. When Lara finally faces Leigh, she tells her that her human subjects are still alive. Enraged, Leigh attempts to kill her using the powers of the artefact, but Lara defeats her.

At last, in possession of the Ora Dagger, the Eye of Isis, Element 115 and the Infada Stone, Lara goes to Antarctica to meet Dr. Willard. She discovers that the power from the meteor is causing genetic mutations, turning many RX Tech employees into vicious monsters. When she meets Dr. Willard and voices her opposition to his operation, Willard betrays her, stealing the artefacts and disappearing into the excavation site. After fighting more mutants and navigating the treacherous ruins of the ancient city built atop the meteor crater, Lara faces Willard, who has now used the power of the four artefacts to activate the even greater power of the meteor. Lara deactivates the meteor, kills the mutated Willard and escapes by helicopter.

Features
The gameplay of Tomb Raider III picks up where Tomb Raider II left off. Once again, Lara's range of abilities has been expanded, now including such moves as the crouch stance, crawling, a sprinting move and the ability to "monkey swing" on overhead bars and vines. Sprinting allows Lara to gain a burst of speed while running. A bar then appears in the corner of the screen to indicate the amount of stamina Lara has left. At any time during a sprint she can perform a forward roll, for example to dive under closing trapdoors.

A portion of the game still takes place underwater, but this time new perils have been added. In some levels (eg. Madubu Gorge), the current of the stream will pull Lara in a fixed direction, preventing the player from being able to swim back or grab onto a ledge. These waters can only be navigated using a kayak. Additionally, some tropical pools are inhabited by a school of piranhas. Unlike alligators, these fish are invincible, and as soon as Lara enters their waters they will flock toward her, and kill her within seconds. Furthermore, the water in the Antarctic levels is too cold for Lara to swim through it. She can only remain in the water for a short amount of time, and submerged under it for an even shorter amount of time. When she dives into it, a new status bar will appear in the corner of the screen to indicate her body temperature. If that bar reaches zero, Lara's life will rapidly decrease. The only way she can cross these waters over a large distance without freezing to death is by using a motorboat.

Quicksand is a new type of ground that distinguishes itself from regular soil by its moving surface. Should the player fall into it, Lara will sink deeper and deeper until she disappears and drowns. Sometimes these swamps reveal hidden stepping stones for Lara to cross.

As always, the pistols are Lara's most basic form of defence. The shotgun, the harpoon gun, the uzis and the grenade launcher have remained from Tomb Raider II (though the grenade launcher's grenades will now bounce around unless directly hitting a living target, unlike the instant explode upon impact style of Tomb Raider II). The small-calibre semi-automatic pistols have been replaced by the powerful Desert Eagle. The M16 rifle has been changed to a similar MP5 sub-machine-gun. Also new to Lara's arsenal is the Rocket Launcher.

On the PlayStation version, saving the game is restricted to the amount of Save Crystals the player has stored in Lara's inventory. These floating blue crystals can be found throughout each level, but unlike the original Tomb Raider, they do not require the player to save the game at the pick-up spot. The PC version allows the player to save at any point. The developers planned on having the Save Crystal system for the PC version, but this was unfinished and the green crystals act instead as small medipacks.

The objective of the game remains unchanged, although Tomb Raider III arguably has fewer tombs to explore than the previous games. Instead, most levels take place in a more modern environment, and Tomb Raider introduces an element of stealth into the game play. For example in the Nevada adventure, it is sometimes preferable to sneak past guards instead of fighting them. Being spotted may set off alarms and close doors that are otherwise needed to complete the stage and therefore the player will have no other option than to take a more difficult route. Unlike its predecessors, after completing the India levels, the player can then choose which of the next three areas of the world they want to explore in any order they wish.

Lara's mansion in England, UK
Tomb Raider III features the largest tutorial level yet seen in a Tomb Raider game. The assault course from Tomb Raider II is drastically expanded to include exercise of Lara's new moves, target practice and a racetrack to hone the player's handling of the quad bike. Inside the mansion, a secret room can be discovered filled with artefacts and memorabilia from Lara's past adventures. It is the last game of the series to feature this level until Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend.

India
The game begins in the jungles of India, where Lara is on the trail of a mystical relic called the Infada stone. She travels by foot and on a quad, as the game takes her through the ruins of ancient Hindu temples and along the shores of the River Ganges. Whilst exploring these parts, she comes across a researcher hired by Willard, called Tony, who eventually goes mad with Jungle Fever and steals the Infada Stone from its shrine, driving it into his chest. This chapter has 4 levels: Jungle, Temple Ruins, The River Ganges, and The Caves of Kaliya.

South Pacific islands, Oceania
Among the beautiful, tropical scenery of the South Pacific, Lara fights a tribe of cannibalistic warriors and reanimated dinosaurs, finds a crashed plane, and kayaks through the dangerous currents of Madubu Gorge. Her trail leads her into the Temple of Puna, where the "Ora Dagger" meteorite stone is supposedly guarded. In this episode, she also learns of the Polynesians' journey to Antarctica and why they fled in such a sudden manner. Prolonged exposure led to one of the natives being born without a face leading to the shocked tribe fleeing the cursed land. Later, she manages to defeat Puna in his temple and acquire the stone. This chapter has 4 levels: The Coastal Village, Crash Site, Madabu Gorge, and The Temple of Puna.

Nevada, USA
The United States Government has obtained one of the stones, and named it Element 115. It has been stored deep within Area 51, the secret military base in the Nevada desert, where all sorts of experiments are rumoured to take place. Unbeknownst to them, it is one of the four pieces of meteorite rock on Lara's treasure list. After a haphazard attempt to break into the base, Lara is locked up in a cell and stripped of her weapons (for this reason it is preferable to play through the game with this level being the first of the optional levels, as important arms such as the Rocket Launcher can be lost forever otherwise). From here on the game takes her through prisons, laboratories and military testing hangars. The levels in Nevada have an emphasis on using stealth rather than action. Unlike the other chapters, the Nevada chapter has 3 levels: Nevada Desert, High Security Compound, and Area 51.

London, England, UK
Lara crosses the rooftops of London on a dark and rainy night, in search of another mysterious artefact called the Eye of Isis, which is currently kept in possession by the infamous cosmetics tycoon Sophia Leigh. After a brief detour through St Paul's Cathedral, she goes down into the disused Aldwych tube station, where she is introduced to a secret gang of masked mutated men who call themselves "The Damned". These were experimented on by Leigh with the Eye of Isis in order for her to achieve eternal youth only to leave them disfigured and immortal. Later, she visits an Egyptology department in the British Museum. Lara then goes on to infiltrate Sophia Leigh's gigantic cosmetics factory, and makes her way through a system of air ducts to reach Sophia Leigh's office for the final confrontation. Lara also visits "All Hallows", a level taking place in All Hallows-by-the-Tower, if the player has collected all of the game's secrets by the end. This chapter has 4 levels: Thames Wharf, Aldwych, Lud's Gate, and The City.

Antarctica
After Lara's helicopter crashes into the icy waters of Antarctica, she makes her way through the abandoned research stations of RX Tech. After meeting up with Dr. Willard to hand over the stones, she descends down mines and into the recently excavated Lost City of Tinnos. The heart of the meteorite cavern is where the mad scientist performs a ceremony to transform him into a large immortal mutant until the artefacts are removed. This chapter has 4 levels: Antarctica, RX Tech Mines, The City of Tinnos, and The Meteorite Cavern.

Reception
Tomb Raider III received generally good reviews. Some reviewers commented that gameplay had not changed a lot but still praised the game, saying it had "In-depth gameplay, good graphics and an established, unique theme." IGN commented the levels show "Real thought and Insight from designers" and praised the new vehicles but expressed frustration that the control system had still not improved. "Absolute Playstation" praised the game, saying it surpassed the previous two instalments, complimenting Lara's new abilities and moves, also saying the save system was an improvement from the previous games. Gamespot praised the game, saying it will provide "hours of fun" but also stating that if players want "something new" they will have to "look elsewhere". The game is generally considered the best of the original trilogy of Tomb Raider games, but reviewers consistently commented gameplay hadn't changed a lot from the original Tomb Raider game.