![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() However, the high resolution of the terrain's textures combined with their abject flatness, devoid of any of the lumps, bumps, and shading we're all used to these days, leads to an uncanny valley effect at times, the scenery becoming a bit 'Lego wallpapered over with a geography professor's field trip photos.' The improved lighting and draw distance of the remastered graphics also tend to detract from the first Tomb Raider's quiet sense of isolation: the famous T-Rex reveal loses some of its impact now that the area's dressed to look like an outdoor jungle under gloomy skies. My retro-loving heart has to admit the game does look better for having them-more organic, more worn. New 3D foliage, spider webs, items, light shafts, and other miscellaneous details that were previously either painted onto ground, presented as flat objects, or simply nonexistent are so well integrated it's easy to believe they were always there. On the whole this remaster straddles the line between retro authenticity and shiny modernity shockingly well, the repetitively tiled landscapes instantly recognisable without looking like a complete eyesore on modern screens. I was surprised to find I was generally happy to leave the remastered graphics on, and more often than not impressed by the subtle (and not-so-subtle) enhancements that came with them. Even the draw distance is just realistic enough to convey cracked stone, running water, and broken tiles, but still leaves room for my imagination to have a great time filling in the gaps. It's how these Tomb Raiders "really" look, after all, and I'm a big fan of early 3D in general, especially when it's handled as well as it is here, the right-angled environments clothed in pin-sharp pixelated textures, the lighting, skyboxes, boxy character models. Going in I assumed I'd spend most of my time in the retro mode's comfy familiarity. ![]()
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