Tomb Raider Underworld: Completion Thread

  • Have you finished Tomb Raider Underworld? Talk about it here. Spoilers are allowed here, so to those who've not yet finished it, please keep away. If you don't mind spoilers, read at your own risk, ;-) .


    I'm a little disappointed that there isn't much to do once you've finished. You can either go through Treasure Hunt mode or start a new game. I wish you could replay levels and pick any outfit in the game, not just ones they provide you with in the selection. I thought this one would be perfect...perhaps if they merged Underworld's game with Legend's options for level replays and outfit choices, then it'd be perfect.


    Shame.

  • I totally agree with you. And I really miss the Croft Manor. (They should have included one of her other two manor houses in my opinion, just for the fun of it...)


    Plus, I wished they would have...

  • Agreed. I mean, I don't see why we couldn't have had one of Lara's other manors, perhaps with a whole new interior and exterior, and if that's too much to ask, then have it look the same as her first.


  • Yes I'm missing the Croft Manor, too. And revisiting the stages is little bit boring, because there aren't enemies anymore. But the story mode is fun, I really enjoyed it. The graphics look perfect (Lara, too!). They could release this sort of Tomb Raider every six months :) Maybe there will be some download contents on xbox-live. I'll have a look right now...

  • Uhh...


    I think asking for a Tomb Raider game every six months is a little too much to ask for. I mean, Underworld took how long? And it still isn't perfect like it should have been. Six months might be the length of the planning stage.


    The downloadable content won't be released until late December 2008 and early January 2009. The only content available are trailers, the demo, themes, and gamer pics. I think it's stupid to release more than one theme for the game; the New Xbox Experience only allows for one background from the theme, despite the Underworld ones having about five, and they won't even let you choose which background you want.


    :thumbsdown:

  • Yes I know, the new NXE dashboard isn't what I expected. I don't know if I'll buy extra stages on Live, because I prefer physical things like DVDs. You know what I'm talking about. If you bought tons of themes, they are pretty useless now ;)


    "I think asking for a Tomb Raider game every six months is a little too much to ask for."


    Please don't overinterpret :) The more Tomb Raider the better...

  • Since croft manor burnt down, it would be a good excuse to invent a new “manor” for the future. Like it was, there was not much else you could invent in croft manor that hadn’t already been done, and stuff like the enormous underground crypt that no-one knew about is starting to look unlikely to say the least. How about she moves into a castle once owned by a branch of her family or something? That would give huge scope for new “manor” levels, with secret passageways galore!


    I would have liked a few more loose ends tied up. For example, where did the doppelganger come from and did it really die. What happens to the hammer. Do the thralls retrieve it or what? She spent all this time getting the hammer, and threw it away. We don’t even know for sure Natla is dead. I guess she still has the belt and gloves, not much use on their own except to glow blue at parties. And she doesn’t know how to recharge them :-)

  • According to biographies, when Lara's father died, she was not old enough to automatically inherit all three manors, so she had to go to court with her uncle who fought her for them. Ultimately, Lara won them all. Now that the one in Surrey is gone, and I don't think she'll spend the money to fix it, she has the other two she could move into. No doubt she already did - in the ending of the Southern Mexico level, Lara contacted Zip who was working on finding Amanda and Natla, who in the end, locates them on Amanda's ship, Tisiphone; Zip was most likely in the tech room of one of Lara's other homes. I can't possibly imagine he and Winston sitting outside the destroyed Croft Manor in Surrey with a laptop, trying to pinpoint Amanda's location. I'd love a castle-like manor for Lara the next time around. Something like the one Mac had in the movie Entrapment with Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta Jones, perhaps with more explorable land like in the Cradle of Life - perhaps target practice while horseback riding, :thumbs: .


    Natla created the doppelgänger for Amanda to send after Lara to mainly, get her Wraith Stone, and cause chaos about the manor while she's at it as a secondary objective. The doppelgänger is indeed dead as Amanda threw it into the void of Jormungandr's poison, Eitr, which was the same poison that reanimated Amelia into a thrall. Although in the game when Lara dies by the touch of the poison, in reality, Lara would turn into what her mother did. There can be a debate on whether or not the doppelgänger is dead or alive - one, because of the poison, or two, because the poison will turn humans into thralls, but then again, the doppelgänger might not be human, but an Atlantean creature.


    Mjolnir, however, is most likely corroded to pieces after being engulfed in Jormungandr's poison...that, or it's just floating about at the bottom of the 'Eitr sea' in Helheim. And Natla is indeed dead - Mjolnir's powers are capable of killing immortal gods on contact, no doubt why the other gods in mythology feared Thor the most since he could kill them with one strike of the hammer. Natla, the Queen of Atlantis, is or was an immortal god, and by getting hit in the head with Mjolnir, and falling into Jormungandr's poison, she was killed, finally.


    The two gauntlets are recharged by Thor's Belt, Megingjord. The two iron gauntlets are required to wield Mjolnir, but they lose power after time, and the belt recharges the power, enabling the user to wield the mighty hammer.


    Hope that answered your inquiry, :-) .

  • wooo... finished it... I agree with catracoth that the general layout was really bad. Legend was great for that.


    But the thing that annoys me was that there were no really hard fights. I mean in Legend there was some form of boss in practically every level (except the first two and nepal), in anniversary there was the T-rex and the centaurs (and thats as far as I got.... cursed mules with fireballs) and then in underworld... ummm.... what? The only slightly hard fight was the first big trollish thrall thing, and from then on you've got the hammer, so its only a three shot kill.... I like bosses...


    The puzzles are ok but personally I get on fine with them, there weren't any that really stumped me (except the bridge, but I was being stupid then)


  • .....I didn't say the general layout was bad....


    On top of that, I'm glad there weren't any "boss fights". That's so plaid out nowadays, almost every action game has it.

  • Tomb Raider Underworld: Completed ;-)


    My opinion:
    To an extent, I agree with the above-mentioned 'criticisms' - to be honest, I'm not blown away by the game. I enjoyed a couple of the puzzles, and the Arctic Sea was a great adventure.
    *Deep breath* But ...


    In conclusion: A good game, without doubt. But it could have been an excellent one. Crystal, I'm dissapointed and Eidos - you should have known better.

  • The last time wasn't properly. She can only die by Mjolnir - we didn't use it the first time. This time we did, and she's dead for good. Alister was shot in the heart and was dead when Winston checked his pulse, so I'm positive he's gone for good. Amanda's still alive, so I don't doubt she'll return. The doppelganger was thrown into the vortex of Jormungandr's poison which kills instantly, so I'm sure she's gone for good too.

  • Well, in an interview with Eric Lindstrom I read a few weeks ago, he mentioned a sort of "Kurtis Trent"-esque fate for one of the characters, if I remember correctly... ?(


  • Perhaps, it is indeed a little early to scribble out possibilities. Anyone else notice that Lara says "No" a lot?


    -When the mercenary leader shoots the flammable tank on the cargo ship in the Mediterranean Sea; "No..."


    -When Lara sees her doppelganger; "No..."


    -When Alister is shot by the doppelganger: "NOOOO!!!"


    -When she sees her mother in Helheim as a thrall: "No...no, no no, no"


    [hehe]

  • dumbed down


  • The last time wasn't properly. She can only die by Mjolnir - we didn't use it the first time. This time we did, and she's dead for good. Alister was shot in the heart and was dead when Winston checked his pulse, so I'm positive he's gone for good. Amanda's still alive, so I don't doubt she'll return. The doppelganger was thrown into the vortex of Jormungandr's poison which kills instantly, so I'm sure she's gone for good too.



    RedHell, I couldn't have said it better myself. Actually, I didn't ;-) That was the point I was trying to make - just because we've seen a character 'die', doesn't mean we won't be seeing them again [hehe] So I think it is entirely possible to see one or two, maybe all three, 'dead' characters arriving in the next game(s). But I am waiting to be proven, either right or wrong ;-) As for Amanda, I agree - it's doubtful that she won't be returning.



    I agree - there were a couple of really nice puzzles - the Thai Bridge (Thanks for helping on that, ;-) ), the Mayan Calendar puzzle and the gate in the Arctic Sea were great. I am, however, undecided about whether or not I like the Boss Fight idea.

    [...] but a cynic would say the game is being dumbed down and adapted to attract new customers into the genre!


    Guess that makes me a cynic then ;-)
    I am greatly aggravated by the option of the 'helper icons' - I know you can turn them off (and I did), but it just adds to the feeling of dumbing the game down, in my personal opinion. It makes me think that they're making it easier so more people will play. More players is in no way a bad thing, but Tomb Raider is meant to be a puzzle-based adventure and the helper icons (at least symbolically) are taking away from that. This may just be a bunch of nonsense and I may just be silly here, but it is my opinion: feel free to disagree.



    Absolutely. I played the game almost exclusively with the pistols, barring for Thor's Hammer and a disastrous attempt with the Tranquilizer Gun [hehe]



    Hahaha. I was thinking more along the lines of "Bad archaeologist!" :P but I do agree. Especially when on the motorbike - there you are, driving along, when suddenly you brake, dismount and kick open a pot! It is insane. I think they should have lowered the number of secrets per location (who needs 50 secrets?) and instead have put more effort into them, myself.



    Hmm... :think: I haven't noticed it, but since you mention it, I'll keep an eye out for it and let you know what I think. :D



    Wow, that is interesting. I've not heard anyone say that about Underworld :thumbsup I still think they are impressive (maybe it's just bias from recently re-playing TRIII [hehe] ), but then again, almost every game (new and old) boasts about the graphics and looking back at them, you think "Those were/are impressive?" and I'm probably going to be thinking that about Underworld by the next TR ;-)


    I did forget to mention another positive in my previous post: I am impressed with Lara's new ablities. I like the 'wall-run' and 'perch' abilities from Legend and, although I keep forgetting to use it, I like the 'chimney-jump' move as well. I also like the fact that you can aim weapons at enemies while hanging from a ledge/whatever. I do not like that 'action' = hand-to-hand combat (for the xbox, at least). It gets rather annoying when I'm trying to see if something can be moved, or when I am incorrectly aligned to pick up something, and she starts round-kicking the air.

  • Quote

    perhaps if they merged Underworld's game with Legend's options for level replays and outfit choices, then it'd be perfect.

    That's what I meant by general layout.... eg: level replays and outfits... Sorry, I didn't phrase that well.


    Talking about the whole manga-ifying of Lara, I noticed that too. When Underworld first arrived in the post I was using quite an old graphics card that really wasn't capable, so everything appeared to be the same level of detail and absolutely fine. But then I bought a new graphics card and one of the first things I noticed was how little detail there was in lara's face compared to... well... everything else, she's just a little cartoon with chubby cheeks, big eyes and practically no shading on her face. Although, to be honest, I think the only reason I noticed the change was because before she was delightfully pixelated. lol


    I hated the pots but the problem I had with them was when a secret wasn't in a pot, ie: laying about on the floor, I just didn't see it.


    Personlly, I decided to keep the helper stuff on but only beacuse in legend I had an absolute crisis... In Legend you had to jump then grapple to swing across a gap, but it only told you how to do it the first time, so later on (can't remember whereabouts) I got to a big gap... Could see the big shiny disk, and kept throwing the grapple, jumping, pressing action, throwing a grendade, but really couldn't remember how to do it. So I had to redo the level completely just to check the control help. And bearing in mind that it was the first time through... That first level was really hard at the time. So in underworld I didn't mess with the difficulty settings, just in case. If I decide to replay the game though they'll be the first things to go.

  • I haven't even started. I'm getting it for Christmas. :cry

    I feel so sorry for you... I only just avoided that fate. My mum insisted that I asked grandma to pay for it and give it me for christmas but I outright refused and gave gran a load of albums instead, and now I regret even that as I've finished TRU and now have no new music to listen too... Ah well, not long to wait now. :|