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Tomb Raider Underworld (Xbox 360) | 
| From: Eidos
Category: Video Games
New (17) Used (13) from £22.95
Avg. Customer Rating:  18 reviews
Sales Rank: 184
Platform: Xbox 360
Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
Media: Video Game
Operating System: Xbox 360
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: PTOM8TEN07
EAN: 5021290035553
ASIN: B001BN8UCK
Release Date: November 21, 2008
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Product Description
For generations, stories have been told of the fearsome weapon of the Norse god Thor......
Amazon.co.uk Review
The first lady of gaming returns in Tomb Raider - Underworld with her deepest and darkest adventure yet. Ostensibly searching for the mythical hammer of the Norse god Thor, the real draw of the game is exploring the underworlds of multiple different cultures.
 A pair of panthers make an uncomfortable safety net |  When you're a tomb raider, exploring ancient tombs is all in a day’s work |  Lara’s pistols are no match for the kraken |  The Mediterranean level includes a huge area for swimming | The basics of the game are classic Tomb Raider, as you explore the trap-filled interiors of ancient ruins using Lara’s famed acrobatic skills (and dual action pistols). From an underwater temple guarded by a giant octopus-like kraken to ancient Mayan structures in the South American jungle, she makes Indiana Jones look even older. All of the levels are much larger than in previous games and far more interactive. You'll leave footprints in the sand and find all the scenery fully destructable. Every puzzle has multiple solutions, and the hand-to-hand combat system has been completely revamped. A new 3D map system also helps to ensure you never get lost so that you can concentrate on saving the world. Key Features - Dream vacation: Travel the world in search of ancient artefacts, from the steaming-hot jungles of Mexico to the frozen Arctic, from the coast of Thailand to the depths of the Mediterranean Sea.
- Think like Lara: An interactive, non-linear game world means anything that it looks like you should be able to pick up and use (or destroy) you can.
- Bettering Bond: An all new grappling hook, sonar map, scuba gear, a range of new weapons, and Lara’s trusty motorbike make her the best equipped adventurer in gaming.
- Help on demand: Receive as much or as little help as you want, from gentle nudges in the right direction to a full explanation of what you need to do next.
- Behind the scenes: All of Lara’s animations in the game have been fully motion captured from Olympic gymnast Heidi Moneymaker. Her voice is that of Spooks actress Keeley Hawes.
About the Developer: Crystal Dynamics
Based in the San Francisco bay area, the Crystal Dynamics team has been making games since 1992, including popular titles such as Pandemonium, Gex, and Legacy of Kain/Soul Reaver. Crystal Dynamics began revammping the Tomb Raider series with Tomb Raider: Legend.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 13 more reviews...
 Best one yet...bit still so flawed January 6, 2009
Always loved Tomb Raider but every time I played it I would become frustrated with the wooden movement of Lara Croft. I never found the controls to be that easy to get then hang of. The developers tried to fix this, I'm not denying that. They just haven't fixed the basics and instead gone for giving Lara more elaborate movements. A bit disappointing to be honest but I'll come back to this later on.
Visually, this game is really quite beautiful as would probably be expected and is definately a return to the Tomb Raider we know and love. Puzzels, artefacts, crumbling temples.....I loved the settings.
The camera is absolutely appalling. I know it's not an easy thing to get right but where you have Assassin's Creed, another action/adventure, in which the camera was stunningly precise, it can be done. You will find that the camera goes haywire a lot of the time. It will jump about very quickly leaving you a bit disorientated. I lost track of the amount of times Lara fell off a ledge to her death because the camera went funny when I was hanging off the ledge. It's hugely frustrating.
Another thing I really could do without is the camera focussing a close up on Lara's backside so frequently. I'm a straight female. I don't fantasise about Lara Croft. I would rather just play the game and not have to pan the camera out from her rear. I appreciate this may be a selling point for the lads though!
Weapon wise I wasn't blown away. You select your weapons via Lara's PDA which is really just your inventory. This is fine, but when a tiger is mauling you, you don't have the time to watch Lara take the PDA from her belt and tap a button. Just having it immediately appear on screen would be better. When you've equipped your chosen rifle and aim, you will find Lara is still using her pistols. You will then have to tap the D-Pad to switch the weapons you thought you'd equipped in the first place. All the time, being shot at/mauled by your enemy.
Combat is fairly striaght forward. Lara can now aim seperately at two enemies using her pistols - good, but seems to be incapable of shooting or aiming at a tranquilised tiger - bad. You know it will wake up within seconds, and yet you can't shoot it after you've tranquilised it. Or I can't anyway...
Lara uses a sonar system on her PDA to navigate but I have to say, I didn't use it. For me, the essence of Tomb Raider is, well, Tomb Raiding, and I didn't want to use sonar to tell me where the hidden gap was.
Lara's movements as mentioned previously, haven't been improved that much. There are still some really annoying aspects to the basic movements. Her running still seems as rigid as it always was. Sometimes when you jump off a ledge it doesn't matter what direction you press her to jump in, she will leap off the opposite way, when using swinging bars if you lose momentum trying to get her going again is a task. Lara can do some nice fancy somersaults when climbing up onto things, she can bounce upside down off of enemies, but she seems to have trouble running and jumping. I would much rather the developers perfected the basic movements before giving her some free running abilities.
I'm sorry this is such a negative review. Don't get me wrong, I am enjoying the game, but there have been times where I've just switched it off in sheer frustration (always go back to it though - probably a good sign!). If I was responsible for all of the deaths I've had so far in this game, fair enough, but the lack of control I feel I have over Lara and the camera is off putting.
Best Tomb Raider yet? Probably. Do I feel its good enough to hold its own with similar titles in such a competative market? Probably not. Some of the things which occur frequently in this game, in particular the camera, shouldn't occur on next-gen consoles. The developers should be past that stage.
 Good story line, poor game play January 4, 2009
The overall game including the levels and storyline is very good. However, I found that the camera was terrible. As the camera was needed to perform accurate jumps etc, the fact that it seemed to move on its own, caused Lara to radically alter course. i found this most annoying when using the grapple hook. Otherwise pretty good game. Worth buying if you're a fan of Tomb Raider.
Great game! December 30, 2008
This is a great game and a definate improvement on the last game. Several times I literally jumped out of my chair due to being attacked by...well that would be telling. The only reason this didn't get 5 stars is it's too easy. I completed on 'normal' (the default) in a few days. I'm going to play again now on the hardest settings. Definately worth a play if you like the TR games.
Just about three stars December 29, 2008
There's lots about this game that's great: the graphics, the tweaked fighting options, Lara's moves and movement, and the 'classic' Tomb Raider feel to the whole thing. There's a bit of a wow! factor that takes you back to the original, so why the feeling of something not being quite right?
A number of other reviewers have highlighted the bugs, and some of them are really quite annoying. Getting Lara 'stuck' in invisible scenery shouldn't happen at this level, and the checkpoint/autosave can be so bad it's scary for this day and age - even a manual save doesn't guarantee you starting at the point you left.
But these bugs are symptoms and not the cause of the disquiet. After all this time of making these games they should be a damn near perfect combination of everything that was good in the rest of them. The frustrating thing is that it really isn't. Yes, it's got the Tomb Raider feel to it, but I'm beginning to think that some of that is me wanting it to be good.
I think the best way to describe it is that there's nothing 'clever' about it. One of the key elements of Tomb Raider games is, for me, admiring the thought and passion that has gone into it. The cunning puzzle that took an age to solve but gave a sense of immense satisfaction, the well placed block that is crucial to defeating a creature, or the only safe way down an obstacle when the clock is ticking. This one is Tomb Raider by the numbers.
Underworld has large levels but they're just too straightforward. I'm a little afraid to say this but sometimes it verges on the tedious. There's very little variation in the puzzles, and once you've got the fighting technique it can be applied for the whole game. The simple puzzles have a place, but that place is Legend with it's short arcade-like levels (which I'd rate at four stars).
It's not bad...it's still Tomb Raider...it's still fun...but it's nowhere near the step forward we all want it to be. What I wanted was a step on from Anniversary, but I think it doesn't even reach the same level. That's the key point - I feel that Underworld is not as good as a game that was, at heart, a spruce-up of a design over ten years old. Substance has been heavily sacrificed for style, and as we know, gameplay should always be king.
Atmospheric, fun and not as frustrating as previous games in the series December 12, 2008
I've played all of the Tomb Raider games so can hopefully give a balanced view on this latest game in the series.
I loved the very first two games on the original playstation, but then the series took a turn for the worse, especially with the third game which was just so hard and frustrating that I eventually gave up around 2 thirds of the way through. I didn't quite finish Anniversary either, as it became too frustrating.
I've just finished Underworld after a couple of weeks of mostly very happy gameplay. The fact that I could happily finish it is a big plus for me.
The good:
- Graphics
- Soundtrack
- The scale of some of the puzzles (one of the rooms towards the end is enormous)
- The controls on the Xbox (I played the previous 2 games with a keyboard and mouse - the Xbox pad is much easier)
- It's not as annoyingly frustrating as some of the previous games, and you can actually finish it
The not so good:
- One of the mexican levels with the annoying calendar puzzle needed a bit more testing, and seems a bit buggy
- Another level would have been good to make the experience a little longer
- Not much replay value
Would love to have some mini challenges in the next one to extend the life of the game. Some motorbike time trials would be good fun for instance.
All in all I agree with Edge, and give it 8, or perhaps 8 and a half out of 10. Most importantly, it's fun and not overly frustrating.
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