Level reviews

"Well , there is for sure a story and a notes and lore behind this trle but i didnt care, sorry for this ! i just wanted to jump into the game , into the submarine , into tight places , into diving etc. the game is satisfying af , good gameplay , perfect atmosphere , difficult secrets , bosses , fantasy . at first i was worried or disturbed playing without any guns but nevertheless i enjoyed it . too much back and forth between levels , unfortunately u cant stop the progress or else you will forget things and places . the diving part was at first sight confusing but then it was still confusing xd , guess i was lucky finding the right one way . at the last floating island session which i had to shoot 10 eyes bugged for me so i had to start over the shooting and also the senet was problematic for me , pawns didnt move most of the times ,not for me , not for the ai . kingluis you trully deserve the hall of fame place" - Petaludas

"After 15 min I had enough of dystopian mood, but then the crawlspace part was very good, hehe :)) The Cargo Area fire puzzle confused me so I checked Doggett's walkthrough to realize I was meant to push a switch BUT ignore what it did and go back (never a good thing, even with a hint, because there's a chance you've never seen a place to make use of it). Then there were two crates like if the goal was to get something from below the second crate - but when I was eventually able to move it, there was nothing below, just a failsafe to return from another place instead (??). I had trouble finding the annex keyhole, because only now the flames extinguished an hour earlier appeared useful... I guess it's another level which doesn't forgive taking a break in a wrong moment - while rather immersive, it felt like if the author couldn't really decide which direction to push the gameplay in. And then... suddenly... it became a 10/10 level with insane creativity, so why did it take such a long prologue to do so (not the first, not the last level which does that, le sigh)... Seriously, over the next hour of playing I had nothing to complain, until the apple confused me again - found the slot myself though, because I had more time this time - so, probably the most optimal way to enjoy this level is to take a savegame from the first leveljump and, if not, reserve a whole day for a single playing session, because otherwise you might lose track of things." - DJ Full

"Great game! Absolutly an amazing work. Vary hard in sometimes. Very interesting history. In many ways a kind of labyrinth. Many places absolutly gorgeous, as the part diving. Really makes you feel inside the adventure and the submarine. Good work in puzles. Thank you very much!" - Juan Carlos

"This is essentially a revisit to the Russian sub from TRC, except this is a more ominous scenario, as four horsemen and a variety of other creatures are infesting the place, and it's up to Lara to stop them. Besides the premise, another major difference is the level design, which is arranged in a hub style. Unfortunately, as usual this setup leads to a lot of backtracking as Lara runs to use one key or item after another. But that doesn't mean there aren't several interesting moments along the way, one of which is a creature on fire chasing Lara through a crawlspace. This is essentially a timed run since Lara is not armed for a majority of the adventure, but it could cause frustration due to the cutscene not triggering until after the player enters, and it might be unwinnable if Lara starts in a bad position. I enjoyed the various puzzles, as well as dodging the various laser traps and the intense timed run for four switches. After getting the necessary components Lara will do her deep sea diving, which is pretty similar to the original except a bit more open-ended in its layout, as well as using a torpedo gun instead of flares to deal with enemies. That was pretty cool except I wish it was indicated that the ammo is limited – it doesn't show that anywhere in the game. The second part of the adventure really gains momentum: after returning with the infamous spear, Lara finally gets her hands on some pistols (after I wandered past them for a while) and revisits each area to pursue the four horsemen and save the day. These boss fights are quite unique and I enjoyed them overall, except the final one, which is a game of Senet. Normally I like playing boardgames with imposing spirits, but the main issue here is that there is no recourse if the player loses the game. That means one too many overpowered rolls of a 6 for the opponent will have the player replaying the whole game several times (saving is disabled at this point). The visuals are very good throughout each level. Maybe things are a little too dark but at least it brings out some nice colorful lighting and a spooky atmosphere. The adventure comes in two difficulties, with the main difference being the saving method. I tried the hard version for a few minutes, but after only finding a stationary one-time-use savepoint I decided to play the other version and had a good time doing so. Despite the rough spots that I've mentioned, there are so many engaging and unique moments that I am glad to have given it a go. 3 hours 33 minutes." - JesseG

"A surprisingly good level for all gameplay to take place in a submarine. The puzzles and combats are few but very unique, the exploration is excellent with a metroidvania style. The spiders part is excellent. The game is not very pretty visually but it was something to be expected. A highly recommended game." - requiemsoul

"I waited for the unlimited saving version to become available before tackling this behemoth adventure and I'm grateful I did. That said, I still encountered a couple of odd glitches: a bugged saving system if you eagerly saved in Deepdive (I had to download a savegame from the forum to bypass the issue), a strange occurrence where Lara disappeared if you ever used the look key (not game stopping) and a slight bug with the pedestal puzzle onboard the submarine, which was fortunately solved after a reload. Putting those annoyances aside, this was incredibly enjoyable to play through. The TR5 environments and atmosphere are faithfully recreated and there's a genuine sense of peril as you explore even further and open up new levels, which was really well executed. The boss enemies were neat additions, as were the various secret roses, although the duct crawling was a tad onerous after a while. Still, definitely recommended if you have the patience." - Ryan

"According to the builder's profile he's in medical school, so it's unlikely that we'll be seeing many more levels from him. But this tour de force may well serve as his magnum opus, as it's very well put together and provides an invigorating raid. The furor in the stuck thread led to a revised release where the player can now choose between saving normally or being allowed to save only at designated spots. I chose the "easy" version, because there are many sequences sprinkled throughout the game that require considerable skill to get through without dying. On the other hand, by doing so I encountered a couple of vexing bugs along the way: (1) Shortly before Deepdive I triggered a Tinnos wasp in Containment Area that doesn't show up until later in the "hard" version, by which time you have a weapon to deal with it. Since the tasks in that room include an extended monkey swing where Lara is both vulnerable and helpless, I had little choice but to cheat and manufacture a weapon to get rid of the wasp. (2) As noted in a previous review, the save function in Deepdive is fatally flawed. You can save and reload at the beginning of the level, but if you do so you won't be able to save in later levels for the duration of the game. And if you attempt to save during the timed swim at the end of that level, the game will crash on you. Despite these distractions, I really enjoyed the variety presented in these 10 interlocking levels, although crawling around in ducts got old after a while. This one will surely land in the Hall of Fame before long, and deservedly so." - Phil

"Technically, this was slightly problematic, as there was an initial version with savegame crystals (disks actually, blue and golden), which ended up being replaced by a newer version with an easy mode (regular saves), and hard mode (disks) - and the previous savegames stopped working. That was due to early complaints. I was inclined to play the hard mode, as there were many, well placed disks scathered around the levels, and it was fun in its own way, but ended up choosing the easy mode. I must say I enjoyed this TR5 Russian Submarine inspired level (with a touch of mystery and horror) quite a lot. The tasks are very varied, inventive and fair enough to the player, the atmosphere is quite enjoyable, and so are the settings, and there's a nice use of the colour palette, I loved the different bosses and how one had to deal with each (I especially liked the giant spider and the guy on the wheelchair, not to mention the fire creature, not a boss, but great), and there's even a final game of Senet at the end, something which is very seldom used (I won the first round!). Having said all that, I thought there was way too much crawling along ducts (even though I can understand it makes sense, and all the connections are rather well made), and orientation was Lara's worst enemy, quite mazy with all its connections between different levels. Yes, I did take several peeks at Doggett's video, lest I might get too lost. I found two game-killing bugs, but luckily they could both be solved with some perseverance. The first was in Deepdive - don't ever save during Deepdive or you'll end up getting crash after crash, and saves that won't work. Just do it all in a row. And then, in Horseman of Death, before the game of Senet, there was just no way the sudden ascending image was triggered, and Lara could climb up the stairway, up to the portal, as if it were some ancient god torture. I think it may be related to the pedestals, at the end of Dormitories, just before, where one places the skulls. Do all the pedestals actually work flawlessly? I had to try each until I found the one that finally led me to the game of Senet. I could be wrong of course, and it may simply have to do with sheer luck... In spite of those issues (things that tend to arise when there's enough complexity, I guess), I obviously recommend the adventure, and, in all fairness, rate it with four (not perfect, but almost) tens." - Jorge22

"I didn't feel brave enough to try the hard version, so I played the easy version instead. Hence, I am not able to comment how the crystal saving was implemented. The game is highly reminiscent of the submarine levels from TR5, except this game has much darker atmosphere including some horror elements. Especially in the first half of the game when you don't have guns yet, there are a few thrilling enemy encounters, such as escaping the mutant in the ventilation shafts while crawling. The submarine is also huge consisting of several interconnected levels and, therefore, the level structure will test your memory and navigation skills quite a bit. Nonetheless, the progression never felt too confusing and I usually had a pretty good idea where to go next. Besides exploration, author has incorporated several cool features including unusual puzzles, boss battles where you have to kill the enemies in unique ways, and a level where you are using the yellow diving suit from TR5 (this level also has a torpedo gun, which was super fun to use). Furthermore, it was nice to see the Senet game puzzle from TR4 in the last level, which I haven't seen before in custom levels. Visually the environment is solidly built containing atmospheric lighting and faultless texturing. All the numerous corridors and rooms tend to look highly similar though, and there are not so many areas that would have stuck in my mind as visual highlights of the game. However, this wasn't particularly a problem, and you could always justify the level design with the fact that real submarines do contain lost of similar looking corridors and rooms. One subtle thing, which nicely helped to spice up the environment, was the use of distinct distance fog colors between the levels. Also, inclusion of the underwater diving suit level in the middle of the game was a great idea, not only gameplaywise, but also because it added variety to the environment design. All in all, this was an excellent level set, which in my opinion deserves to be in hall of fame one day. Hopefully, we will see more ambitious levels like this from LOTRKingluis in future." - Samu

"What a trip (in a positive way)! An adventure with a consistent story, diverse gameplay and a lot of custom assets - mostly a mixture of a survival-horror experience and some classic TR elements. It's a multi-levelset, but it can be seen as one long adventure, cause there is switching between the levels and everything is set in one big area (a sinking submarine) with sub-areas. The mystery and horror aspect was well transported by the amazing eerie atmosphere. The author played a lot with the fear of the unknown and put little bits here and there until there was finally a shocker, sometimes even a jumpscare (falling corpses or the big spider for example). There were also shockers put in a way I've never seen in a Custom Level like the escape from the crawling mutant. The gameplay was almost always linear, but often didn't feel linear, because of the connection of all the areas and the high exploring aspect. Also the diversity of the gameplay was interesting and kept motivating of playing further, plus there was always the fear of a new shocker around the next corner. A downside of some gameplay elements were spots of forced damage (like the glass spikes), but if medpacks were used carefully, this wasn't an issue. People complained a lot about the saving system and the level almost appeared controversial. Saving is only possible at certain "checkpoints" and it's either a save that's only useable once or a spot at which it is possible to save as many times the player wants. This kind of choice was part of the gameplay and supported the survival-horror feeling like in classic games of that genre (Resident Evil, Silent Hill) - despite this being an artistic choice, which was well implemented and fit to the overall atmosphere, the saves were fairly placed. There were very rare cases in which a death meant to let the player replay more than one minute. Sometimes it was almost like there were too many saves at one place. It's not necessary to save after every step to enjoy a game, but the opposite: my experience was, that I watched my steps more carefully while playing, trying to stay alive, and so I appreciated some of the areas even more. Objects and enemies were well designed and mostly modified versions of classic assets - especially the enemy design was very interesting. Also the bossfights were varied from each other, so every boss and every area had its own theme. The senet game was a bit bugged though, but it's not the author's fault per se since it's just a bugged feature in general. The story was well told through the things that happened in the levels or during the bossfights, but the important thing about this is, that it wouldn't be necessary for a player to understand the story or read the diary to enjoy the game - in other words, there was no need in reading any hints to proceed in the level. There was some backtracking due to the level switching feature, but there were a lot of shortcuts to areas visited before (sometimes though a bit confusing, because of the big size of the submarine, so a good sense of orientation was needed). Textures and lighting were consistent and fitting - every level and area had a distinct color scheme to it. In rare cases unfortunately some single textures were squashed (in corner areas) or there were some cracks. It's one of the best Custom Levels of this year in my honest opinion - so much unique and custom stuff which was well implemented, only very few bugs and no unfair situations. Unfortunately there aren't a lot of mystery levels, which can deliver a consistent horror aspect and such a great surreal entertainment. I didn't find any of the 5 secrets and I took about 4 hours to finish this amazing game. Highly recommended!" - MarlenaCrystal