Level reviews

"Another one-off by a member of the Bigger is Better School of Levelbuilding, with rudimentary gameplay but occasionally interesting room geometry. Sometimes the builder seems to be reaching for the sublime, but he never quite gets there, as this striving is not supported by adequate texturing and lighting, and also has no bearing on gameplay other than than to make the monkeyswings and ladders longer than they have any right to be. In the end it all falls apart anyway with unlit and wallpapered default-sized rooms, in which the builder no longer even tries to avoid the vanishing horizon (which he managed just fine until then).
Before that, however, he achieves one or two nice visual effects featuring numerous flame emitters (which of course bring on the flare bug); indeed, judging by his use of fixed cameras and an - avantgarde' (wonky and too fast) flyby, he fancies himself a bit of a cinematographer. There's even one instance of what Dimpfelmoser would call mehrfacher Achsensprung (fixed cameras jumping several times between Lara moving away from the camera and her moving towards it - in a very long underwater tunnel, which one cannot but suspect having been built precisely for this purpose).
Gameplay, on the other hand, remains basic throughout and may easily induce a state of stupor. Unlike manarch, I never felt quite bored enough to resort to DOZY, but I did use the Sprint key liberally. The level contains a maze of sorts which I luckily didn't have to explore, as I reached its exit (like Treeble and Gerty) almost instantly by keeping to the left. There is one easily avoided fire trap in the room which is presumably the one described by Orbit Dream as textured in such a manner as to make your eyes water (it is indeed on even worse than Martin Hill's Very Large Room with Stripes). Objects are Tut1 standard, with a few additions from Cleopal (harpy, demigod) and a Lara skin that seems to indicate that the builder watched Barbarella a few times too many for his protestations that he did so ironically to be believable." - Mulf

"Another one-hit wonder. With this one it seemed to me that the author lost motivation towards the end, as the rooms became increasingly bigger with less and less to do in them, and obviously less care with automated wallpaper texturing for a fair share of them. At first I thought the author would set us off to search for two cartouches, but turns out we never go back to that room at the beginning again - we end up finding another cartouche for a slot much later on though. There were a handful of tasks to do here, but nothing too taxing and I guess I got lucky as by simply sticking to the left hand wall I got through the "maze" of sorts at the end within seconds, and with the finish trigger just a couple of battles away, I didn't feel the need to reload an earlier save to explore it further... 25 minutes. 02/21" - Treeble

"Very huge rooms with little to do, the texturing is average with stretched textures or thin walls, but I had a lot of fun browsing this level. The flyby showing the 2 half cartouche, is too fast and passes through the walls." - Drakan

"When I saw all that amount of fires in the room with the first eye piece I thought: "more fires and the flare bug will appear"; and a bit later it was so. Not very funny this Egyptian level with the classic tasks and enemies, I think there's an abuse of the monkey swings and shimmies in all the level. Your goal will be find two eye pieces and later two cartouche pieces, not hard to get. The worst was the stretched textures and the dark rooms without flares to properly explore. But still playable if you want to take a look." - Jose

"Oh, dear, this really hasn't aged well at all. The only good thing about this level (in my opinion) are the occasional enemy attacks. Everything else is a bit of a mess. Horribly stretched textures which hurt my eyes a bit, the flare bug, an invisible block at a door, lack of interesting gameplay, loooooong corridors and a nauseating flyby which looped three times. I was also not fond of Lara's outfit; why she wants to raid in that is beyond me." - Ryan

"Ignoring the questionable outfit choice on Lara's part(which was more than likely used to satisfy the builder's nasty fantasies), this is at the end of the day, just another run-of-the-mill Egyptian debut level in terms of quality, containing practically every beginner builder mistake that you'd expect(generally poor texturing, boxy lifeless environments, flat atmosphere etc.) So best to just skip this one." - Ceamonks890

"I decided to take a round "play the featured level" and this one came out ;). The map of the level is quite large and way too large if you ask me, some rooms are heavily oversized here, which makes progression rather tedious (I used DOZY to get through the long hallways after some time), especially since the builder has used several ultra-long ladders and monkeyswings where I didn't have enough calmness to use them normally. The texturing and lighting isn't very professional, but I must say the initial rooms had a certain something; the further you get into the level, the worse the looks get though, with all cliche-like beginner mistakes. A few good enemy attacks are used and cameras are also working properly, even some fixed ones. It's nothing special, but despite the pedestrian parts no disaster. 15 minutes." - manarch2

"Yes,my scores pretty well sum this up: it's a '3' sort of level.Not unplayable,but poorly textured (one room positively makes your eyes water),basically lit,has a nerve-wrenchingly fast fly-by,contains no puzzles (almost all the doors open when you approach them),and generally keeps you mildly bored for its duration. Every now and then,however,you experience something rather fun (the Boat in the Lava river,the harpie attack)to keep you playing.The most worthy thing of note is Lara's outfit;really Dear,what were you thinking??" - Orbit Dream

"Judging from my ratings you might think I despise the level. Though I doubt it will ever become a favourite of mine I actually don't hate it yet it is very amateurish and generally looks like an attempt made by someone who thought the manual and tutorial level was nothing for him. The good things in here are the quite entertaining fluid gameplay (you never get stuck really if you look around goot enough) the at times interestingly looking rooms with the boat in the lava river being the highlight. But all that cannot disguise the many flaws - big empty dull rooms stretched carelessly applied textures the flare bug kicking in somewhere in the middle (caused by the nifty fires thorough this tutorial-type tomb) listlessly thrown in enemies and despite the aforementioned entertainment factor the at times tedious gameplay (long climbs shimmy-cracks monkey-swings long swims generally - heaps of running around). What can be suggested to the author? Well maybe the manual / tutorial level for a start? I've heard there're multilingual versions nowadays too (am just guessing that the language *might* be an issue don't hit me if I assume wrongly lol). As for the player reading this and still wondering whether to play this or not? Well it is fun easy short - so why the heck not? Can't think of a reason - do play this but don't have any great expectations and you'll have your fun." - eTux

"Lara in a new outfit raids Egyptian rooms to find a retextured star. The course is straightforward and there is a serious lack of challenge and puzzles only a few switches to pull. Most of the time the doors open when Lara approaches. Different enemies to deal with their placement is sometimes enigmatic. The lighting is rather absent except for some shadow bulbs. A lot of improvement is needed for the texturing and more than one texture should be used for the water surfaces." - eRIC

"Gameplay reasonably straight forward lots of massive rooms long corridors and swims to negotiate but no puzzles. The biggest draw back is the lack of either gun flashes flares or bins light in the frequent dark areas. Enemies consist of scorpions fire birds (just avoid them) ninja and demigods. Pickups are there to be found but I had arrows but no cross bow may be that was one I missed. The graphics tend to be stretched and in the one dark area rather too garish. Lara must have goose pimples on her goose pimples wearing that out fit (or lack of it) The lighting apart from the comments above was reasonable except a corridor lit up the first time it was crossed then the lights weren't lit. A level not all that difficult but after all that Christmas food especially the liquid variety it may be one to play." - Whistle

"This level was much bigger than I thought it would be and I even left most of the maze alone as I found the exit pretty early. Rooms are huge that means lots of climbing monkey climbing shimmying and swimming. Not many enemies and it is really a pity that the flare bug kicked in as there were some places I would love to have a look with the binoculars (because of the fixed camera) but then I would be also in desktop heaven and that I don't like. The boat you encounter at a certain moment was great to see a pity that the LE engine don't let you go for a row in it. You should have a go at this level even if it is to see what Lara is wearing 28-11-2004" - Gerty

"A rather time 30 minutes beginner level which mainly stands out for Lara's daring bikini outfit. You get the usual suspects as enemies (ninjas scorpions crocs harpies mummies and demigods) and go searching in a fairly linear fashion for a Horus Eye cartouche and a hand. Lighting had its good moments though and the gondola in the lava river was quite a sight. Also enjoyed the fountain rooms and flame emitters were rather well used. There is too much climbing and monkey swinging to do though and the rooms are just too huge and empty. And that flyby needs plenty of work and a one shot trigger." - Michael

"Just when I was enjoying the latest custom levels and thought levels with pitch black areas were in the past came this level to remind me how annoying it is and how harmful for the eyes. Not to mention the flare bug that is all over the place. The areas are empty with a mummy here and there some ninjas crocodiles and scorpions. It reminds something of the tutorial level with one the Eye of Horus to find and cartouche pieces. A flyby that kept looping if Lara happened to step on the trigger again wasn't very pleasant but generally it had its good moments. The textures though were all stretched so unfortunately there isn't much room for a high rating. Putting that aside though it was a nice try I wouldn't' classified it as bad or boring I guess it was fun in its own way. I'd like to see more attention given though to the bugs and some interesting puzzles added." - Kristina

"I'm not sure if this could be the author's debut but it has a lot of the hallmarks. At 30 minutes this Egyptian level seemed to have actually run a little long as the flare bug came on quite early and as a fair bit is dark or camera angles make it impossible to see as you can't use the binoculars this became a little annoying. The game itself has Lara on the hunt for the Star of Egypt and she comes across no puzzles in this endeavour but rather collecting a couple of items and using some of her moves if not to a maximum to find it. All in all it's sadly somewhat uninspiring." - Sash

"We have a new level from a new author. The author tried to make a decent attempt to build us a level and for that I am grateful. This one doesn't have all the typical rookie mistakes and for that I'm grateful. The level does have loooonggg shimmies and monkey swings which are always a mistake. It lacks good enemies (it has lots of mummies including some trapped in holes which does not build tension) and lacks having enemies show up at the right times. There is a lack of tension and resolution - it needs to set up tough problems with gratifying solutions. Nonetheless a very nice first try and I hope the author keeps at it." - Duncan