The 2013 Tomb Raider was a great and an original game, the new instalment is still a decent one but pretty far from the potential it really had. It's something similar to what Resident Evil 5 was compared to Resident Evil 4( this is even being generous). First of all the story is at very best - mediocre. Spoler alert!! We are chasing the Holy Grail, something never done before but I would give them some credit because they used a different name/word. Most of the new/old characters are lacking the reasonable motivation behind their actions, you can hardly feel anything for them and the poor dialog is making even Lara look stupid.... The story is trying hard to enforce Lara's dad but given the flashbacks he is acting more like a teenager and not like someone you would expect him to be. This version of Lara has been raised without her mother and if her father is really such a "sissy" it's really hard to believe that she was able to become such an exceptional adult. Her step mother is an obvious traitor the minute you see her. Jonna's character is written quite bad, not a single mention about the asian best friend from the previous game ... the one you saved from the Japanese queen. Constantine is such a cliche as a villain, in order to understand how evil, he quickly starts to kill those whom failed under his command. Jacob also is obvious whom he is just from the start. Drawing the line, not a single original new character and Lara is even made worse. 75% of the game you are loking for a map for something which is 3 blocks away from you and as it happens those on your side knew the location right from the start but refused to say something about it. There are some side quests, all of them seem quite unnecessary. Old/Ancient Jappanese ruins,cities are replaced with old/ancient soviet ruins/cities. The immortal army that guards the final prize is also replaced with a greak one. The final act is a pure copy of the one from 2013, even the maps/locations are being extremely similar. The A,I seemed somehow unbalanced, I played on the third difficulty(from 4) and most of the times is quite duable but there were 3-4 places that were somehow harder and I died quite a lot ,,, in the final 20 minutes of the game I lost my nerves and just switced on easy in order to finish the game. In my case there were more bugs on this exclusive XBOX ONe version of the game than the PC version of the previous one. Your foes are the same - brainless soldiers, wolves, 2 bears and 2 tigers and an ancient army. The final boss scene is original as the ending of Swarzeneger's movies from the 80's. The RPG elements of upgrading Lara and your weapons were annoying in my eyes. You need to reach the second half of the game in order to unlock the cool quick kills which is strange considering that Lara became a ninja assasin in the previous game and there is no logic that she would lose those skills. Developers were talking about how we would have more than one scenario in the skill tree but in end there is just that one scenario and most of the skills even seemed childish and stupid. The Level design is so so, at certain moments the view and the graphics seem incredible but they are pretty much the same winter/forest designs from the 2013 game. Offtopic - I can hardly count the times that Lara should have died from a hypothermy in the game! The 2015 tombs are cooler than the 2013 ones but they are still being optional.
Given the ending(another cliche) I have a very bad feeling about the next instalment of this series. In my eyes, this Lara needs more main story tombs, more jungles/piramids and less human foes. For example, Lara goes back in time - in Egypt or ancient Europe with more superpower things in the story. She finds love in some charming guy from the past and in the end of the game their are separated by their time periods. Lara is heartbroken but our male protagonist sends her some loving message through the centuries which would be a very emotional ending.
Crystal Dynamics if your read this, please hire me for the next instalment, my imagination can be really productive for you :)