Tomb Raider Custom Levels

[Blín D'ñero]

I could not stand it any longer, and replaced the 107.ogg with a dummy so now i'm freed from the annoying wolves howling in a loop. In 109 it is fainter, acceptable. I had finished the first part, but started the game all over just to enjoy it without the over-present howling. The game is better the second time.
What is alas also annoying, is that however the lush 3-dimensional vegetation is a beautiful addition it is unpractical, as the camera often gets lost between those cascades of leaves and Lara so that you can't see at all where you're walking/standing.
The horrible desicion to display the blinking red words "GAME OVER" whenever Lara dies. Hey, i know when she dies. And game is not over. It doesn't fit in Tomb Raider. We don't have to put in a coin for a retry do we.
The "helpful" poleclimbing jump. Pulleese! In the pole room the camera is behind Lara but on the exit-pole the camera is in front. I kept forgetting that she'll turn around the pole before jumping in the opposite direction. Keep it simple!

Funny bug: both a flying bat and a running wolf trapped by the same invisible block, infinitely flying / running stationary. I won't have to waste bullets on.

Another one: variation on the corner bug without even jumping: walk upon slope in opening, suddenly Lara is up on the next floor. Saves quite some effort.

[Blín D'ñero]

More sloppyness: less than a tenth of second brief view of what a lever you just pulled, activated... so that's useless. Sloppyness, or deliberate torture.
Sloppy is the view camera sinking below the platform Lara is standing on. Getting spiked even though you're next to the spikes-tile is forcing you to handle with the utmost precision. But that's caused by the unprecise tomb raider engine. For some micro-precision jumps you cannot rely on the one hop back and run method, but slightly off. It is confusing and time consuming but challenging, and that's what this game is about. No "Mystery".
Ugly (colours, lighting), a little sloppy here and there, but it kept me going on, unable to call it quits! Hate/love: I hate it but must admit it is a very good game.

I'd give it 8 / 10; because of my complaints i can't.
i rate it 7 / 10

[Blín D'ñero]

Yes, what i feared: "LB Advent Calendar 2009 - Auf dem verschenkten Berg (On the Mountain of Presents)" is in German. Do not make Lara speak german. I'll quit this game and wait for an english version.
The Inventory displays some weird choices: a SLR camera for binoculars. A green balloon with a stick jammed through it -or maybe an apple- for small medipack and a banana for a large medipack. Ehmm... fruit is hardly a medipack. And something that looks like a plunger but could also represent a candle in a footing- but a candle is completely different to a flare.
Anyway, at the start, the game looks good, bright and clean. What a relief after "The Mystery".

[Blín D'ñero]

Ok, i quit. I lost my interest with the knight: Lara's inability to grab and move the statue the normal way. Most directions been taken away. Don't like this kind of "magic". Take infinite ammo away: OK (as some custom levels do), but don't touch the fact that Lara represents a human being so don't mess with her limbs. This crosses the line for me.

0 / 10

[Blín D'ñero]

Now playing The Ancient Knowledge by Danilo Rocha.
I like this one, it's classic style, mysterious egypt temple.

Only 4:3, widescreen isn't supported (the widescreen tomb4.exe will crash on it), that is: the environment seems to support it but Lara not. Because on my 1920x1200 widescreen monitor playing it at 1600x1200 (1:1 pixel mapping) Lara looks normal but the environments seem horizontally compressed, but more evidently: the binoculars are ovals rather than circles.
Also, in Look-view (camera) Lara doesn't get transparent, that can be a hindrance sometimes, so that is a pity.

But it also has the blinking "GAME OVER" in red when Lara dies. And very odd: flares make a horrible noise, like a rocket engine!
Shimmering (dis-/appearing) textures: i swear i see a Roman "II" of antracite colour, on the rock wall in the pool in a cave, from one angle it's there but gone the other angle.. (probably the backside of a lever in an adjacent room, shimmering through)...

Also this game uses invisible grabbable cracks; i only noticed it because the pillar's sihouette had a wide open crack on the opposite side, so the faint line all around it is climbable, even starting from the faint line. I find that cheap trickery. Why not all other lines on all walls and pillars equally climbable then? A crack must always start with a clearly grabbable crevice.

[Blín D'ñero]

And again an invisible crack: the bottom line of one decorative band on one wall functions as a crack" however none of the other decorative bands with lines throughout the game are cracks. And very clear 'cracks' between large stones throughout the game are no more than textures...
And a cage (placed over the second eye piece), with very wide grating, turns out to be NOT climbable at all.

He obviously had much pleasure building the huge complex of uncountable and good looking rooms; has too abviously a thing for symmetry though: often a center room has two identical rooms on each side and each with an identical lever or jumpswitch that both must be activated in order to trigger the event in the center room.

Later, the game also allows Lara to climb through the opened solid stone trapdoor (opened in such a way that it actually covers the upper part of the ladder).
Twice, because at the end, ladder climbing starts on the opened solid trapdoor at the bottom of a ladder.

Overall a 7.5 minus my complaints (the flares noise! ) =
6.5 / 10

[Blín D'ñero]

Now on to Tomb Raider Revelations III – The Hand Of Rathmore by Roli.

This looks like a circus.
Rooms are somewhat small, confined and closed, yet there are wolves and dinosaurs living in them. Put together without much care to get a convincing cohesive atmospheric interior, rather some sloped structures, a few wooden ledges and one swingpole strategically placed about on the wall; such rooms are what they look: excercise rooms.

This game as well has the retarded, blinking red "GAME OVER".
And Lara is not transparent to the Look-camera.

Nevertheless, it seems very good. That timed run is tight. But i just made it.
Weird: Lara's shadow is lighter than the dark floors she walks on. As if she has a small mirror between her legs, faintly reflecting light onto the floor.

[Blín D'ñero]

This is the sort of TR custom games that make you die several times before you can figure out what's happening. And from the millisecond snippets before you die you see from the camera where possibly to go to prevent getting smashed by the same boulder over and over again. I find that weak designing. Hopping onto a slope, blindly sliding down towards something lethal (but before dying you'll be able to make quick observations for a next attempt after load savegame) is risktaking like a kamikaze. Not everyone is a risktaker. Tomb Raider is not a risktaker's game, but a smartminded adventurer's game.
Nevertheless, i again made it, finally.
Just like with the levers and coloured tiles: you have to try each of them (and die) before you know which colours open the doors.
Always, always should there be subtle hints with every puzzle.

[Blín D'ñero]

Getting the cage to the other corner of the room depends on the useage of the bug that you can push Lara through between the corner of the cage and the wall.
Then, when the dinosaur comes, and i make Lara run back inside the room with the burning tiles (hoping the animal will get burnt), the dinosaur sticks its giant head inside, keeping running stationary like a stupid stuck robot whilst of course its body can't make it through the doorway... and Lara -who is supposed to consider every dinosaur an enemy and always shoots them, in this case will NOT autotarget the beast. And now what. I'm stuck in this room with burning tiles, and a massive dinosaur blocking the exit without showing any interest in Lara and Lara not autotargeting it nor do her bullets cause it any damage.

--- Hmm. I have Lara standing under its belly between its legs shooting while it's angrily hopping back and forth in the doorway. The bullets now cause bloodstains on its body. Nevertheless, it won't die. After about 250 bullets the animal becomes calm, jaw still moving like fiercely roaring but completely silent, and it remains standing where it is, blocking the exit. Lara did not take damage at all. Jump/pushing her between its leg and the wall i get Lara outside. The animal makes no attempts to follow her. Now looking at the behind of a giant dinosaur standing tailwaving in the doorway of the room i just exited. Well ok, i'm out, let's continue then.

It seems i have to put something into a receptacle. Has the fact that the dinosaur isn't dead yet anything to do with me not posessing that "something"? Back to killing it, i fire all 36 shotgun bullets in it but the animal just refuses to die. It keeps standing there roaring soundlessly.

What a crap game. Quits.

3 / 10.

[Blín D'ñero]

I've downloaded and installed Reign of Chaos - China by "Author(s): illyaine". But the first level is Mexico. So it's a project set. Mexico is quite a poor piece sofar.
It doesn't only look poor, it's poorly made and with a poor scenario.
Let me just mention: zombies that walk through moveable crates;
shooting vases as mechanism to open a gate...
a monkeyswing at the end of which Lara just pops into a crawl space standing:

I hope this soon ends so i can move to another country.

---
Finished. I rate it
1 / 10