Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis is a gorgeous revival of the original's puzzle-driven spirit, but I'm glad it's been delayed

The subtitle of Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis implies a lot beyond the scope of Lara Croft's quest to find the lost city. The developers at Crystal Dynamics and Flying Wild Hog have, themselves, had to reckon with the legacy of one of the most iconic characters and franchises in video games. After playing the game for myself and speaking with some of those devs at Summer Game Fest, I'm fully on board for their interpretation of this classic adventure – even as I'm equally certain that Legacy of Atlantis really needed its delay into 2027.

Legacy of Atlantis serves as a bridge between two different versions of the Tomb Raider franchise. On one end, you have the puzzle- and exploration-focused original series, and on the other you have the more cinematic, action-heavy survivor trilogy. This new game remakes Lara's original adventure, yes, but closes the distance between the two visions of the franchise – and is built as a jumping-on point for entirely new players.

The Tomb Raider legend

It's both an "incredible honor" and a "crushing responsibility" to be revisiting this story, experience director Jeff Adams says with a laugh. "We've been working hard to make sure that we're delivering something that feels faithful to fans who may have experienced this adventure in the past, but we're also really excited for a lot of new players who maybe have never played Tomb Raider before to get a chance to see stuff that they might find really enjoyable."

While at Summer Game Fest, I play Legacy of Atlantis's take on The Lost Valley. That's one of the original game's most memorable levels, where you need to collect a series of cogs to unlock an ancient mechanism to move forward, and then you fight a bunch of dinosaurs. That basic outline is the same now as it was then, but only in the broad strokes – the entire level layout and flow is completely different, but that original spirit is still in place.

In contrast to the survivor trilogy, Legacy of Atlantis seems to be much truer to the puzzle-heavy spirit of the original – something I've very much missed from the series. There are multiple paths to explore, room in which to get a little lost, and a fair few collectables to uncover. Lara's equipped with a scanner that'll give you some hints toward interactable objects, but you are encouraged to actually figure things out for yourself.

"I think we tend to learn a lot from every Tomb Raider that we make," game director Raul Siqueira explains. "Obviously, the survivor trilogy was way more focused on the action component of it. There was a lot more combat than previous games. But fundamentally we believe that the core of a good Tomb Raider game is the balance between puzzles, combat, and traversal."

That's why Legacy of Atlantis hearkens back to what the devs refer to as the "cerebral" pace of the original, but they have worked to make the combat feel like more than an afterthought. "We knew that we didn't want to put too much emphasis on it," Siqueira explains. "At the same time we wanted combat to have depth."

When you're beset by velociraptors, you'll need to dodge out of the way of their attacks with well-timed acrobatic rolls as you rain dual pistol fire on them. That sounds basic, but it feels very good, and the way Lara can leap out of the way of attacks has a similar pace to the jumps you would've been making in the original game. Just, you know, with a little more precision and a lot less flailing. Well-timed dodges let you build up a focus meter which you can expend to get a bit of bullet time and take down enemies quickly.

So what's that delay-worthy problem? The controls. Where the OG Tomb Raider relied on very precise, very rigid movement, this is a post-Uncharted adventure game, just like the survivor trilogy, where you magnetize to ledges and have pretty generous leeway to make your jumps. Until, that is, I find myself awkwardly shimmying back and forth trying to find the precise spot where I can grab the next handhold, or fall imperceptibly out of position of a grappling point, or get stuck in the ground, or touch a wall during an escape from a T-Rex and get jump-scared by an instant death as Lara is swallowed up.

There's plenty of time for these issues to be fixed before launch, but they were pervasive enough to really tamp down on my enjoyment of the demo. Legacy of Atlantis is stunningly gorgeous, but the majesty of its visual presentation quickly fades when you're confronted by – and I apologize for the word I'm about to use – this amount of jank.

Many individual aspects of Legacy of Atlantis are thoroughly impressive – the visual design, the emphasis on puzzles, and the expanded combat system – which is why I'm praying that the basic playability problems can be polished out by launch. There's an excellent foundation here, and I really want this version of Lara's legacy to stand strong.

Here's hoping Legacy of Atlantis can join the ranks of the best Tomb Raider games.