Lara Croft is back, and slightly more equipped to deal the situation, as she ventures into the Siberian Wildness in search of a lost city. Like the reboot of the titular Tomb Raider, the sequel is a down and dirty action adventure with brutal kill animations, grizzly combat and dirty, blood soaked protagonists. Rise of the Tomb Raider does a lot to improve on the last game, with stunning visuals, more adaptive skill trees, a bigger collection of tombs, and other breath-taking locations to explore.
This also comes with a bunch of new enemies, which on top of the sinister Trinity, includes the natural wildlife that was much happier without Lara Croft starting avalanches all of the place. More than just wolves, you’ll find bears and snow leopards all willing to take time out of there busy schedules to take important parts of your body off. But it’s the wolves in this game that seem the newest, and most threatening of anything I encountered in my time in Mother Russia.
Unlike the last game, they are given no formal introduction, you’ll just find them out in the ruins of old soviet endeavours, or in snowy forests. You might catch them snacking out in a clearing, or perhaps you’ll be less lucky and only see them as they stalk ever closer to you.
Dogs are something that I have had to deal with for a long time in video games, but canines are not my best friend. In real life, I am not comfortable around these four legged ‘friends’, and have not been since I was a child. But it wasn’t until Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare that I realised that this perfectly rational fear translated to digital dogs as well.
While killing a dozen or so terrorists or whatever, the faithful bark of their attack dog struck fear into my very soul. The next thing I knew I was screaming, charging headlong through the enemy regiment to clamber up a ladder I hoped would remove me from their hellhound. I wasn’t aware of how scared I was of virtual dogs until that moment, but in a handful of other titles I met mongrels with the same unblinking terror.
Over the years since then however, I have somewhat come to terms with these barely tamed killing machines living amongst us in real life, and can actually tolerate their presence (if they’re small enough, and preferably asleep). This is also true of their not so real counterparts too. That was, at least, until The Rise of the Tomb Raider.
The wolves in that game are everything I don’t enjoy about dogs. The near silent patting of there paws as they approach. The steady, unyielding gaze as they draw closer to their prey. The way the move in packs, slowly, intelligently surrounding a young woman armed to the teeth but scared for her life.
I had almost completely forgotten that fear, when your heart bottoms out and plunges into where your stomach used to be as its forms into a gaping empty void. The way my muscles tensed as first laid eyes on these proud, snowy grey beasts was the one of the most literal examples of fight or flight I have ever experienced in my life. I would have run from the room, controller still clasped in hand had some part of my brain not flooded with adrenaline not reminded me the fear was merely fictional.
This, this was not my proudest moment. And I’m not (just) writing this to laugh at how foolish I was, to be so overcome with a fear that I nearly fled from a television screen, but to say how much fun it was too.
Once my intelligence wrestled control from my instinct, and muscles relaxed enough for my fingers to move, I evaded these incoming predators and with a few (read: a lot of) misplaced arrows, managed to survive my encounter.
Being able to deal with my fear, in a safe environment where I knew that ultimately I had full control of how and if I interacted with them was a remarkably soothing prospect. I was able to play against my lifelong instincts and scare myself, really truly scare myself with these seemingly unnatural hunters without any risk harm. This wasn’t the abstract fear of a horror game but a true, affecting fear that I have experienced my whole life.
I know that my fear wasn’t much to deal with, and that others have much stronger reactions than I, but it was a reminder of how powerful the medium of video games could be. Rise of the Tomb Raider was never designed to help people overcome their fear of dogs. Hell, it wasn’t designed to scare the player at all as far I can tell. The wolves they created weren’t meant to the pinnacle of everything worrisome about dogs, and my reaction was probably one completely unaccounted for by the Quality Assurance department at Crystal Dynamics.
But regardless of all of that what I had was a moment of true terror, one I hadn’t experienced in years; one that was more impacting then my initial encounter with digital canines all those years ago, and a moment of clarity that came from it. If this can be done by accident by developers hoping to make an exciting action adventure, this medium could be used for so much more with a little intentional nudging.
Lava Lamp Goo 