A mother load of new details have hit regarding Lara Croft’s next outing and from the looks of it, gaming’s leading lady will be headed to Mother Russia in search of another ancient city with an old friend.
As it was revealed by Game Informer’s February cover story, this year’s Rise of the Tomb Raider will take after Uncharted’s globe-trotting ways. The game’s set to encompass a variety of environments, with Siberia being one of them, in addition to deserts and forests in contrast to 2013’s Tomb Raider, which took place on only one island.
The game’s story will follow Lara Croft and her sidekick, Jonah Maiava as they traverse Siberia in hopes of discovering an ancient invisible city built by the Grand Prince of Vladimir in the 13th century. Lara, who’s apparently dealing with post-traumatic stress following her original escapades two years ago, is hellbent on proving her discoveries, supernatural and otherwise, to the world.
Akin to The Last of Us and Alien: Isolation, Lara’s mad crafting skills will see her scavenge for metals, minerals, plants and animal hides to construct stuff like poisonous ammo, traps, grenades, molotov cocktails and healing items rather than gaining XP for slaughtering harmless animals, as were the bulk of her options in 2013’s Tomb Raider.
Animals, like the vicious, furry one you see above you, will be smarter and more reactive to the climate – one unlikely to be easy on either woman or beast. Some of them will only come out at night or during the day while certain hides will add a Monster Hunter-like element of tracking your prey.
Human enemies’ line of sight and hearing will also be affected by such climate changes as fog and rain.
Developers further intend for puzzles to be more involved this time around from the sound of it, including such things as having players decipher ancient languages to unravel clues.
Rise of the Tomb Raider will reportedly have an Xbox 360 version that’ll be handled by Nixxes Software due to Crystal Dynamics’ devotion to a next-gen Tomb Raider on Xbox One. The game reportedly hits both systems this holiday season with Microsoft publishing the title.