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Rise of the Tomb Raider

After the release of the well-regarded Tomb Raider reboot back in 2013, expectations were raised substantially for Crystal Dynamics'due south next installment in this beloved activity-adventure franchise. Fortunately, the game meets or exceeds those expectations in near every fashion. However, since the game is a timed exclusive for the Xbox 1 and Xbox 360, information technology's no surprise that the functioning is hampered by the express hardware upon release.

With a full of 74 reviews, the Xbox Ane version of the game is sitting pretty with a score of 87/100 on Metacritic. In fact, our sis site IGN liked it so much that it awarded the game with an "astonishing" score of nine.3/10. Compare those numbers to the previous game's metascore of 86/100, and IGN rating of nine.one/ten, and it becomes clear that this release is a worthy follow-upwardly.

Rise of the Tomb Raider is undeniably an splendid game, simply how does information technology hold up from a technical perspective? As per usual, Eurogamer'south Digital Foundry has examined the Xbox One version of the game, and results are something of a mixed purse. The bulk of the game runs at 1920×1080, but it seems that cutscenes are just rendering at 1440×1080 (stretched out to a proper 16:nine attribute ratio like other notable releases).

Equally far as frame rate goes, the game can't quite maintain a 30fps lock. While the frame rate is solid virtually of the time, information technology often drops noticeably during combat — arguably the absolute worst fourth dimension for instability. Some environments and NPC crowds tin too cause some stuttering and tearing, merely those are slightly more than forgivable since the gameplay isn't meaningfully impacted. The game also suffers from a few issues around shadows and motion blur, only those are modest potatoes here — nothing to get worked up about.

More often than not, this game is a real looker. The animations look incredible, the lighting and geometry are completely believable, and Lara'south hair has never looked meliorate. It's just a shame that such a gorgeous game can't achieve its full potential only yet considering of a business organisation deal with Microsoft. When the PC version launches next yr, we'll finally be able to see exactly how beautiful this game tin be. And while the PS4 version most certainly won't exist able to stand upward to the PC release, information technology'due south safe to presume information technology'll run better than this version.

Every bit for the Xbox 360 version of the game, early reports look relatively promising. While this port wasn't done internally at Crystal Dynamics, information technology was placed in the capable hands of Nixxes. Yous tin look a lower resolution, an imperfect frame rate, and less impressive effects overall, simply you're withal getting the consummate gameplay experience on decade-onetime hardware. And since concluding-gen releases are starting to become a rarity, this will most certainly be worth picking up for those of us who haven't made the bound to the current generation.