Some of the changes introduced in Tomb Raider 1-3 Remastered are proving problematic for players.
Tomb Raider 1-3 Remastered modernizes Lara Croft's earliest adventures, and developer Aspyr has gone far beyond just adding a fresh coat of paint. The collection includes all expansions for the first three games, as well as modernized controls, a fully rotatable camera, hundreds of trophies, a photo mode, and more. The modernized graphics, complete with new textures and lighting effects, are an absolute triumph, though fans have been more than a little puzzled by some of the changes to the gameplay.
Aside from the enhanced visuals, one of the biggest new additions is modern controls, designed to make Lara more maneuverable and make life easier for those not familiar with the classic tank controls. In reality, as players point out over on the Tomb Raider subreddit, it does the opposite. The big issue is that actions such as back steps and backflips can only be performed when Lara's weapons are drawn - which now also requires a button to be held down rather than being toggled on and off - making navigating obstacles and crossing gaps a much trickier process.
very modern indeed from r/TombRaider
"The modern controls are garbage," says Chose_UserName217. "Pretty disappointing. I thought they'd be good like in Anniversary." LichQueenBarbie, meanwhile, writes, "I tried the modern scheme and couldn't get over a lot of choices they made there... I implore newcomers to not be scared by the term 'tank controls' and give them a good go."
Players have also pointed out that when using modern controls, the camera has a habit of colliding with surfaces and getting stuck in narrow spaces, so getting Lara from where she is to where she needs to be is even more difficult. In a separate Reddit post, user Jepruio says, "It's incredibly hard to do any jumps when in a tight corner, as the camera just won't budge, which then causes all the directional movements while running to a ledge to suddenly switch mid-run leading to a jump in the wrong direction."
This YouTube video by andshrew gives you the idea.
Another change giving players trouble, albeit only those familiar with the old games, is that the menus for load and saving have swapped places, leading many to accidentally reload their game when they meant to save their progress.
They need to swap around load game and save game in tomb raider remastered cause the amount of times I’ve loaded instead of saving is a joke at this pointFebruary 17, 2024
Loving Tomb Raider Remastered but I just lost 30 mins of progress because I didn’t realise load and save switched places…February 14, 2024
That being said, it's clear a lot of love has been put into these remasters and with the wonderous modern invention that is the internet Aspyr could potentially address these issues in a future update.
Alongside the questionable changes, players have found a number of neat little features that Aspyr has added, including the ability to have Lara don her signature sunglasses while holding down the 'look' and 'walk' buttons while loading a save.
Press L1 + R1 while loading a save to unlock Sunglasses from r/TombRaider
What's more, if you have the same buttons pressed while loading into Lara's home in the first game, you'll see an adorable painting of the T-Rex displayed in the main hall.
Press "Walk + Look" while loading the TR1 Mansion, and this appears on the Main Hall (Thanks u/Chabb) from r/TombRaider
It's early days yet, so who knows what other treasures Tomb Raider 1-3 Remastered is still hiding.
Following the launch of Tomb Raider 1-3 Remastered, it was revealed that the project was led by a fan with a lot of experience bringing Lara's PS1 adventures up to date, having spent the last eight years remastering Tomb Raider 1 right through to Chronicles.
Tomb Raider Remastered Trilogy is the only reason you need to buy a Steam Deck dock right now.
