Tomb Raider Custom Levels

[Blín D'ñero]

Oh and i just knew it: in Sylvan Lake, those curled up bridges to unfold aren't necessary either, it's only a longer path. When i made that one precision jump onto the rocky edge of the building i knew i was taking a shortcut! It's a double offering by the builder to choose from: an easy longer way or a challengeing shorter way.

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Merely picking up a Mask in a room lowers a grating -or another blocking object- in another room... that sort of thing is what i seriously dislike when it happens. In this level no different, Southern Observatory.

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Lara walks right through the globe she is supposed to pull/push!

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Okayy... the end. What now? It was a very good game (after a somewhat weak start). Id's say the previous episodes sink from 8½ to 8 and
MU 4 gets a full fat 9 / 10

[Blín D'ñero]

The Templar Archives by Wasp.
The glass window next to where Lara finds the huge Dining Room key is not shootable, while the way she just got into the building to begin with was by shooting the exact same type of window to smithereens.

What follows, turns out that half (at least) of the Venice map of Tomb Raider 2 has been re-used here.
Scratch that. It's TR2's Venice entirely. Just reorganized somewhat.

In certain angles textures disappear: while walking around looking around, entire bookcases vanish, parts of buildings disappear, and seen from above, parts of the floor get replaced by blackness.
The glass corridor high over the water to the other side, only one small portion of the glass is shootable, the rest isn't. It's only to draw your attention to a crack in the opposite wall...

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Played a bit further but could not get charmed by the crappy product mixed with warmed up old soup remains.

Exit.

[Blín D'ñero]

Lost Realm and Hidden Tomb by Debbie Overstreet.

Climbing where there is no ladder also in this game:

Objects disappearing and reappearing in certain angles. Walking around a large stone throne, not very solid :

Those boats in the pool, Lara swims right through them as if they were just a gas.

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There's hardly atmospheric storytelling: it's a contextual bazaar, a potpourri, just for the fun a lot of Tomb Raider elements piled up after each other. Not entirely, but a good deal in that direction. The puzzle part is fine nonetheless.

At certain point you are supposed to perform an extra far jump from the rope. This one is seldomly used, it's based on a sort of engine flaw: grab rope, and start swinging as high as you can...once you have reached that point (2 ~ 3 swings back and forth), release the swing button so that she'll pull her feet in again. THAT's the moment when it starts: immeditetly push the swing button and again swing twice and then jump at the apex. You'll jump futher than usual. In this case Lara only just about lands on the corner-edge of the platform. It's nice!

In a small corridor-shaped room with a lever, that was accessable via a brief swim through an underwater channel, as soon as Lara pulled the lever, 2 dogs and a mummy popped up behind her. They all 3 should have swam in her tail then, yeah right! I didn't even bother to kill the dogs. I swam back to the main room, and heard them howling. Half an hour later when i came back they still did that, so i killed the noise-makers. Proves they cannot swim at all. I didn't hear the mummy complaining.

[Blín D'ñero]

I have found a pyramidal key, and the builder has forgotten to give it a name, so in the Inventory it is called "Load".
The stone tablet at the right (the normal "Load") is still called "Load" also.

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The Hidden Tomb is sloppyness galore. End of map around you, so looking into pitchblack nothingness with parts of buildings, pillars popping up and disappearing (depending on viewing angle). From atop a little hill you can see into an unfinished roof on pillars. Via a raised block you can jump onto another roof on pillars (you think) but it turns out a gas: you fall right through it landing on the ground. Just like a large heavy stone coffin, you think, but Lara walks right through it. And see the coffin is totally empty.
And for everybody is here a second crowbar, even a second lasersight, jolly good party!
It's still entertaining though. I mean i have played bad levels until i had to stop from boredom and annoyance. This is not at all bad, and that is not likely to happen here. It's sloppy and messy but still has the special "something".
Hey, and i now have 2 x Vraeus - or Portal Guardian as they're named in the Inventory. Or should i have used one in the previous level?

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You can also climb just on the wall...

and there's an invisible block Lara bumps against....

[Blín D'ñero]

Easy fun to kill the guys throwing the firebolts:

They attack you, you lose health quickly

Move away through the room with the lower ceiling, for cover around the corner. Then turn around to see how they will slide as if on a rail, towards the opening untill they bump their heads, and stay there.

In that vulnerable and passive position, kill them whichever way you want! Take your time!

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In a next room another pair, you can take out one by one (second one waits till the first is killed).
But the room after that, Lara gets shot right through a statue. Yeah : a firebolt-slinging guy standing in another room behind the statue, has already started shooting. And when i wait to look closer, i see him coming walking stepping right through the solid statue as if it were a gas! and kills Lara just like that, she has nowhere to hide. Because the guy can step through stone. Lara can too, making use of the hole in the buggy TR engine: kill the guy to make him stop killing Lara, regain health, then move jump between the statue and the wall, 6 jumps and she's through. But of course, shooting the vases is much quicker!

[Blín D'ñero]

Further in the level: 3 skeletons, only chasing (and reacting to) Lara in a small confined area of a large broad corridor leading to a large hall, when Lara steps outside the invisible line, they stop noticing Lara however she's just standing right there, still pretty close to them!

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ARGHHH! Everything's shaking and i don't have the right leg plate (sorry, "Greave") yet! I'm screwed so it seems... Reload older save then.
==Ok, found it in the previous room passed the skeletons. But returning to the lever-room is problematic: because of the now fallen wooden beams blocking the way (they have created 'backtracking not allowed') . Thanks to the engine bug, i manage after many many jumps to sqeeze Lara through, at two places. Has this game been beta-tested, at all?
Hard to find the way out with that extremely irritating horrible shaking!
I give up, there's no exit.
What a mess this game is.
I rate it 4 / 10

[Blín D'ñero]

Wessely’s Last Will by Clara and Spongebob

Oh horror, it's a 'Christmas level'. From the readme: "A peaceful level" Hmm, christmas trees, merry christmas in neon, no guns at all... Wasted time to check all buildings in the surroundings of the car, then i thought i could jump/grab up onto a wall with 3 arches (there's a slight hump on the floor i thought was indicating this), but no: Lara floats right through it as if it were a gas. After long fruitless searching i find a jumplever next to the gate and lo and behold it opens the gate. Rediculous that Lara who has an invitation to the funeral must force herself entrance via that lever high on the wall. And once there, she falls into the grave hole. Around are a bunch of people, nothing happens. While the constant falling snow irritates the eye. I've had enough. I dislike it too much.

Next!

[Blín D'ñero]

Andreas' Sword 1 by EricClaire.

Yeah, right. Or not. Hmmm...

But i've played on a little and can say that everything else in this game seems to be very, very right.
Besides that the combination of the sober latin, Western Middle-Ages, cistercienzer monks choir "Kyrie Eleison" song doesn't match very well with ancient Egypt.

===However. The next -weirder- thing is: when i enter the torch room and stand on the tile with the torches, the fire in the bowls stops, ok? But i still hear the sound of fire, and Lara can still light her torch from the fire-less bowl!

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Allows player in area looking outside map, why?

And i keep having an enormous shovel in Inventory...
But, a really good and smart TR game may have such minor oddities, and this one certainly is.

[Blín D'ñero]

Monster suddenly comes running right through the still closed small gate (in the picture, behind it). Why? How? And then it's sitting instead of attacking Lara?

Lara hops onto the block, it runs through the fence (as if it were a gas) and the room behind and back, punching Lara.
Eventually i kill the annoying beast. The burning corpse blocks the fence; i will never know what's behind it. Probably a secret; as i saw a green lamp there.

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I just found the second Ankh in the 2nd level Andreas Scroll. The game is superb, full of surprises, tricky moves, and very well put together as a composition. I'm loving it!
It is superb and it just ended.

Andreas' Sword 1:
i rate it 9½ / 10

[Blín D'ñero]

There's a Andreas' Sword 2!!!
Downloading...

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Yes and it's as brilliant as i hoped for, right from the start. This is the kind of Tomb Raider i need my shots of, on a regulary basis.

It is awful. I get stuck, maddening stuck. Because it is confusing. Then after trial error and again and again, i find it and admire the precision in the tricks that just happened. This is good.
This game is rediculously clever without ever losing credibility, never gives an impression it were made for extremists; it's smart and integer.