Lara Croft Go is a different kind of Tomb Raider game, its a grid based puzzle game. It’s available on most major platforms. Reviewed on iOS.

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When Tomb Raider was rebooted back in 2013, I fell in love with the series all over again. The gameplay was exactly what I was looking for. When Lara Croft Go was released back in 2015, it was a day one purchase for me because of my love of the IP. Life got in the way and I never got to dive deep into it. It was later released on iOS and it took me a while but I finally got to dive in.

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The first thing you notice is how different it looks from the rebooted Tomb Raider, not just in the gameplay but the aesthetics. The default Lara is very reminiscent of the original Lara from the PlayStation classic Tomb Raider.

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If you are a fan of Tomb Raider that does not mean that this game is actually for you. If you are drawn to the action in these games then this is definitely not going to be for you. The action in this game is very minimal. It’s all about figuring out the patterns of enemies and how to get to the objective.

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Every time you move, your enemies move. Some attack at range, some will chase you, it’s all about strategy. You need to be clever to outsmart your enemies. There are no time constraints, your enemies only move when you move so you have plenty of time to plan out your course.

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On the surface, it may not always look like it but at its core, this is just a puzzle game, and honestly for the entire main campaign a pretty basic one. I breezed through most of it and didn’t get stuck all that often until I came close to its conclusion. It didn’t stop my enjoyment of the game but I wasn’t expecting it to be as easy as it is. One thing that the game is missing is some kind of hint system in case you were ever in a jam. After the main campaign is over, you unlock a couple of bonus chapters that really ramped up the difficulty and that hint system would have been great to have here.

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With that said the bonus chapters are the strongest part of the game. There really is no story since it’s only a puzzle game and not a full Lara Croft adventure so I do not fully understand why those chapters are not considered to be part of the main game. It is here where I had to do the most thinking and where the game shined brightest for me.

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Verdict

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Lara Croft Go is a simple but fun puzzle game for most of its short campaign. After the campaign ends you unlock harder levels that increased the enjoyment for me. I recommend this game to fans of puzzle games. If your an action junkie don’t let the protagonist in this game fool you, stay away if your only coming for the action we have come to expect from Tomb Raider.

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Final Score -6/10