Tomb Raider 4 - The Last Revelation (DC)

Although it was a while before Tomb Raider 4 was ported to the Dreamcast, it did so with a whizz and a bang, bringing numerous refinements to the table, such as visual and aural enhancements that made it a sure fire betterment to the original game. The game opens with a flashback portion, where a young Lara is being shown the adventure ropes by her mentor, Werner Von Croy, but unfortunately, the cave they're in is not secure, and begins crumbling down, causing Lara to save herself and sacrifice her mentor. Some years later, however, Lara is in another cave, and unfortunately unleashes an Ancient Egyptian God who intends to unleash the apocalypse on Earth. To ...  Read the complete review

When I got a Dreamcast for Christmas I got three games with it: Sonic, Chu-Chu Rocket and Tomb Raider 4. Now when I received this I was expecting TR4 to be the game I played most. However on finding Chu-Chu Rocket to be one of the funniest games of all time and discovering that Sonic actually had more to it than meets the eye, I found myself ignoring TR4. I loved the original Tomb Raider. Back in the days when I had a Saturn I played for hours. It's main appeal was the fact that it was the closest thing we had to an Indiana Jones action game (before Infernal Machine came out). It was also a fresh look on gaming, a new genre which would ...  Read the complete review

When Lara's two main assets (great graphics and superb playablility obviously) were unleashed upon the gaming world the effects were astounding with middle aged men the world over ending up salivating vast lakes of dribble beneath their monitors. Now, in her fourth outing on her fourth console the formula has been done to death, not only by Eidos but by other companies who have seen the success of the original. With a film coming out next year and Lara merchandising packaged with every game we have to ask the vital question is it getting too stale? According to Lara's relatively poor showing in the sales charts from this game the answer is yes. Gameplay ...  Read the complete review

The Dreamcast sales were dwindling, so they decided to bring Lara Croft to the console. Lara has a terrific ability to sell a console, and she had terrific potential to develop on the Dreamcast. Sadly this is unused potential as Eidos have decided to port the PSX version directly onto the Dreamcast. Whilst the PSX version was hardly poor, the dreamcast version is bad. It could have been improved massively to take advantage of the DC's extra power. Better graphics, a few exclusive levels and some definite listening to criticisms of the PSX version were ignored, in favour of rushing the product out to get the DC sales going. The game itself isnt as ...  Read the complete review

So, the ultra successful Tomb Raider franchise finally hits Sega's great "white hope" at last; the question is: is it any good? Well, it really depends on whether you bought your Dreamcast for next-gen gaming or not. This fourth instalment of TR has been converted from the PC version, which is not a terrible thing you understand, but here we have a 128-bit console running a game which hasn't dramatically changed since it's inception on the PlayStation and ironically, Saturn, all those moons ago. The graphics are at best glitchy, and really don't even attempt to flex the Dreamcast's graphical muscle. The control system is now feeling very old ...  Read the complete review