Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light (Xbox 360)

In Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, intrepid explorer Lara Croft hunts down the ancient Mayan artifact known as the Mirror of Smoke. However, a Mexican warlord called Vasco had followed her and seizes it for himself, accidentally unleashing the death god Xolotl who threatens to cover the entire world in darkness. While this may sound a bit like the exciting supernatural climax to a treasure-hunting tale, this is in fact just the opening cutscene, Lara’s adventure here not focused on contending with human threats but instead the mystical forces of the evil spirit and the tomb full of traps and puzzles he aims to escape.

 

The guardian of light mentioned in this game’s title is an ancient Mayan warrior who was sealed alongside Xolotl, Totec brought back to try and help seal the evil god should he ever be disturbed. While he is initially reluctant to accept Lara’s help, quickly she proves her worth not just in her skills and smarts, but also in having more modern knowledge than a man who last was alive two millennia ago. Totec is at least a quick learner when it comes to utilizing the firearms of Vasco’s fallen men, but after that initial bit of an uneasy alliance, the story doesn’t have much of a presence in Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light. Vasco feels like he exists purely to justify more modern technology being found in the Mexican ruins this game takes place in, but while Vasco is borderline irrelevant, Xolotl is just a rather basic evil force serving as the obstacle to overcome. He makes a few appearances now and then to say generic villainous things and sometimes causes a little problem the two heroes must then overcome, but this top-down action-adventure game is more concerned with setting up solid puzzles and dangers than adding any depth to its principal players.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light is primarily meant to be played cooperatively, one player assuming the role of Lara Croft and the other Totec. Lara comes equipped with a grappling hook, giving her the ability to climb to higher places, rappel, and even make tight ropes that Totec can then walk across, while the guardian of light is able to throw his spear to make footholds only Lara can stand on. Totec also has a shield, usable not just for blocking incoming dangers like arrow traps but also giving Lara a boost to higher ground since her rappel only works when there are dedicated gold rings to latch onto. A good deal of the cooperative puzzle-solving will be based around properly identifying which of the abilities can be used to overcome individual limits. Oftentimes spikes, fires, or deadly drops limit your options or you might see large boulders you need to place in the right spot to open the way onward, and while there are definitely some puzzles even late in the game that do just boil down to doing something basic like the shield boost or tightrope walk, new mechanics and elements can be mixed in to keep you thinking, especially in optional tombs. Poisonous explosive plants can upset your work if you don’t account for their blasts and frequent regeneration, standing on switches to alter the elevation of platforms can comingle with other ability uses in intriguing ways, and there are times where it almost feels like you’d need another player’s help if not for the last trick both characters have. Both Lara and Totec can drop a bomb and remotely detonate it, planning ahead a common component of tougher trials but Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light does mostly keep its puzzles condensed to a manageable immediate area.

 

In an interesting touch, despite co-op being stated as the intended way to play Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, you can play the game solo and Lara will not be joined by a game-controlled Totec. Instead the guardian of light sits things out, entrusting Lara with his spear. Many puzzles undergo slight alterations or even full on replacement if you do play alone, the game noticeably different in some parts but not to such a degree it feels like an entirely different experience. Thankfully, no matter who you play as or if you’re flying solo or with a friend, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light won’t feel like a lesser experience, and while the ability use to overcome clever puzzles is often the highlight, there are also action sections to break it up with their own appeal. Some points you’re sprinting through hallways full of traps trying to survive, at others you need to carefully time your leaps to dodge spinning flame traps. Despite a good deal of the game living up to Lara Croft’s tomb raiding ways, there are also periods where you’ll head out from underground ruins and caves to swamps and jungles to give the game some appreciated diversity in its settings, but a plethora of optional objectives will also influence how you interact with the game’s levels.

Each stage in Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light has a few unique objectives as well as some that are pretty consistent over the journey. Most levels have 10 hidden red skulls for example, often requiring both a good eye and a bit of quick problem solving to reach them. Most levels have a goal time that is going to be almost impossible to hit on your first run through if you care for the extra content, but other objectives can encourage more careful play like clearing a trap hallway without ever dying or performing some smaller objective in a limited amount of time. The rewards for these extra objectives are meaningful, relics and artifacts serving as equipment that can bolster your stats a bit, and sometimes you just get a straight upgrade to your health or ammunition instead. The are even special boosts that activate if you avoid damage for a while, the player sometimes getting special power-ups like spread shots or health regeneration until they next take damage to reward them for playing intelligently and carefully. The most consistent extra objective across the game though relates to hitting score benchmarks, the player able to earn points by collecting treasures in a level or defeating enemies. In co-op it’s not likely both players can earn the point rewards which is a shame because the top reward for a stage is often a new weapon, but there are new weapons along the main journey that are either rewards for doing optional tombs or required like the grenade launcher that sees some puzzle solving use despite being a bit finicky when its use evolves beyond simply hitting targets from afar.

 

The enemies in Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light often comprise of the monstrous henchman of Xolotl, be they mad creatures who charge you, spellcasters, giants, or even animals like giant spiders or dinosaurs made of lava rocks. Thankfully, Lara’s dual pistols and Totec’s spear do deal damage to most every foe you face save more puzzle-focused bosses, but when certain foes come in great numbers or need to be taken down before they can pull off their attacks, the other weapons you find along the way come in handy despite not having infinite ammo like the defaults. Automatics, shotguns, and rifles of various stripes do have noticeable differences in firing rate and power even with some fairly generic names, and they do mix well with the game’s combat encouraging you to avoid damage and build up points. You might burn through your ammo reserves holding off spiders with your flamethrower, but you can rack up points quickly doing so and preserving your special boosts is wiser than risking getting overwhelmed by their numbers and speed. Admittedly, some combat will be throwaway action that won’t test you much and it can get a bit repetitive, but having moments where you’re fighting foes on precarious ground or trying to set up a boss for some trap damage while holding off his minions can breathe some appreciated life back into the fights.

 

There aren’t too many bosses in Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light though, and even the showdown with Xolotl feels more focused on dodging than utilizing clever techniques. The quest to get there is at least filled with good uses of the problem solving format with a fair few riding that fine line of making you really need to think on the solution without feeling like you’ll be so stumped you need to look up answers. A bit unfortunately though, a glitch or two can impede your progress. Besides a full on game crash at one point, I encountered an unusual issue involving a swinging spike ball. You’re meant to bomb its axle to release it and send it rolling into a fire trap it will disable, but for some reason the bombs were not working until I reset the whole level. Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light has a few stages that are rather large and involve you exploring in many directions while others are more straightforward pushes forward, but it can definitely be disheartening to have to reset the whole stage since checkpoints are otherwise great for helping you recover from deaths. Thankfully, acquired items from areas like challenge tombs are kept, but if you do go for extra goals like the time or point challenges, it could be a lot of lost work to an inexplicable technical issue.

THE VERDICT: Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light is an enjoyable puzzle-solving adventure either solo or with a friend, the mix of techniques Lara and Totec bring having a good range despite sounding simple on the surface. Clever designs make for fun obstacles to overcome and the extra objectives give reason to explore more deeply with rewards that make doing optional tasks worthwhile but not so important you get bummed out when you miss point benchmarks or a red skull. Fights mostly add an effective action component even if they do not feel too involved even when combat difficulty is set to Hard, but even there you can still find incentives for playing well that add an appreciated extra layer that makes up for the weaker moments.

 

And so, I give Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light for Xbox 360…

A GOOD rating. The grenade launcher being a new mid-game ability feels like it could have been the road to follow to keep evolving Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light’s puzzle solving format, but that isn’t to say the adventure ever runs out of ideas. It’s impressive the game’s designers put in the effort of designing a handful of different puzzles to account for playing solo or with someone as Totec so that neither way of playing feels half-baked. While there could have been a few more boss fights and maybe ones that lean on your special abilities a bit more to make for involved battles, the action can make up for being the less impressive side of the experience when it gels well with environmental dangers or the optional objectives encourage you to face the fights with more thought. Besides the actually rare technical issues, the only other issue of major note is when Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light sometimes leans on some slightly imprecise elements, such as the fixed camera angle sometimes hiding a bit of useful info or the moving of giant boulders sometimes relying on the hard to predict way they move when you set off an explosive nearby (that being where the grenade launcher really comes up short in particular). Otherwise, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light is a decent length adventure that doesn’t putter around but does give you reason to take your time since optional extras are often worth the effort, and when they are something like clearing the level very quickly, you can at least rest easy knowing that’s more for a potential second run instead of letting it undermine your first experience with new puzzles and dangers.

 

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light is a pretty solid choice for a co-op adventure. The battles usually aren’t too demanding and revives not too costly since they only come with a small point loss, and when the action does pick up like outrunning traps or facing a more powerful foe, you can still throw yourself back into them until you come out on top. The puzzle solving and extra objectives though ensure there are activities with more substance and teeth, players looking for challenge able to find it there and figuring out a tough tomb or just barely succeeding at a side goal is exciting because the game won’t give you such victories for free. If more abilities were added to the cerebral side of things Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light might have been able to go the extra mile, but even though a lot more attention was given to rewards that benefit the fighting, you still end up with a nice potpourri where no portion of the experience is dragging down the rest.