really fresh take on a 3d platformer character controller, the wall kicks in particular are nasty stuff (positive connotation).

adding a map was the right choice in the long run i think - even if i didn't need a map so much as a guide to remind me to go back to a certain place i hadn't considered after several loops of the game world.

you shoulda seen some of the tricks i pulled to get where i wasn't supposed to be yet. i did everything except for one of the switches for the theater key without getting a certain extremely useful powerup

There is a tendency when dunking on Bethesda games, to criticize them from the lens of their failure to be like other RPGs- The Witcher 3 is more cinematic and refined, Baldur's Gate 3 more densely written, Fallout 1 more actually good, so on and so forth. The truth is that Bethesda games suck much more tragically and pathetically on their own terms than in comparison to other games, Todd Howard who began his career with monumental works of termite art in the end forsook the dream of the Bethesda game. The dream of the bethesda game was always to create a holodeck, a simulation for you to inhabit totally- 'Why the hell would I pick up a spoon?' someone asks, perfectly reasonably expecting game mechanics to exist for gameplay reasons, but it's just that you can pick up spoons because it's something a person is able to do. Personally I think this dream is perhaps misguided, but nevertheless they pursued it, which is admirable in its own right.

"With this character's death, the thread of prophecy is severed. Restore a saved game to restore the weave of fate, or persist in the doomed world you have created."
The message you receive upon killing a crucial NPC points towards the commitment towards the holodeck dream, it will continue on even if you totally fuck up, and indeed there are generally ways around the death of those crucial NPCs provided you understand the simulation.

And fear of people misunderstanding the simulation is what drove bethesda to make many crucial NPCs invulnerable in Oblivion, you never know when you're actually in a simulation or not anymore, even as the NPC AI had become much more sophisticated with schedules, likes, dislikes and habits, the places you could engage shrunk, and then even the ambitious NPC AI in subsequent games was stripped back for ever more presentable and simpler systems, to the point of Starfield doing deliberately what Morrowind had done out of technical limitations 20 years prior: 24/7 vendor NPCs with no schedules, likes or dislikes, who exist only in service of the player.
But maybe most telling of all, was that in Fallout 4 they decided that the player need a good reason to pick up a spoon.

"Bro this game is so outdated!!! Just play Zero Mission instead and skip this!!!!!!!!!!"

why don't I skip over your bad takes how about that

shoutout to HPRshredder and his guide for getting me interested in playing Metroid 1 again as well as The Geek Critique for revisiting the game and shedding a more positive light to it. I haven't seen U Can Beat Video Games's video yet but his Castlevania II and Dragon Warrior ones were really great so this one's probably worth checking too, okay I'll actually talk about the game now

there's something about the original Metroid that has this cool...."uniqueness"? yeah I'm not sure what's the right word for it, but there's a unique feeling about this one that none of the later games quite have. now I agree that every other Metroid game I played is better than this one (every 2D one besides Metroid II GB, a decent portion of Prime 1), but I'd say that this is comparing a collection of gold trophies to a singular dusty gold trophy that could use a quick feather duster to shine again. what I'm saying is that this game's good

what's cool about the original Metroid's story is that there's nothing to precede it. none of the familiar lore of the later games is here so what we're given is in this one (which isn't much) (that's cool though) is all we really get. basically a powerful species known as "Metroids" has been captured by the Space Pirates, they're like criminals but in the space alien variety. The Federation Police sends out some bounty hunters to Planet Zebes, which is the Space Pirates hideout, to stop them from using the Metroids as a dangerous weapon however none of them were able to succeed. as a last resort they send Samus Aran, a cool cyborg dude (please don't get on my case I'll bring it up later) who gained a famous reputation for completely bounties most others thought would be impossible. naturally it would make sense for them to send the best of the best, so now Samus Aran must now traverse through Planet Zebes, explore and find the items and abilities left by it's previous civilization, defeat the two leaders of the Pirates (Ridley and Kraid), and eradicate the Metroids before they destroy the galaxy! for the first game, there's still a pretty decent amount of backstory and is still much more than a majority of games that came before it, so it's cool that there's a reason why you're there as well as an actual world you're in that isn't just a bunch of nameless disconnected levels, that's pretty nice for a game made in 1986.

Metroid is an exploration game, everyone probably knows it. what everyone always knows as well is that you're aren't just going right the entire game (cue a lengthy explanation on how a first-time player goes right until a dead end, only to go all the way back to the left and find the Morph Ball so they can go through the tiny corridor they couldn't before). your ultimate goal of the game is to defeat both Ridley and Kraid so you can access the final part of the game you encounter the Metroids as well as the final boss, however the way you go about doing so is all up to you, to the point where you can choose whether to face Ridley first or Kraid first. now you could immediately head straight for their hideouts and take them out as soon as possible, but an inexperienced player will no doubt get their ass handed to them, which makes sense since Zebes is a pretty hostile planet, so they'll probably want to stay around in Brinstar (the beginning section of Zebes) for a while and gather items to power up and prepare them for the tougher parts of the game. some of the items you can get are Missiles, which not only are a powerful offense, but can also help you open the Ketchup and Mustard Doors that can't be opened by regular shots. Energy Tanks not only increase your health by 100 but it also fully restores your health too, there's 8 of them in the game but Samus's health is maxed out after 6 of them, so it'd be a good idea to save the remaining 2 for when you need to regain some health quickly. now for actual upgrades, the Morph Ball (or Maru Mari as the cool people call it) lets Samus morph into a tiny ball to get through small passages, and the Bomb allows Samus to make bombs in this form to help defeat small enemies and get through blocks that otherwise can't be destroyed. the Long Beam makes Samus's shots long ranged which can be good for dealing enemies from far away, but it's not too important of an upgrade so you can to skip it if you want. the Ice Beam lets you freeze almost all the enemies in the game which also can turn them into temporary platforms before they thaw out which can helpful if you don't want to deal with them or if you want to do a few helpful skips, it can still be used as a regular weapon. the Wave Beam is a beam that pierces through everything and is decently powerful, however it overrides the Ice Beam which is needed if you want to defeat or get away from the Metroids in the final area so it's actually even more skippable than the Long Beam, if you plan to use this then make sure you pick up the Ice Beam again before you head to the final area. the High Jump Boots let Samus just higher, not much to say other then it helps Samus obtain the Varia Suit easier. the Varia Suit not only changes Samus's armor to a bright pink as a symbol of power, but it also halves all damage taken, making it very useful when it comes to traversing beyond Brinstar. lastly the Screw Attack, probably the best upgrade here, lets you perform a powerful shock whenever you diagonally jump, which instantly kills most regular enemies in the game, not only that but it's possible to get the item before you even face Ridley or Kraid, I cannot justify its power with what I'm saying here so you really need to get it yourself so you can understand what I mean.

once you're powered up and have defeated the two Space Pirate leaders, you can head to the upper left corner of Brinstar and gain access to the final area, Tourian, where the Metroids and final obstacle of the game is awaiting you, "Mother Brain". you better conserve your missiles for the end, and I don't mean just for Mother Brain, but to even get to her you'll have to destroy regenerating barriers that can only be damaged by barriers, they don't regenerate if you can manage to destroy them thankfully. the Mother Brain fight is weird, she doesn't attack you at all but the Rinkas (floating projectives that aim for you) and the cannons in the battlefield are very plentiful, so you'll be spending your time getting hit by those a lot thanks to your big hitbox, and whatever you do, DON'T fall in the lava in front of Metroid Brain, try to keep your distance by being on the right edge of the final pillar so you don't fall in the lava and instead land on the safe platform to the right of the pillar. after defeating Mother Brain you've now completed the ga-- SIKES YOU HAVE TO DO A SURPRISE ESCAPE SEQUENCE but it's kinda easy outside of the platforms being a bit small, the layout is also repeated a lot so it really shouldn't be a big deal once you memorized it. when you do that only then do you get the ending and here's when the fun part comes in. depending on how fast you beat the game, you might be able to discover Samus's true identity! if you manage to finish the game under five hours, Samus takes off the helmet to reveal....HE WAS A SHE THE WHOLE TIME?!?!?!?!?! yeah everyone and their mother knows Samus is a female nowadays (unless you don't so if this is how you find out then I'm terribly sorry), Nintendo themselves only kept it a secret for this game in particular, but for 1986 this was a pretty cool hidden twist, especially considering that Samus is one of the first female protagonists. yeah Ms. Pac-Man predates her by about four years, sorry Samus! if you finish the game in under three hours Samus goes down to a leotard which also lets you play as in that form after the credits (or by a password if you don't want to do all that), and under a hour has her go into a bikini. she must be the most cocky and confident bounty hunter ever if she's taking down an entire planet wearing nothing but that under her suit. if you didn't beat the game under five hours, you can always try again and see how faster you can become with more experience and knowledge of Planet Zebes. it's a pretty short game so that along with the incentive of getting to see Samus in a 8-bit bikini makes the replayability of the original Metroid pretty high.

Metroid's graphics are very simplistic, but I think this actually benefits toward the game's favor. normally having a black background for the entire game would be kinda lame, but for here it works. you're venturing inside a dark and hostile planet, if the background was blue or something then the entire atmosphere would be thrown out of the window. speaking of atmosphere, I think this is the first game in my opinion to successfully pull off a tense one. the realistic looking enemies compared to other games at the time having stuff like Goombas or Moblins makes you feel like your dealing with a much more genuine threat, though a lot of them are actually easy to face against especially once you have enough upgrades. all the dark scenery likes the faces you see next to the elevator that takes you to Ridley as well as the iconic face in the corridor just before Kraid's room makes you feel like you really don't belong here, thankfully you're playing as Samus though and no one is more capable for this job than her.

if you need something to boost the atmosphere, then the soundtrack's got you covered. the Title Theme starts off simplistic and foreboding but if you stick around long enough then it transforms to a much more hopeful melody but looping back to the menacing drones again. the Start Jingle and Brinstar continue this optimism with an upbeat and heroic tune before you end up wandering into a Secret Area that brings back the droning from the beginning of the title screen but with a more neutral and mysterious tone this time. if you're lucky and happen to come across the statues that grant you upgrades you get this Item Jingle to signal that not only did you gain a new ability but that you're on the right path to victory. though if you hear this near an elevator and choose to go down, you'll instead hear this foreboding tune of Norfair which while also signifies you're on the right part (to Ridley in particular), it also means the game's no longer messing around and you face a huge threat of getting killed if you haven't prepped up enough before. go down even further to Ridley's Hideout and get to even to hear this game's "you will die" theme. if you choose to go to Kraid's Hideout, you instead get this really rad and groovy ass theme that I can't believe was composed back in 1986. it's insane how bopping Kraid's theme is, it almost feels out of place in a way but I'm not complaining, this is the best track in the game and I will not be argued otherwise. once you face Ridley and Kraid or just venture into Tourian, you get this pretty threatening theme once you ignore the goofy bubble sounds that play during the whole thing. by the time you get to Mother Brain there are no more melodies, there are only deranged 8-bit noises to describe the terror that is Mother Brain, and by Mother Brain, I mean everything else that's inside her room. the Escape Theme starts off with a "you need to get out" vibe but after the first 30 or so seconds it insteads transforms into a "you saved the galaxy, just one more push!" vibe. then there's the Ending Theme which is a full on melody that goes from menacing to triumphant then just starts going all out after that first minute, okay this might rival Kraid's theme for the best track in the game.

so yeah Metroid NES is epic especially for its time and I feel the smaller majority that still thinks this game holds up, though it is rough in a couple of places I'll admit. lack of a map, similar looking rooms, enemies being able to hit you while you're going through doors, starting with 30 energy after a game over, the entirety of Mother Brain's room, it's a little rough to get into, especially on your first or second playthrough when you have no idea what to do. if you have the courage to come back to this game though and learn everything about it, it becomes much more enjoyable and dare I say....fun. even with Zero Mission being arguably a better Metroid 1 experience, I still can't bring myself to say this game can be easily skipped. Zero Mission may take place in Zebes, but otherwise it's a full-on remake with completely different room layouts as well as reworked bosses and gameplay elements, a very great remake I have to add, but I do have the courage to tell you that you will indeed be missing out if you don't give the original a deserved shot. despite all my praises, this is somehow still the weakest Metroid I've played but a 7/10 being the weakest goes to show the exceptional quality of the Metroid franchise, heck I might change my score to a 8/10 later down the line because that's how neat I think Metroid is.

so yeah that's it, play the game, git gud or something do people still use that phrase

Pleasantly surprised at parts with Metroid! Dark Souls bonfire runs have nothing towards the run through Tourian, or making your way through ridiculously precise rooms of Kraid or Ridley's Lair before having to win at equally ridiculous fights.

The silence of Metroid's world works great - the art feels creepier and more organic as you go deeper into the planet, only to at times be replaced by the metallic architecture of Ridley or Kraid. It really conveys the sense of being in an alien planet, one that we'll never see all of, and one that wants Samus dead.

I found the moveset to be really well designed - not being able to shoot down and Samus being two tiles high means you have to really be aware of what's at your feet as well as how that distance affects where you shoot and jump. The screw attack adds an interesting (if chaotic) extra layer of strategy to later levels - although it feels powerful at first, it has an element of the unreliable against the flying beetles, and can feel slightly stiff to pull off in certain situations.

Enemy patterns can be very difficult but I feel like every room had some kind of 'solution', even if it was very hard to pull off. I found some of the timing windows too intense - the very long, narrow corridor in Ridley's lair with endless flying beetle pipes come to mind. Likewise, it can be hard to get your bearings as your health meter quickly depletes, with the game severely lagging when multiple enemies are on screen, and Samus's slightly limited movement conflicting with enemies that are somewhat too quick.

Health is hard to come by: this feels balanced throughout brinstar and Norfair, but takes a turn for the worse in Ridley and Kraid's areas. Part of this was that I never found the Varia suit (50% damage reduction!), but I do think that some of the long runs from the elevator to the bosses were just Too long, especially when you have to grind your health back after dying.

I thought the long beam, bombs, ice beam, missiles were all great additions to the arsenal, having their place within combat. Having the ice beam the whole game led to a really weird dynamic of having to be more precise with shots so as to not unfreeze enemies.

Room designs were generally pretty varied, and I liked that! It really felt like I was just stumbling across loot that the pirates left around - not as much like it was just a big world full of upgrades to find, designed just for me. That worked thematically with the setting. I liked that some rooms had an element of humor - the hidden hole near an energy tank, the secret morph ball passage beneath an otherwise very hard gauntlet, etc.

The copy pasted rooms felt a bit cheap, but it did add to the sense of being in a maze. I had a lot of fun drawing out my own maps for this game.

Overall I was pleasantly surprised! There's a lot to this game that could be improved, but I don't think improvement looks like Super Metroid. Key to this game are the arcade-y, yet nonlinear, stretches of making it to the next elevator or boss, and the way the game demands you to intimately know how to handle enemies and be on your guard. Things can go south really fast relative to other metroid games.

Around this point in time, say, 1990-1992, Konami, despite having plenty of successful titles under their belt, didn’t really have any kind of mascot to call their own. Yeah, they had plenty of successful franchises, like Castlevania, Contra, Gradius, and so on, but they didn’t have a main character that had that worldwide appealing factor to them, as can be seen with other video game mascots like Mario, Sonic, Mega Man, and Bub- I MEAN, UH………. Aero the Acro-Bat. Nice save there, Mega. But anyway, these characters were all the rage back in the day, so they figured that they needed to throw their hat into the ring somehow, and they managed to do so by not only creating a cute animal mascot to call their own… but also by giving them a rocket pack! This character would then get to star in the first of quite a few games known simply as Rocket Knight Adventures.

For the longest time, I had never played any Rocket Knight game before, but I REALLY wanted to, as it looked to be right up my alley. I am a big fan of these mascot platformers from back in the day, and it looked like it had the exact kind of chaotic energy that Konami usually put into their games back then, which I adore, along with charming characters placed right alongside it. It’s almost as if they made this game just for somebody like me! However, I still hadn’t checked it out in a long time, so I knew it was about time that I finally gave the series a proper shot, so I played through the first game, and yeah, it was just as great as I expected it to be. This is definitely one of the best mascot platformers that you can find on the Sega Genesis, giving you everything you could want from one of these games, mixed with a dash of Contra-level energy and craziness that makes it damn near perfect for someone like me.

The story is pretty decent for a game in this genre, where chaos erupts in the kingdom of Zephyrus, with the fair Princess Sherry being captured by the evil Axel Gear, along with a mysterious force seeking to reactivate the power of a destructive starship known as the Pig Star (hey, if Sonic can do it, so can this series), so it is up to Sparkster, taught in the ways of being a Rocket Knight, to set out to not only save the princess but also to stop the Pig Star from destroying everything, which is a story that basically decided to take the two most generic plot points for platformers from the 90s and combine them into one, which I can definitely respect. The graphics are wonderful, having plenty of colorful levels to travel through, accompanied with plenty of characters and enemies, Sparkster included, that have wonderful designs, the music is pretty great, having plenty of up-beat, yet still menacing-at-times tunes playing throughout the game, with this just being one of the many great tracks to be found here, and the gameplay/control feels just right for this kind of game, giving you plenty to work with for a typical platformer, while also mixing in plenty of fresh and exciting elements to help it stand completely on its own.

The game is an 2D action platformer, where you take control of Sparkster, go through a set of seven different levels spanning many different environments that range from peaceful and simple to deadly and chaotic, slash your way through many different enemies using your trusty blade or your rocket pack in many different situations, gather plenty of fruit to keep yourself healed throughout the journey, as well as extra lives for whenever you die (not IF you die), and take on plenty of large and insane bosses, each putting the player’s skill to the test in plenty of different ways. You have all the right ingredients for a fairly standard platformer present here, but then you have the standout elements that make Sparkster what he is, mixing them together with these standard elements, to end up with a concoction that provides a sweet and satisfying experience all the way through.

Sparkster himself does many of the typical things a platformer mascot should, such as running, jumping, and slicing down foes with a weapon of his choice, but alongside all of that, he also incorporates the rocket pack in with everything else, making for one of the best mechanics of the game. With this rocket pack, you can charge it up and launch yourself in any direction you wish, allowing you to not only speed along through plenty of different parts of the levels, but to also reach certain areas you wouldn’t be able to do so otherwise, and to cause MASSIVE damage to enemies and bosses while swinging your sword, and that shit right there ROCKS, I don’t care what anyone says. Mix all that with some other small, yet nice touches, like how you can hang onto trees and other platforms at some points, along with level gimmicks like going in and out of the background and high-speed cart segments, and Rocket Knight Adventures gives the player plenty of challenges to overcome with some kick-ass tools to boot, and it is a joy from start to finish in every way.

Not only that, but the game also makes sure to keep the gameplay fresh and unexpected as you go along, with there being plenty of sections and entire levels where it will change up the gameplay style to make things interesting. There will be plenty of instances where you will be continuously rocketing forward, taking on a horizontal shmup style, slicing down many things flying in your way, dodging plenty of projectiles coming from all over the place, and taking on plenty of bosses along the way. It doesn’t do anything too crazy with these segments, certainly not to the level of actual shmups out there, but it manages to be refreshing and fun enough to where you can definitely get behind it a lot of the time. If all of that wasn’t enough for you, how about an entire boss fight of the game where you control a GIANT ROBOT, swinging punches at Axel Gear, who is also in a giant robot, in an over-the-top game of Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots? It isn’t necessarily the best segment in the game, but it does still manage to be fun and fairly tricky, to where when you manage to take Axel Gear down, you feel like you truly triumphed over a hard foe.

And speaking of triumphing over a hard foe, that belatedly leads onto one of my only real criticisms for the game as a whole: it is REALLY HARD. In the good ol’ classic Konami tradition, this game will not hold any punches, sending plenty of enemies and hazards you way at any chance it gets, some that can even insta-kill you if you aren’t careful, and you need to react accordingly and carefully in these situations, otherwise that rocket knight suit will be donned by nothing other than a rotting marsupial corpse. Granted, there are plenty of difficulty options that can help you make things easier for yourself, but once again, this is a Konami game, which means that not only will you not get the true ending by playing on certain difficulties, but the amount of lives and continues that you get vary greatly depending on which difficulty you choose, mostly not in your favor. Also, this may be just a little personal grievance, but I think the final level gets a LIIIIIIIITLE too trigger happy with its bosses, as you have to go through, like, five or six of them before you have truly beaten the game, even during sequences when you think you are truly save. Again though, that might just be me.

Overall, despite how brutal it can be and the final level dragging things out further than they needed to be, I can’t believe I didn’t try out any of these games sooner, because this first entry manages to get just about everything right, having wonderful and charming visuals, a soundtrack full of bangers, incredibly fun and satisfying gameplay, and that classic 90s Konami insanity that I just can’t get enough of. I would definitely recommend it for those who are a big fan of mascot platformers, as well as those who are looking for more games from the Genesis to play, because if you haven’t given this game a shot yet, then you, my friend, like me for most of my life, were truly missing out. And hey, it’s even coming back in a brand new collection, so that means you will have very easy means to try it out!............. unless you wanna play it right now, in which case, if you aren’t willing to go out and find a copy for yourself, yar-har-fiddly-dee it is.

Game #569

I have exactly one criticism for this game, and it's quite the nitpick: A Hat in Time feels a little too cynical for the genre style it's going for. It's not much, and it's really only in a handful of places - for example, that throwaway line about Hat Kid's soul feeling "the normal amount of empty". It's a really funny line! But it does take me out of things just a little bit.

Everything else, though? Some of the most fun I've had in what's easily my most comfortable type of video game. 3D platformers are comfort food for me, so I was quite excited when this game's Kickstarter was announced. A modern 3D platformer, deliberately evocative of GameCube titles I'd grown up on like Super Mario Sunshine and Wind Waker? I didn't kick in, since admittedly there have been very few games I've backed on Kickstarter, but I was very excited to follow the game's progress.

Then it came out, and it was even better than I could have imagined.

There's an immediate joy to this game. Hat Kid has to be one of the most likable protagonists - cute and fun-loving, but impulsive, rude, and little concerned with the troubles she finds herself drawn into. There are all these hints at the world being fairly dark, what with those character vaults hinting at all the major players' tragic backstories, but this almost never intersects with the actual narrative of the adventure. Hat Kid almost feels like Kirby in this regard: an adorable hero in a sweet world with dark overtones. Only Kirby himself is not wired to interface with tragedy, just friends and foes, while Hat Kid is kinda annoyed by everyone (besides Bow Kid) and is content to cavalierly do her own thing.

Which makes for a great complement to the game's "anything goes" approach to level design! This is one of those games where there isn't really a "tutorial" world, nor is there any point in having one, since what every level asks ends up being so unique. This isn't to say that the game leaves the player in the lurch; "Mafia Town" very naturally shows off what Hat Kid can do and gives the player a ton of space to explore. And then every other world does something wildly different.

"Battle of the Birds" is quite simply one of the most fun and engaging video game worlds, period. What a fun way to bring together wildly divergent ideas! I'm curious about the original "science owls" concept mentioned in the Kickstarter, but I honestly can't imagine preferring it to what we got: two inexplicable rivals, a funky penguin and a train conductor... thing... trying to win an annual film director award. Dead Bird Studios and the respective train/moon film sets make for cool, divergent environments with their own challenges, and while I have a definite favorite (The Conductor), the whole thing's great.

Since I'm going through all the different worlds anyway - "Subcon Forest" is probably the other easy candidate for someone's favorite world. Having Super Mario Bros. 2 in my foundational gaming background, I went in expecting a very dreamlike world (i.e. Subconscious). And while that is the case, it's a dual meaning, since you spend the whole world Subcon-tracting. The Snatcher is suuuuuuch a fun villain, adding a ton of loud personality to what's otherwise a very melancholy, quiet world. I love the scattershot flow that comes from this world, where you can get saddled with contracts in one level that won't even be addressed for another level or two. Makes the whole thing feel way more sprawling than you'd expect.

Speaking of sprawling, there's Alpine Skyline! I've heard it called the also-ran world of this game, and it's hard to argue with that. I do still think it's quite good, though! A big world of pure platforming challenges makes for a fun counter-offer to the game's usual character-driven design. Like you definitely miss the presence of other characters, but there's something nice and silently contemplative to all the obstacle courses that characterize this place.

...other levels I'll cover if/when I get around to doing reviews for the DLC. This write-up just covers the base game.

But, like, I've spent a lot of words articulating a simple point - A Hat in Time is a wonderful, wonderful game. One of those where everything, from the cast to the level design to the writing to the MUSIC, contributes to one of the most enjoyable games I can think of. An easy personal recommendation for anyone.

Given Tomb Raider's British heritage, a game themed around Arthurian legend was probably long overdue. Granted, Legend plays pretty fast and loose with the Arthurian cycle, casting it as part of a common global legend in the same way that multiple ancient cultures have a flood myth, but that sort of syncretic blend of world legends is part of the fun of these globetrotting treasure-hunting narratives.

I probably owe Tomb Raider: Legend a revisit at some later point, once I've better put the Tomb Raider series into context. As of this writing, this is the only mainline, non-Survivor Tomb Raider I've finished. I know Legend is sort-of the start to its own reboot trilogy, but I feel like I'm missing why it was well-received by not tracking the original run of Tomb Raider's decline in quality through Chronicles and Angel of Darkness. As its own thing, I found Legend fine, not really remarkable but not really offensive. But I suspect that sort of game was precisely what Tomb Raider needed at that point in time: a fresh run in a new set of hands several years after Angel of Darkness broke the series' foundation.

Um, game's a bit janky. A lot of the general jumpy climby stuff in what I've played of the original series feels like that, where it's easy to fling one's self off a cliff in a wild direction despite the game's best efforts, so I sort of feel like that's a problem a lot of this genre ran into before Uncharted really smoothed out gameplay feel (or maybe that's just a consequence of my playing on PC?). But there are a few set pieces that feel very much of its era, taking big swings that don't completely connect. Those motorcycle sequences, for example: neat idea, something that you couldn't really do on PS1, barely something you could do on PS2 if this game is anything to go by. That one bit where you're climbing down a tall, tall chamber is surprisingly rough, too, since between the crumbling platforms and some of the jumps down, it was easy to overshoot and wind up taking too big a jump and ragdolling on the next platform. Plus there was that one boss fight against the guy (don't remember his name) who just kept screaming "DAMN YOU LARA BET YOU WISH YOU COULD DO THAT HUH BET YOU WISH YOU COULD DO THAT HUH FINE WE'LL DO IT YOUR WAY FINE WE'LL DO IT YOUR WAY DAMN YOU LARA DAMN YOU LARA BET YOU WISH YOU COULD DO THAT HUH". Like, dude, chill.

But Legend is one of those where jank adds to the experience, so don't read this as much of a complaint. I do think all the ideas the game advances are sound, even if they are rough in execution. Anyway, the times where the game really does come together are quite fun. Not a lot of the game's stuck with me, but that one level, where you start out at a crummy roadside tourist trap about King Arthur that transitions into Arthur's actual tomb, is suuuuch a fun concept. Definitely worth the visit for me all on its own.

I don't know how to wrap this one up, so here's a video I took during my playthrough that I titled "tombraiderlegends.mp4".