If I start by saying that I very much hope that the team that put this together is not responsible in any way shape or form for TLOU2, then you already have a very clear notion on what I think about this game.

It's not an appallingly bad game, far from it. But it is not even worth comparing to TLOU as it is in a far different league.

Let's start by dismantling the gameplay. What would be an appropriate description? I know: BLATANT RIPOFF. With all caps. They are not even trying to hide that they are copying Rise of The Tomb Raider almost to the letter. To a point where even some of the criticism I had for that are present in it. For example making jumps that are seemingly impossible, but your leap is always as big as the situation demands.
The game mechanics are carbon copied, jumping, climbing, shooting, and running, and a few puzzles to solve. Even the collecting of artifacts. Except here it is completely pointless, as it doesn't give anything to the lore, the items are not interesting in any way, or hold any secrets. The only reason to collect them is to get the attached achievement, or trophy as they are called on PS.

The only difference in gameplay is having an AI controlled partner. But that changes less than you might think. It doesn't stop the game from being exactly like Tomb Raider. I cannot re-iterate enough that it is not a superficial resemblance, if they replaced the main character's skin with Lara Croft it would be Tomb Raider. Even the villains could easily be trinity. Hell they are: A pack of mercs lead by random superstitious bad guy.
Talking about the AI partner, the only significant part she plays in the game is the god awful cringe inducing woke dialogue, they spew all the time, but especially during cutscenes.

The story is really vague and uninteresting. I had zero investment in the personal gripes of the characters, which the entire story seemed to revolve around. The most laughable part were the stereotypical indian accents. But the main villain sometimes forgot that he should speak in an indian accent. That is bad voice acting right there. Even Claudia Black who voices the main character who I was a fan of since farscape delivers such a bland performance that every damned dialogue was torture to my senses.

The agenda and motivations of the characters changes more often than the weather. "We're friends, now we're sworn enemies, yay we're friends again" Baah, my head wanted to explode. The characters have no character whatsoever, they do and act completely arbitrarily as the piss poor writing demands.

It's not a bad game technically, but that is little consolation.

+

  • OK-ish graphics  
  • Exact same gameplay as Tomb Raider  


-

  • Piss poor story and writing  
  • Characters have no convictions, their attitude is ever changing
  • Awful dialogue and voice acting  
  • Blatant copy of Rise of the Tomb Raider  
  • Mediocre level design  
  • 7 hours to finish without rushing  
  • male = bad / female = good (as I think of it, there was not a single female character on the bad side, plus the only male on the "good" side is painted in the worst possible light as well)  


Scoring card:

graphics/realization: 7/10
story/atmosphere: 2/10
gameplay/controls: 6/10

overall impression: 5/10

Meh...At least it was short and I didn't waste much time on it, just money.