Second up for me this year was the reboot of Tomb Raider. The demo began with some Uncharted style exploration and climbing. Lara, stranded on an island needs to find shelter from a tropical storm. A short climb across a crashed plane and one missed handhold later she finds herself cold and shivering in a small cave.

It’s at this point where the controversy from E3 raised its head. Although the infamous sexual assault scene was not part of this demo, there was overly judicious use of a high camera angle which just happened to find itself pointed down Lara’s low cut top on numerous occasions. This seemed at odds from the developers assertions that they are not trying to titillate, but show a different side to Lara. From this brief demo it seems that the promises of the developers could have been empty.

After warming by a fire while the storm clears Lara finds a bow and begins hunting a dear. After a few wayward arrows (my fault not the games) and a quick chase of the startled beast, Lara finally managed to get some meat for dinner. A final journey back to camp and demo over.

It was difficult to glean too much from the overall product from such a brief and relatively uneventful demo but visually at least it was impressive. Whilst many may baulk at the Uncharted comparisons this can’t be denied. But who said that was a bad thing? I am still very much looking forward to getting my hands on the final code but feel a little disappointed that they don’t seem to have been quite as forward thinking with the character as I was hoping. Still time will tell.