REVIEW UPDATE October 2008 - Grade A-. I just finished the game a second time. This time I used the easy kill cheat code out of curiosity. With it, one hit and the enemy is dead. It was nice when there were enemies all over and did allow Jen to feed, but is a little too powerful! It shortened play too much. I recommend playing with no cheat codes until you get stuck, and then quiting, activating the appropriate cheat, and reloading the problem area. There are plenty of health power ups available - way more than are needed. I will play the game again some day. BONUS MATERIALS As you complete the game, various items become available from the bonus menu. Every Tarot Card you pick up will be there and each is linked to game artwork. Interviews with various people are added when each realm is completed. Finally, all but three of the cut scenes that have run can be seen. These cut scenes can also be used to start playing the game at that point, although I don't know what the health and other stats are. REVIEW UPDATE: November 2003 - My wife just finished playing the game and also enjoyed it a lot. She did not use the invulnerability cheat code, and had no significant problems fighting the villians. It turns out many of the lesser entities can be run past. My grade for the game has increased to A-. Enjoy. - - - - - - - - If you like the original five Tomb Raiders, as I do, you might like Primal. I certainly did. This is a good game and I do recommend it. It was good enough so when I was playing in this world, the real world went away. My initial grade is B+. If I play it again, and like it again, it will probably get a grade of A-. But that will be 2 or 3 years from now. I find fighting to be pretty boring, and there is quite a bit of fighting, so I played with the Invulnerability cheat code active. With the cheat active you cannot die in any way and the game becomes pure exploration, lots of exploration, and figuring out what to do next and how to do it. It is very good in this form. In game terminology it would be classed as a 3D Adventure with exploration and simple puzzles. But it is better than that. If I play it again, I might try it without using the cheat code - might not too. Primal is based in a totally fantasy world compared to the original five Tomb Raiders' psuedo-reality. It has a great story line, although a little down at points, with excellent characters. The main character, Jen, has to explore the 4 Realms of Oblivion to reset the balance between Order and Chaos. Each Realm is large and interesting and has several sub-areas, but the play is not stopped and started at each sub area. You can save at any time. Travel is adequately linear to be enjoyable and the vital look around capability is present. The actors doing the voices for Jen and Scree are excellent. The small interaction scenes and the full movie scenes with Jen and Scree were great. The character movements include various speeds of forward motion, climbing walls and blocks and ropes, jumping gaps, and swimming. In Tomb Raider you are in full control and can use most character movements at any time, even if it causes you to die. In Primal they are automatic and will only take place if it is safe. They are also spread through various forms you take but it becomes obvious which form to use very quickly. As in all adventure games, you cannot die by falling off a cliff or walking into a something deadly. You can only die in the fights. In the original five Tomb Raiders, fighting is simple shooting, requires only one button and is not too common. In Primal, fighting is hand-to-hand, requires about 5 buttons and there is a lot of it. My fingers tended to get tired of pushing fight buttons. Jen also moves around during fights so it can be confusing which direction you are looking and exactly where you are after a fight. But it is manageable. The camera viewpoint is basically over the head or shoulder of the character. But it doesn't lock there as it does in the original five Tomb Raiders. It tends to drift to the sides and even front as things happen. This can be confusing and you can get disoriented pretty easily, especially when swimming underwater which has three axis of motion. However, the camera control is better than in the latest Tomb Raider, #6, The Angel of Darkness. The game has a good map feature that can help out although the scale changes a lot between frames at supposedly the same zoom level. You can also have Jen ask Scree what to do next, which I tended to forget. It was useful about half the time. As I said, Primal is a good game and I recommend it.

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