Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics have confirmed that a sequel to Tomb Raider (2013) is officially in the works. If you’re a fan of Lara Croft, and of the gritty action/adventure style of Uncharted, then the new Tomb Raider may be for you. The game is beautiful and hilariously merciless on Lara, but it lacks serious replay value, something a triple-A title needs in order to become worth a $40-$60 purchase. I have my own personal wishes as to how the next game should be (included at the end), but here’s four updates and changes we’d like to see in the follow-up to Crystal Dynamic’s successful 2013 reboot [SPOILERS BELOW]:
Side Missions That Matter
Raiding tombs felt like an after-thought. Side missions were optional, simple platforming puzzles that took longer to find than to solve, with the only reward being a nice chunk of salvage for upgrading weapons. Now that Lara has earned her title, tomb raiding needs to be a central part of exploring and of story telling. We love Lara’s adventures because they’re full of danger, and that’s exactly what was missing from these side missions. If anything, side missions should have better incentives like health upgrades. They could also have battle challenges featuring…
More Super Natural Enemies
Everyone loves a twist, and Tomb Raider followed the Act III twist from the Uncharted games by introducing super natural bad guys in the climactic final levels. It’s the most intense part of the game, and I think I speak for everyone when I say we’d like more of that spread out through the game.
More Ways To Die
…because we love insane death montages.
More Stealth Action
You should always have the option to one-hit KO a baddie if you can sneak up on them. Now that Lara knows how to use a crossbow and pickaxe, we’d love to see more levels tailored to choices: the badass route or the sneaky route. This would be especially fun if tombs were filled with bad guys, and they acted as pieces of the puzzle.
Opinion Suggestion: A Choice System
You may remember that Tomb Raider was the first game in 2013 to make some people say, “Game of the Year?” Since then, we’ve had Bioshock: Infinite, The Last Of Us, and are looking forward to GTAV, all of which are contenders for the coveted title. However that won’t stop Crystal Dynamics from aiming to create 2015’s Game of the Year, and I think they could if “Tomb Raider 2” had some sort of event choice system, similar to Infamous, but with the subtley of Mass Effect (minus the books of dialog). Tomb Raider sought to prove that pure instinct is the beauty and curse of the human spirit by beating the innocence out of Lara to transform her into the tomb raider. Now that Lara is hardened to death and the supernatural, wouldn’t it be great if the player could decide how to use that power?
Let us know what you think, and tell us what you’d like to see in “Tomb Raider 2” in the comments below!
