“Shadow of the Tomb Raider’s” difficulty can be adjusted so that puzzles, combat, or exploration can each be made easier or more difficult. Moreover, to the developers’ credit, they have implemented a number of quality of life tweaks. Though I generally stuck to the main questline and sidequests, the optional tombs that I sampled were diverting puzzle boxes that sometimes stumped me but didn’t flabbergast me. The blending of tutorial, story exposition, and plot setup within the first thirty minutes of the game is bluntly effective. By this point, you’ve already engaged in perilous rock climbing, desperate swimming, a bit of stealth combat, and some move-this-over-there-then-rotate-some-gears puzzle solving. The astonished expression that flashes across her face, as the star chart descends into the floor and a pedestal supporting a dagger appears in its place, is another fine detail in the game’s opening charm offensive. Flexing her esoteric knowledge, she adjusts it. There, she finds a star chart positioned in the room like a stone table.

Obviously, it’s but a matter of time before Lara is standing in its inner sanctum. At a Day of the Dead festival, they learn that Trinity has discovered the location of an underground temple in the area. In Mexico, Lara and Jonah are on the hunt for Trinity, a secret society that murdered Lara’s father, a renowned archaeologist. After the back half of the plane is torn off, taking her best friend Jonah along with it, the game cuts to two days earlier. On a storm-tossed plane above Peru, Lara struggles to gain control of the vessel that’s ripping apart. Like any number of blockbusters these days, “Shadow of the Tomb Raider” opens with a crisis.

Light puzzle shadow of the tomb raider