Lara Croft Go puts exciting tomb raiding at your fingertips

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Lara Croft Go screenshot
You're about to murder so many snakes, you have no idea.
Screenshot: Evan Killham/Cult of Mac

I’m anxiously awaiting Lara Croft’s next outing on consoles this fall with Rise of the Tomb Raider, but in the meantime, developer Square Enix is tiding us over with Lara Croft Go, a miniaturized adventure starring the iconic graverobber and dinosaur fighter. It’s out now for iPhone and iPad (reviewed version), and like its predecessor, Hitman Go, it’s more about strategy than all-out action.

This game diverts slightly from Hitman, however, doing away with the board game/diorama theme and just sticking our hero into an ancient, turn-based ruin. But that doesn’t diminish its charm or fun at all.

Here’s the setup: Famed explorer Lara Croft has found another archeological site that she is more than happy to relieve of its riches and deadly monsters. You swipe anywhere on the screen to move her one space at a time across the stage, picking up items, flipping switches, and avoiding beasts or traps. It has a variety of obstacles, including giant snakes that stay put and attack if they see you, spiders that patrol back and forth in a straight line, and lizards that will follow you until you lure them into a trap (or they kill you; whichever comes first).

You also have the standard wall saws, rolling boulders out straight out of Raiders of the Lost Ark, and collapsing floors and walls to deal with, and it becomes increasingly important to plan out your moves ahead of time.

Lara isn’t helpless, however. She still has her trademark dual pistols, although for some reason, they’re only useful from one space away. For longer range, she can pick up spears scattered around levels, and she can also use conveniently placed torches to keep monsters from attacking.

Lara Croft Go has a lot of stuff going on, in other words, but it never feels overwhelming. And if you mess up, you only have to start your current section over rather than go back to the beginning of the level. Go has plenty of those, too, with over 40 stages in five differently themed chapters.

I couldn’t find a whole lot not to like here. Turn-based strategy isn’t my favorite game genre, but I had a lot of fun figuring out the levels, and a lot of the solutions were clever and satisfying, especially when they involve rolling a huge rock over a bunch of a-hole snakes. You should definitely give it a try if you’re into puzzle titles.

Lara Croft Go is available for $4.99 in the App Store for iPhone and iPad. The developer provided Cult of Mac with a free download code for this review.

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