Video Game / Tomb Raider III

Your perception of good timing is...bad!

"Although I've got my new weapons to help me, I'll certainly have to use my wits a lot more for this adventure.'"

— Lara Croft, in her promo for this game. She's not kidding.

Tomb Raider III: Adventures of Lara Croft^note often referred to, and officially marketed as simply Tomb Raider III is the third game in the Tomb Raider series, developed by Core Design and released for the PlayStation and PC. It is the sequel to Tomb Raider II and was released in 1998. The next game in the series is Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, released a year later. III would later receive an expansion, Tomb Raider III: The Lost Artifact, exclusively for PC in 2000.

One of the more outlandish entries in the series, the story begins with a meteorite impacting prehistoric Earth, destroying all wildlife in the area and creating the frozen landscape of Antarctica. In the present day, Lara Croft is exploring the Indian jungle in search of the Infada artifact until she runs into a researcher named Dr. Willard, who reveals to her the location of 3 other similar artifacts around the globe, and enlists her help to retrieve them. His actual reasons for getting all the artifacts are unclear...

The game is built on the advanced graphics engine from Tomb Raider II, adding multicoloured lighting effects, environmental rain, fog, and wind direction. Lara herself gained the ability to crouch and crawl on the ground, monkey-swing over chasms, and sprint to gain short bursts of extra speed. Various sound effects were also changed or improved (the most recognizable example being the pistol shooting sound), and the use of short musical cues/stings was greatly expanded. However, the game is probably most (in)famous for its ridiculous difficulty level; playing the first two games in the series is considered a prerequisite to even attempting the first level of this one, and even then you're going to have a tough time.

In 2023, it was announced that this game, along with the rest of the original Tomb Raider trilogy, would receive an HD Remaster for PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X, which got released on February 14, 2024.

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This game contains examples of:

• Abandoned Area: Aldwych station in London is a more recent example, while the temple from India and the City of Tinnos were abandoned long before the events of the game.
• Advanced Ancient Acropolis: The city of Tinnos in its heyday was this, albeit the technology was considered advanced for the ancient Polynesians, not by modern standards. Now it's all a ruin under the ice of Antarctica.
• Advancing Wall of Doom: India loves this trope a little too much.
• Affably Evil: Dr. Willard is soft-spoken, polite and compared with Tony, his late employee, quite reasonable. It's only when Lara starts to object to his plan upon delivering the meteorite pieces he turns nasty on her, but even the plan is explained in the polite manner.
• Air-Vent Passageway: In High Security Compound there are a few sizable vents above prison's kitchen and a cooling vent for a satellite dish. For the creators' credit, they require Lara to crawl (a move introduced in this game) and are very tight.
• Ambushing Enemy: The India levels are riddled with giant cobras that lurk in the brush and rear up to attack if Lara gets too close. Fortunately, the snakes can't move, so if Lara is very careful she can make them rear up, then jump out of their attack radius and kill them from a safe distance. This is most prominent in Caves of Kaliya, where Lara can and even should just run through an entire corridor full of cobras, moving away before any of them can strike her. The Nevada Desert level has similar snakes, probably meant to be rattlesnakes.
• Ancient Conspiracy: Lara finds a masonic lodge around the closed Aldwych station.
• Animation Bump: Some may consider the FMV cutscenes to be this. The intro, the beginning of the "Antarctica" mission and a few others are rendered in what was very high quality at the time, whereas the in-game cutscenes feature rather polygonal models, the lack of mouth movements and frequent clipping.
• Anti-Climax: The final cut-scene has almost nothing to do with the plot. It's often quoted as one of the reasons for the "love or hate" reception of the game.
• Arbitrary Gun Power: The MP5 is portrayed almost as an assault rifle, taking down anything in its way, while two mini Uzis hardly scratch your enemies. In reality, both guns use exactly the same 9mm Parabellum ammunition.
• Area 51: The Nevada section of the game takes place in the surroundings and inside the base, which also shows off many of the tropes associated with that place.
• Artificial Brilliance: Enemy AI is much improved over the previous games, especially with human enemies. Enemies will actively target Lara and evade her shots, and will sometimes even fire a last desperate shot at her after she guns them down.
• Artificial Stupidity: Even if improved, the AI still has its moments. Most notable are melee fights between convicts and guards, where both parties will circle around, chasing each other at hand's reach. Whether or not the freed prisoners will survive or not is purely up to chance. Some enemies have a visible range limit, so you can stand just behind it and they won't come any closer to retaliate.
• Artistic License – Space: Upon impact, asteroids and meteors that aren't going to cause an Earth-Shattering Kaboom will plow through the surface of the Earth, leaving a trail of destruction behind. They don't become simply buried deep into the ground, especially given the trajectory shown in the intro.
• Art Evolution: The game's graphics, textures and models are much better than in the previous two games, enough to distinguish it from them. There are many minor improvements along with the headlining features listed above, including smoke coming out of the pistol barrels, a smoother water texture, blood pooling in water, and multilayered sky-boxes. Many sprites (fire, pickups) were replaced with models/3D effects. The in-game cutscenes themselves were also improved by having higher quality animations and more expressive body language between characters. Audio was was also improved where many of the sound effects like gunfire, footsteps, and animal noises were made to sound much more realistic compared to the sounds in the previous games.
• Art Shift: When Dr. Willard is first introduced, it's an FMV cut-scene. After India, he's never seen again until the end. When he returns, his cut-scenes are made using the game engine. A sizable chunk of players didn't even recognize who this guy eating soup was.
• Assassin Outclassin': During the Thames Wharf level, Lara is ambushed by several hitmen, but she gets the upper hand and takes them out first. At the end of the level, Lara manages to interrogate one of the hitmen to find out who put the hit on her.
• Awesome Aussie: The soldiers from the South Pacific plane crash are all Aussies with Artillery.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • The grenade launcher packs a punch and ammo for it is plentiful, but the way the grenades are delivered means they hardly hit anything moving faster than a crawl.
  • The rocket launcher is absurdly powerful, but it has a very slow rate of fire and it has to be reloaded after every shot. Ammo for the weapon is incredibly scarce.
  • Like the M16 before it, the MP5 is powerful and is excellent at sniping enemies from afar. The weapon is incredibly unwieldy in movement, which is what you'll be doing most of the time when shooting.
• Bare Midriffs Are Feminine: Lara's South Pacific Island and Nevada Desert outfits show her stomach.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: The dragonflies. It's not due to an engine limitation - they are intended as being two feet long.
• Bigger on the Inside: The UFO in Area 51 somehow manages to be this to a ridiculous degree without any loading whatsoever, possibly due to how the game engine handles rooms. Or because it's a UFO.
• Blasting It Out of Their Hands: Inverted. While Lara does shoot the gun out of the assassin's hand, she also shoots him in the arm, so he won't be too eager to get the gun back.
• Block Puzzle: A few - par for the course for the series - but the most notable examples are in India and London. Sometimes it's finding the block that's the puzzle.
• Blood Is Squicker in Water: An impressive example of the updated graphics, creatures injured or killed in water (including Lara) release a cloud of blood from their corpses.
• Blowguns: Both as mechanical traps shooting darts and, in more typical fashion, carried as weapons by some Polynesians. Like snakes and lizards, they can poison Lara.
• Body Horror: The most extensive examples in the series come from this game.
  • The mutants featured in the Antarctica levels, and of course, Dr. Willard's final form.
  • The Damned, who were stripped of their skin after being exposed for days on end to Sophia Leigh's chemical experiments.
  • In-story, the Polynesians living in Antarctica suffered horrible mutations - one of their rulers was born without a face. After that they abandoned the site and declared it cursed.
• Broken Bridge: A literal bridge is placed above the Madubu Gorge, leading to the front gate of Temple of Puna. Too bad for Lara it's drawn, forcing her to take the long route with a kayak. Tropes Are Not Bad, as the level is one of the best in the whole game, providing balanced challenges and lots of fun.
  • It's impossible to prematurely cross the swamp connecting the Coastal Village to the Crash Site; some of the solid swamp patches are missing until Lara obtains the map from the wounded soldier.
• Call-Back:
  • The Jungle theme is a remix of a track from the original Tomb Raider I.
  • The large Sphinx exhibit that Lara encounters in Lud's Gate was designed as a callback to the first game's Sanctuary of the Scion.
  • Most of Lara's advice in her gym is the same as in the first game.
• Cannibal Tribe: The Polynesian tribe in the South Pacific levels.
  Lara: Ripe flesh can be a bit of a delicacy around here.
• Captured by Cannibals: The one-legged soldier. He's fully aware of his predicament, but as he's in no condition to escape, he's decided to calmly accept his fate.
• Chair Reveal: Puna reveals himself in this way. When Lara is about to pick the Ora Dagger, the structure in which it is mounted is revealed to be the back of his throne, and he was waiting for the final confrontation.
• Checkpoint Starvation: Thanks to which the game is considerably harder to beat on the PS1, as the only way to save during a level is via the save crystals. Enforced in the remaster's New Game Plus where saving can only be done through limited collectable save crystals like it was in the original console version.
• Chimney Entry: Lara can climb the chimney in the library of her own home in order to access a secret section of the attic.
• Clipped-Wing Angel: Dr. Willard's heavily mutated spider-like body.
• Conspicuously Light Patch: Some of the movable blocks will be a bit more defined than the surrounding ones.
• Consummate Professional: Dr. Willard, who feels that he's Surrounded by Idiots, even if the phrase itself is never spoken.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Going to Lara's gym in her mansion will have her tell the player that players who been to the gym previously may notice some new décor added to it. The original Tomb Raider I had a gym inside the ballroom serving as a tutorial.
  • The hidden trophy room contains fragments of the Scion and the Dagger of Xian.
• Convection, Schmonvection: In the final levels in Antarctica, which have lava pools sitting right next to piles of snow.
• Cutscene: They became much more widespread compared to the previous two games, allowing for more complex storytelling. Every area has multiple cutscenes and almost all levels end with one (highlights including Lara meeting Sophia Leigh and the wounded soldier in the jungle).
• Cutscene Incompetence: After the Nevada Desert, Lara tries to jump a fence with her vehicle, but it goes wrong and she crashes to the ground instead, knocking herself unconscious. Two MPs carry her off to prison and strip her of all her weapons. Well done, Lara.
  • More frustrating, considering that it is possible to make this jump in game play (and many much bigger ones elsewhere) if the cut-scene flag is turned off.
• Damage-Proof Vehicle: Zig-Zagged. Quads can be destroyed and mine carts easily get derailed, but nothing can destroy a humble kayak or the mini-sub. (Unfortunately the same can't be said for Lara; it's easy to take heavy or even fatal damage from falls while in the kayak.)
• Dead Guy on Display: Poor Randy and Rory. Lara finds one of them suspended in mid-air, in a crucified position with a huge hole bored through his chest, and the other one on a nearby pedestal with a huge slash through his stomach.
• Dead Man's Trigger Finger: Happens in this game with the Nevada MPs and gun-toting guards from Antarctica. As if they weren't hard to kill already.
• Deadly Euphemism: Tony drops one when asked about his fellow researchers:
  Tony: They're staying put.
• Deadly Rotary Fan: The fans in the ventilation system of High Security Compound. Thames Wharf also has a pair of giant fans underwater, but manipulating the water level slows down the fans enough for you to pass by without being killed.
• Deadpan Snarker: Lara gets much more of an attitude this time around.
  Lara: Then you might like to mind...the bell.
  Mook: (Looks around, sees the bell, tries to run away, and gets thrown off the roof) Aggggghh!
  Lara: Happy retirement.
• Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: Playing on PC comes with the luxury of saving anywhere. NOT so on the PS1 version.
• Delicious Distraction: Since there is no way to directly engage schools of piranhas, this is required to do when having to dive right next to a shallow full of the predatory fish.
• Difficult, but Awesome:
  • Shotgun flipping. The shotgun suffers from a bad case of Short-Range Shotgun and due to a variety of factors, making most of it takes a very precise movement set that requires Lara to jump over her enemy and flip mid-air. Done right, and it's possible to put three shells into the target, one of them In the Back, while being near-impossible to hit back.
  • The kayak might look frustrating at first, but after mastering its controls, Madubu Gorge turns into one of the most enjoyable levels in the whole game.
• Direct Continuous Levels: Occurs within each region, with the South Pacific and London being most prominent examples - you start directly where the previous level ended. On the other hand, you can never turn back (one interesting example is the beginning of Crash Site; trying to back to the Coastal Village triggers a mysterious earthquake to dump rocks all over poor Lara, and even if you manage to dodge them you'll find the path back to said village being blocked off).
• Disconnected Side Area: About two-thirds of all levels are built on this trope, but Thames Wharf and the whole South Pacific section are the most prominent examples. The first level is also worth mentioning. You can see its ending location almost from the start - on the other side of an impassable swamp.
• Dismantled Macguffin: Zig-Zagged with the four meteorite artifacts. They don't have to be physically combined, but must all be present in order to summon the meteorite. There's actually a fifth one, the Hand of Rathmore, that appears in the game's add-on for PC/Mac - The Lost Artifact.
• Disposable Pilot: The pilot who brought Lara to Antarctica barely manages to land in the blizzard, only to drown seconds later when ice suddenly breaks under the helicopter.
• Distant Prologue: The opening cut-scene starts in the time of dinosaurs, with a meteorite entering Earth's atmosphere. Then it cuts to present times, where a research team in Antarctica have found it.
• Double Unlock: The bonus level, All Hallows, requires all of the game's secrets to be found and the Cathedral Key. The key itself only appears at the end of Thames Wharf and it won't show up unless you found all the secrets in the level first.
• Down the Drain: London features the predominantly-underwater level of Lud's Gate. It's quite frustrating.
• Enemy Mine: Lara and The Damned. She wants the Eye of Iris, they want their revenge on Sophia... and the embalming fluid.
• Enigmatic Minion: Dr. Willard. He's introduced as a guy working for someone else, yet he turns out to be the Big Bad of the game.
• Event Flag: Used to trigger effects ranging from opening doors or spawning enemies and ending with a mudslide. Some of them can be avoided, limiting the number of enemies to fight with or making the return trip easier.
• Every Car Is a Pinto: Quads can either land from a jump like nothing happened or get a scratch from too narrow a turn and explode in a fiery inferno.
• Evil Is Burning Hot: Fire and boiling water are main weapons of Tony.
• Evil Is Visceral: Mutants run on this trope.
• Evil Plan: Dr. Willard makes his rather subversive.
• Evilutionary Biologist: Dr. Willard is revealed as one.
• Excuse Plot: Played With. This game's plot is much more loose compared to the rest, and mostly serves as an excuse to get Lara traveling around the globe.
• Exposed to the Elements: The sailors in the flashback travel to Antarctica wearing nothing but their normal clothing that would protect them from the cold in England, but not against the sub-zero temperatures of Antarctica.
  • Averted with Lara herself in the Antarctica levels. Not only does Lara wear a proper snowsuit (though her head is not covered), she will also take damage if she stays in the freezing water for too long.
• Famed In-Story: Just like in the first game, Miss Croft is famous enough to have one of the bosses a fan of her, waiting for an autograph.
• A Father to His Men: The one-legged soldier is one for the rest of his men. Too bad he will end up as the main course soon.
• Flashback: When Lara starts to read the diary of Stephen Barr, the action goes back to the described events.
• Foreshadowing:
  • The first time Lara encounters a statue in India, it's simply that, a statue. In the next room, a similar statue comes to life and tries to kill her.
  • Close to the end of the first Antarctic level, Lara stumbles upon a horribly mutated scientist. The next level is full of all kinds of mutants.
• Frigid Water Is Harmless: Zig-zagged in the Antarctica levels. For the first few ones, swimming in the open water of Antarctica can cause hypothermia quite quickly. It's averted in the water puzzle in the Lost City level.
• From Bad to Worse: The Aussies from the South Pacific section had it really bad. Their transport plane crashed on a tropical Lost World. Those who survived the dinosaurs regrouped and went for shore, only to be Captured by Cannibals. The Celebes Isles don't seem like a great place to stay...
• Game-Breaking Bug: It requires Violation of Common Sense to trigger but in High Security Compound if you ditch recovering Lara's weapons and head straight into the tunnel with the conveyor belt instead, the game won't take it lightly and abruptly crash as soon as you reach the first corner. However, it is actually probable to trigger this unintentionally given there isn't a single clue where your guns are actually hidden.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: In the cut-scene after Temple Ruins, Lara is limping and thus the quad looks even more appealing. When the level starts, there is no trace of her limp.
• Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: Dr. Willard's ideas about reaching new levels of power circles around this trope.
• God Guise: Puna plays with this, even having his own temple. Given the fact that he can shoot lightning and summon strange lizards out of nowhere, it doesn't take a primitive tribesman to treat him as a god.
• Good Pays Better:
  • If you decide to help Lara's allies during fights, they will survive much longer (or even make it to the end), being helpful in future fights.
  • In London it's entirely possible to ditch the Damned and their embalming fluid. However, only by helping them will Lara gain access to one of the secrets in Lud's Gate.
• Great Escape: The High Security Compound level is an escape from the titular compound.
• Grenade Launcher: Early access, abundant ammunition and one-hit kills anything on contact. Focus on the "on contact" part - it's often easier to tirelessly shoot with basic pistols than try to hit anything with the grenade launcher.
• The Greys: Dead specimens of these are found in Area 51. There's a partly autopsied one in an operating room near the flying saucer, and inside the saucer itself there are several in standing positions in glass alcoves.
• The Guards Must Be Crazy: Generally it's very easy to sneak past them or make them ignore Lara running just a few meters away. At one point in Lud's Gate there is a short stealth section which can be finished while carrying a lighted flare - just keep Lara out of sight of the guards. Other times, in Nevada, they're so focused on Lara they completely ignore other prisoners who are actively attacking them. There's one spot in Area 51 where, by hiding and with a little luck and patience, you can get a single prisoner to take out four guards (three of them with machine guns) for you.
  • In one room in the High Security Compound, the goal is to hide and turn on a laser so that a guard gets hit with it. But if you time it wrong, the guard simply avoids the laser... and makes no effort to figure out why it's suddenly been activated.
• Guide Dang It!: Never before or after was there a Tomb Raider game so merciless with this trope. While the series is all about exploring and searching for secrets, some places are simply beyond even veteran players.
  • Sprites were previously used for item pickups, but this game switched to models. Thus, they were subjected to the game's lighting system - in dark areas, pickups are invisible unless flares are used, and even then they tend to blend in with the surroundings. The icon that appeared on the HUD to indicate the item being picked up was also removed. It's very easy to miss important items due to this.
  • This game introduced sprinting, something that the manual does describe. What it doesn't is the fact that Lara can also dive roll when already sprinting, which is essential to finish a few of the timed sequences, or else the door will slam shut right in front of Lara.
  • The very first secret is so well hidden that players tend to mock it as an open trolling from the dev team. It's impossible to see, and impossible to find unless you've played the first couple of games and know that plants aren't actually "there" in Tomb Raider games.
  • The game introduced swamps and quicksand. Some of them must be traversed, usually with mud to the chin or above and slowly going deeper. While there is always a safe path to do so, there are no suggestions in-game about it.
  • Caves of Kaliya is a sizable labyrinth full of death traps... and no indication where to go or what to do. Many routes deliberately return to the starting point and thanks to the textures it's easy to miss the correct path and keep on circling for hours. The level can be traversed in under 7 minutes when the route is known, however.
  • Coastal Village comes with the biggest counter-intuitive ways to beat the level with all secrets and pick-ups. After disabling the light-sensitive trap, it's better to take the route that was open all the time than go past the now-defunct trap.
  • It's possible to keep circling in frustration around the lift shaft at the start of RX-Tech mine for quite some time. To figure out this puzzle you must hear an echoed sound of opening doors, which indicates that it's the right time to turn back and start running in the opposite direction. Deaf players weren't pleased.
  • Some of the especially cruel secrets actually have conditions to acquire them, and you may not know you've messed up until it's too late. Some secrets require you to have found a previous secret that you may or may not even be aware of, require you to have a Helpful Mook open it for you, or even avoid being discovered by other enemies or else they'll close them off forever. Also, in certain levels, going down one path over another will lock you out of some secrets. Nowhere in the game are there any hints to any of these outside of trying everything.
  • Unlike Tony and Puna, who you just shoot at until they die, Sophia Leigh's boss battle isn't quite as simple. You have to blast a fuse box near a bridge to electrocute it and her after she climbs to said bridge, but nothing in the game tells you that you can do this and you never do anything like it again. Keep in mind that the game has auto-aim and Lara will aim at Sophia when in range, but will not target the fuse box, which has to be shot by simply standing in front of it and firing any given weapon.
  • The Crash Site level's initial hurdle, the gigantic quicksand swamp, is especially devilish, as it requires the use of an item you gained in a cutscene. In no other game in the series have you ever acquired an item, let alone one that allows you to complete a level, between levels, in this case the map to which stones are safe to traverse. What really makes it stand out is that you are already carrying the Infada Stone in your backpack (and potentially other meteorite pieces), so your inventory will by default show an arrow to see item section, making the map easy to miss.
• Hand Cannon: The Desert Eagle is overall the most effective weapon, but almost all its ammunition comes from secrets.
• Harder Than Hard: The main game aside, figuring out and getting some of the secrets is quite a feat even with a walk-through in hand.
• Hard on Soft Science: Inverted. Dr. Willard has this attitude toward a molecular biologist, mocking him as more useful as a horribly mutated abomination than when he was human.
• Harpoon Gun: The only weapon that can be equipped underwater. Useful in London and completely useless anywhere else.
• Heal Thyself: While instant-healing medipacks are a staple of this series, on the PC version the save crystals restore half of Lara's health with no logical explanation whatsoever.
• Hell-Bent for Leather: The leader of the Damned, who wears clothes good for a greaser.
• Hell Is That Noise:
  • The rattling and moaning of Winston in the mansion.
  • The buzz saws in Coastal Village sound almost unnatural.
  • Thames Wharf has an area where several water tanks can be filled with water. Doing so creates this noise that sounds less like rushing water and more like a gate to another dimension being opened.
• Hotter and Sexier: Zig-zagged. This game is the first to include outfits (for the South Pacific and Nevada levels) where Lara shows her belly button. On the other hand, Lara wears a winter coat and snow pants for the Antarctica levels, and the catsuit for the London levels similarly covers her legs.
  • Played straight with the CG artwork for the series as a whole that came out around the time of the third game: Several pieces had Lara nude or topless (albeit with strategic coverings so nothing was shown).
• Human Sacrifice: The Polynesians give these to Puna, or whomever was residing in the temple previously. Since he's using the Ora Dagger and its power for God Guise, it's a very twisted form of cannibalism.
• Hungry Jungle: Invoked.
  Tony: This jungle has rooted enough rot into me. I'd offer the same advice to you, but you don't seem the type to take it...to care if I said you're gonna die in there.
• Incredibly Durable Enemies: The large mutants from RX-Tech Mines and especially the Tinnos monsters. How tough they are? They can take a rocket from the rocket launcher, normally a One-Hit Kill weapon that reduces whatever it hits into burning chunks of meat, and keep going. In fact, by the bullet count, they survive more shots from Desert Eagle than Tony, the boss concluding the India section of the game. If that wasn't bad enough, they are in the Lightning Bruiser territory.
• Indy Escape: Starting from the first level. Those spiked walls have a mind of their own.
• Indy Ploy: The whole escape from prison is more or less made on the run, with neither a plan nor time to prepare.
• Inevitable Waterfall:
  • At the end of Ganges River, Lara reaches a waterfall. At the bottom she finds a crashed raft, which was used by Tony to get there. You can figure out the rest.
  • If Lara falls off the platforms in Nevada Desert during the canyon climbing section, the current will sweep her over the waterfall to the very bottom and she will have to climb all the way back up.
• Infinity -1 Sword: The humble shotgun will carry you through most of the game and becomes obsolete right before getting your hands on the Desert Eagle. The shotgun is obtainable before Lara meets her first enemy.
• Insurmountable Waist-High Fence: Probably one of the worst offenders in the series in the Temple Ruins level. One of the paths to a Key of Ganesha has Lara come across an empty pool with a lever. Lara cannot for any explainable reason pull said lever outside of it being an "underwater lever" and therefore cannot be pulled while standing on dry land, and must traverse several death traps to reach another lever to fill the pool before she can pull the lever in the now filled pool and open the door to the key on the other side of the pool. The only consolation is that there is a secret on that route to be found.
• Instant-Win Condition:
  • Each level ends after crossing the point designated as the finish (unless there is a boss fight), regardless of the situation around. Lara starts the next level with full health.
  • Picking up the artifact in Area 51 instantly ends the whole section, even with a swarm of MPs shooting at an almost-dead Lara. One wonders how she managed to get outside the complex...
• Insult Backfire: This gem:
  Tribesman: Is well for you, me fasting this day. You make plenty good flesh pot!
  Lara: You forget I might be quite hungry myself. Famished, actually.
• In the Hood: The Damned wear hoods and masks to hide the fact that they have no skin.
• Interface Spoiler: The remaster spoils both the fact that Puma exists (since he does a pretty effective Chair Reveal in what looks like a pedestal for the Ora Dagger) and that your attacks are useless against Sophia Leigh, in both cases due to displaying health bars during boss fights. And of course, you also see Spider-Willard's regenerating health, giving a very handy cue how much time is left to pick another artifact.
• Irony: The 1834 Antarctica expedition was part of the round-the-world voyage of the HMS Beagle, of which Charles Darwin was a member. Given the meteorite's effect on living things in general, and how close Darwin came to discovering it, it's interesting to surmise what addenda might have been necessary to his most famous work...
• Jump Scare: Used very often and yet they retain full potential for the whole game, keeping players on their toes. For this game only, many different short musical cues were composed for this very purpose (the other games only use a few repeated stings).
• Jungle Drums: As Lara is talking with the captured soldier, the natives start to play on drums and chant in the village. She instantly switches the subject of their conversation to "escape plan".
• Lampshade Hanging: Everything Tony said, mentioned or suggested during his brief conversation with Lara. His words come with great Rewatch Bonus after finishing India.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Out of the five men who went hunting in Antarctica, only Stephen Barr made it back to London. Caulfield, who mocked him about being the only one without any loot, got his throat chewed by a wolf seconds later. When the cave started to collapse, everyone but Stephen fled, leaving dying Caulfield behind. The karma get them later - Smythe was eaten by the Polynesians and whatever happened to Henderson and Jonson wasn't nice either.
• Last Breath Bullet: Human enemies with firearms will often get off one last shot as they're falling down dead. This shot will also be more damaging than their normal fire. If you've been jumping and flipping to avoid their fire, keep doing it until you're sure they're down for good and never be in front of a dying gunner.
• Lava Adds Awesome: Large lava pools exist in the final levels of Antarctica. The meteorite sanctuary is floating on lava.
• Ledge Bats: Anything that flies can ruin your day when it comes to acrobatics or just walking around ledges. The dragonflies from the Lost City of Tinnos level are the most infamous, since part of the level's difficulty comes from dispatching the dragonflies already in the area and then quickly making the acrobatics before the next batch will close to Lara.
• Lightning Bruiser: Raptors, running mutants and Tinnos monsters. The last one can run much faster than Lara, shoot at her, claw her up close and withstand up to three rockets before dying. It takes a single one to blow anything else into pieces.
• Living Dinosaurs: The South Pacific islands are infested with them to the brim, with a few different species. Of course, the T-Rex makes its third appearance (this time with updated graphics), and the Velociraptors from the first game make a comeback. Now they're bullet sponges that take far more firepower to kill than before. Crash Site ends with a non-obligatory fight with seventy velociraptors.
• Living Motion Detector: The T-Rex cannot see Lara if she doesn't move (a direct Shout-Out to Jurassic Park) - but it can harm her, as it will stomp around very close to her even if she stays completely still.
• Living Statue: The statues in Temple Ruins.
• Locked Door: Numerous, but two are most notable:
  • Temple of Puna - the whole level is one big circle around the complex, just to open a gate right next to the starting position.
  • More than half of Aldwych involves Lara breaking into a secret masonic lodge to steal their ceremonial mallet... and smash a padlock with it.
• Lost World: The whole South Pacific section of the game.
• MacGuffin Delivery Service: Dr. Willard knows just what to tell Lara to send her on the globe-trotting artefact hunt.
• Magic Meteor: The meteor laying under Antarctica has some powerful properties, which are also very, very corruptible.
• Malevolent Architecture: Everywhere, especially the Indian temples, which seem to have been designed to kill anyone who dares venture inside.
• Marathon Level: A few notable examples:
  • The second level of the game, "Temple Ruins".
  • Most of London, especially "Lud's Gate".
  • "The Lost City of Tinnos" takes it up to eleven, being the final "full" level of the game (the next one is just a boss fight with a short escape afterwards). By the time players think that they've reached the final chamber, they are not even in the middle and the route starts branching.
• Match Cut: The opening cutscene has a transition from the distant past to modern times, using the exact same mountain range as a fixed point, but all the surroundings turning from a lush jungle into a frozen wasteland of Antarctica.
• Mind over Matter: After Tony impales himself with the Infada Stone, he causes the temple to collapse around Lara just by gesticulating towards it.
• Minecart Madness: Lara moves around the RX-Tech mine using minecarts. Ride attractions include: derailment on sharp turns, lack of tracks, broken bridges, switches/points which need to be changed on-the-fly, bores widening the tunnels and a lack of proper lighting.
• Misplaced Wildlife: Surprisingly sparse. The only example are piranhas, present in India and South Pacific.
  • In the diary flashback there are regular, dark-furred wolves. On the shores of Antarctica. But this can be hand-waved toward the Unreliable Expositor Stephen Barr.
• Monstrous Humanoid: Mutants in general. While in-game they struggle under engine limitations and use only two models, the script calls for a more diverse group of monstrosities barely resembling the humans they were.
• More Dakka: Lara's range of weapons reached its height in this game, including things like Uzis, MP5, grenade launcher and rocket launcher. A particularly useful Good Bad Bug allows Lara to combine the firing rate of any two-handed weapon with the ammo of any other gun. Yes, if you want, you can kill a monkey using an MP5 equipped with rockets.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: The living statues from Temple Ruins have six arms, carrying a scimitar in each. Not only are their attacks powerful, but they can soak up bullets without a fuss and even block them with their blades, all whilst stomping around at some speed. Keep in mind that this is in the game's second level.
• Mutants: Truly horrific ones swarm in the shafts of RX-Tech Mines. In the past, the Polynesians fled Antarctica because of the increasing level of deformations with each generation living there.
• Mysterious Antarctica: The final act of the game takes place in Antarctica. An ill-fated expedition from the 19th century, miners armed to the teeth, horrible mutations caused by a meteor, the ancient ruins of a long-gone civilization, Eldritch Abominations guarding those ruins... there are many Shout Outs toward Lovecraft and The Thing.
• Mythology Gag: The design of various characters from the remaster is based on their resin figure casts (specifically, the box art images).
• Nerf:
  • The grenade launcher, while still retaining its power from the last game, has its trajectory changed - its grenades drop and roll on the ground instead of sailing through the air.
  • Flares were also weakened by making their duration be half as long as they were in the previous game, meaning you'll burn through a lot of flares if you plan to search every dark area carefully.
  • Compared with previous two games, shotgun and uzis got hit with nerf not due to decreasing firepower of those guns, but the quantity of ammo for them. As a result, Lara is constantly short-strung for ammo.
• Nigh-Invulnerability: Sophia is immune to all your weapons thanks to the artifact she wields. Even trying to get close has her shoving you back with her powers. How does she die? Shooting the electrical box on the metal walkway she stands on will get her electrocuted. The fight against Dr. Willard is a similar case, except he becomes weak to gunfire after you recover all four artifacts.
• No-Gear Level: The most brutal version in the whole franchise. In all other incarnations, Lara is stripped of her guns at some point. Here her whole ammo reserve and medipacks (except for a single small one) are gone too.
• Non-Indicative Name:
  • Both India and the South Pacific are more about temples of doom, London takes place in an urban setting and Nevada is all about Area 51, so there are hardly any tombs.
  • In-game, the Infada Stone was held briefly by the Infada tribe from India, but it originates from the Polynesian culture and was carved in Antarctica.
• Noob Bridge:
  • Better learn how to sprint and crouch. Fast. And how to do dive rolls while sprinting, too.
  • In the Nevada Desert, should Lara fall into the canyon pool, she can only get out by jumping across a bunch of rocks. One jump appears to require the run+jump+grab combo, but pressing grab actually lowers her arc slightly; she'll bounce off the rock if she tries to grab it, and will just make it if she doesn't.
  • Killing one of the Damned in Aldwych too fast means he won't open vital doors. Instead Lara has to chase him the whole way, let him open the door and then kill him. Have fun with figuring it out alone.
• No One Gets Left Behind: Stephen decided to help bleeding Caulfield, while their friends simply ran away from the wolves during the cave-in.
• Not Completely Useless: Out of all places, the harpoon gun really shines in London.
• Nothing Is Scarier: Happens quite often in dark locations, like Temple Ruins, most of the South Pacific and Antarctica after entering the mine.
• Notice This:
  • One of the paths in Coastal Village takes you inside a temple. Entering the room will have Lara and the camera focus on the sunlight shining in from the ceiling, which is a clue indicating that it's a trap.
  • In the Lost City of Tinnos, a map of safe platforms is drawn on the ceiling. However, the camera will only turn on this if Lara is carrying a flare at that time, casting light on the map.
• Older Than They Look: Sophia Leigh looks to be in her "late twenties, early thirties", but one of her henchmen tells Lara that his father and grandfather both worked for her. She is in fact immortal.
• 1-Dimensional Thinking: Subverted - the hitman didn't even have time to try any moves before the bell launched him off the roof.
• One-Hit Kill:
  • Dr. Willard's spider form fires homing energy projectiles that cannot be defended against and are one-hit kills.
  • Puna's only direct attack is a lighting bolt that instantly fries Lara if she's hit.
  • Explosives-based weapons take a single shot to blow most things into pieces.
• Optional Stealth: In Lud's Gate, one of the secrets requires Lara to sneak past three guards and shoot them at close range, before they block the way leading to that secret.
• Outrun the Fireball: Happens in Area 51, after Lara has to outrun the fire burst from the launched missile.
• Palette Swap: Lara's training outfit for Croft Manor is the Nevada Desert outfit with the trousers colored red/brown.
• Parrying Bullets: Big part of what makes the Living Statues so tough to deal with is their ability to simply cover themselves with their six swords.
• Permanently Missable Content: Some levels split into two paths, which means you'll miss out on items from the path you didn't take (sometimes you can double back and take the missed route if you really want to collect everything). Secrets are even easier to miss forever due to either a Point of No Return, on an alternate path you missed and can't backtrack to, or an event that seals a secret away if you didn't take care of it right away. Even some weapons can be gone forever if you miss secrets containing them and play the levels with their "obvious" pickups before playing the level that has Lara lose her weapons. The very first level is infamous for having the first secret containing the shotgun be so well hidden that most first time players easily slide right by it. (though in the case of Lara losing her weapons, all weapons except for the Harpoon gun can be found either obviously or in secrets in that location or the final Antarctica levels.)
• Pet the Dog: After mercilessly going through the Polynesians and their village, Lara reaches a shack containing a captured soldier with a missing leg. The first thing she does is offer him an escape.
• Plot Coupon: Parodied, when Lara has to get a metro ticket to progress further.
• Plunger Detonator: About 2/3 of entire Nevada Desert level is about getting to the detonator and then searching for the key to it. All of it to just break down few rocks and climb to the fenced compound with the quad bike.
• Power-Upgrading Deformation: Ho boy... let's just say that this game likes Body Horror a bit too much.
• Prison Level: One level of the "Area 51" mission ends with Lara being captured by guards. In the next level, she has to escape from her prison cell, find replacement weapons and equipment, and find the alien meteorite fragment she's looking for.
• Professional Killer: The hitman from London. He focuses on killing people, not asking questions. And it's a Family Business.
• Puzzle Boss: Sophia Leigh and Dr. Willard are completely Immune to Bullets, requiring Lara to find ways other than blazing guns to beat them.
• Quicksand Sucks:
  • Several levels have quicksand that will either pull you halfway or pull you under completely. You're not completely screwed since you can still wade through at a slow pace, but if you go under, Lara will quickly drown and then die unless you are quick enough to get her to safety.
  • The Crash Site level has a massive pool of quicksand at the start and you need to consult a map given to you by a soldier earlier in order to see where the solid platforms are.
  • In case of Lost City of Tinnos, you need to wade through a quicksand without any map or indication of safe passage. And even the safe way requires to take a deep breath to push through. It's very easy to panic or just accidentally get out of the safe path without prior knowledge where to go.
• Really 700 Years Old: Sophia looks "late 20s, early 30s", but the ageing assassin working for her claims that both his father and grandfather worked for her, meaning that she is at least 100 years old.
• Refuge in Audacity: In Aldwych, Lara is required to steal a ceremonial mallet from secret masonic lodge to smash a padlock with it.
• Reptiles Are Abhorrent: First of all, you will learn to loathe how snakes work in this game. Then we've got Puna, who is able to summon lizard-men out of thin air. The lizard-men themselves are a strange combination of reptilian and monkey characteristics with poisonous breath. It's strongly suggested that they were created by Puna or his predecessor as personal guards. Oh, and don't forget that South Pacific is a Lost World.
• Retirony: The assassin from London was planning to retire after the hit on Lara.
  Assassin: I mean, I could even be retiring from you.
• Roaring Rapids: Madubu Gorge is full of these. If Lara falls into them outside the kayak, she will instantly drown.
• Running Gag: Continuing the first 2 games' tradition of featuring one large medipack unreachable by normal means, one village hut has a large medipack sitting at the back. The catch: the entire room is filled with deadly quicksand. It's impossible to get this medipack, even if Lara stands right on top of it, and there's no escaping the sand. And don't forget that Lara has a rather nasty habit of getting incapacitated or dazed throughout this game:
  • After escaping the jungle temple, Lara is attacked by Tony and forces herself to the ground to avoid being crushed by falling rocks.
  • Attempting to jump an electric fence on a quad bike in the desert has Lara botch her jump, getting her tossed from the bike and knocking herself out cold.
  • At the end of the Aldwych level, Lara sides down a shaft that is a bit too far for her to land safely and winds up injuring herself upon impact.
  • After Lara's meeting with Dr. Willard in Antarctica goes sour, the man flips the table on her to knock her down, leaving her dazed. Before Lara can get up, Willard steps on Lara on his way out to keep her on the floor.
  • Towards the end of the game, Lara sprints down a hallway to catch up with Dr. Willard, who has just used all 4 artifacts to unseal the cavern's powers. Unable to stop herself in time, Lara teeters on the edge of a ledge and falls off, landing on her back on a walkway below.
• Run or Die: Downplayed, but still - there is no point fighting the dragonflies from Tinnos, unless they are swarmed or block your way. They just keep on spawning - in some versions of the game they have an infinite spawning pool, but otherwise, it is possible - albeit time and resource-consuming - to kill them all.
• Save-Game Limits: The PlayStation version has a limited number of save crystals, so use them wisely.
• Save Scumming: Averted in the PlayStation version due to the save crystals being highly limited. Saving after a major tough event, like a death trap, is generally a good idea, but trying to push ahead and delaying your saves can bite you in the ass if you're not careful. Played straight in the PC version where saving is unlimited.
• Save Token: The PS1 version has collectible "save crystals", which are the only way to save mid-level. The PC version replaces them with a save-anywhere feature, the crystals themselves now being green and restoring half of Lara's health, being used as soon as she touches one.
• Scenery Porn: This game expanded on its predecessors with a range of environmental effects and lush textures, especially in India, where there are a few places purposefully created to allow the player to marvel at the sights.
• Secret Path: Aldwych has a few. Most of them are windows to shoot, but one, ( a drapery in the masonic lodge), is a notorious case of Guide Dang It!, as there is no indication of its presence and inside it there is an object required to get one of the secrets.
• Sentry Gun: Ceiling-mounted ones guard many places in the High Security Compound and Area 51. They only start shooting if attacked or their laser-sensor is crossed, but since Lara usually has to reach the places guarded by them...
• Sequence Breaking: Several levels have them, but Thames Wharf has a several of them in various places:
  • Going for the first secret involves crossing a large chasm near a crane-like structure. It's possible to jump towards the black ledge sticking out below and by going this way, you've reached the end of the level and saved nearly an hour's worth of playtime. You also wind up bypassing all the secrets and items.
  • In the area where you need to use the Flue Room Key, you can jump towards a ledge with a fence below from the scaffolding and bypass the flue room to save a few minutes.
  • In the third pool room, after swinging across to the other side, dropping down to the ledge below will give you enough distance to jump towards the tiny opening below that is filled with water. This bypasses the need to run back to the main room to press a button that fills the third room with water again.
• Sewer Gator: In London, no less!
• She Knows About Timed Hits: As before, Lara will teach you how to move around in her mansion. Many of her lines are actually recycled from the first game, but re-recorded by Judith Gibbins.
• Short-Range Shotgun: Shotgun damage depends entirely on the distance from the target. At point blank, it has the exact same damage output as Desert Eagle. At maximum range, you need nearly three times as many shells to kill the exact same enemies, even if Lara stands still and her target is charging directly toward her. On top of that, the shotgun is among the shortest-ranged guns in the game. As long the current area allows for it, close in to your targets, or else even the basic pistols are going to be better.
• Shout-Out:
  • The T-Rex can't see stationary targets, like the one from Jurassic Park.
  • After encountering the first mutant in Antarctica, Lara mentions him looking like Brundlefly.
    • And the setup for that mutant and future encounters with them are very Thing-like in their nature.
  • There are many vibes of the xenomorphs in the Tinnos guards.
  • Deep within Area 51, there is a Power Crystal known as "Element 115". Deep within another Elaborate Underground Base in another game, there are other crystals called "Elerium-115".
• Shmuck Bait: Coastal Village loves this. Surely that large health kit sitting in the middle of sunlight isn't going to cause trouble, right? Enjoy getting shot by poisonous darts and the way forward being blocked with spikes as you are now forced to jump in the water to take a detour on the other path you skipped. A large health kit sitting out in the open in one of the huts for easy access? Enjoy sinking under the mud and drowning! Oh, is that a switch on the wall behind this door I just unlocked? IT BURNS!!!
• Sinister Shades: Tony's shades combine this with Scary Shiny Glasses, as far as the game engine allows. Remaster makes them into the iconic wrap-arounds reflecting everything.
• Sinister Subway: The closed Aldwych station is one of the London levels. The trains still run, though...
• Skippable Boss:
  • It's entirely possible, if not advised to run past the T-Rex.
  • The same goes for the final confrontation in Crash Site with seventy raptors, even with the rear gun of the aircraft being at Lara's disposal.
  • You can leave mutated Willard in the cave, not even bothering to look at him. Borders on Sequence Breaking. That said, if you manage to pull this off (it is extremely difficult without Save Scumming), then you'll reach the surface only to find the gate to the exit blocked off, and the switch to open a nearby door malfunctioning. Maybe the developers thought of everything after all.
• Sliding Scale of Linearity vs. Openness: A firm 3, as the game is the most non-linear of all Tomb Raiders. A few levels can be finished by taking alternative routes, varying the order of Plot Coupon retrieval, and as a whole, this installment came with a unique section selection. After each artifact is collected, it's up to player's choice which one should be next. Of course the game always starts in India and ends with Antarctica, but still it's a considerable effort to make it less linear.
  • Non-linearity is also the main theme for the South Pacific section, with levels being as open-ended as possible.
• Snipe Hunt: A variety. Tony sends Lara into a wild goose chase after the Infada Stone through the temple ruins... while he already had it and run away from her in what appeared to be a suicide.
• Soft Water: Constantly present, but with an egregious case in in Nevada Desert level. Early on, Lara has to take a jump into a well shaft, which is about fifty meters deep. She splashes into the water unharmed. It happens again later in the prison base, when Lara jumps down a huge shaft into a sewage system.
• Spell My Name With An S: Sophia Leigh's name is pronounced so-FIE-uh, not so-FEE-uh. This is the original British pronunciation of the name Sophia, which has largely been replaced by the American pronunciation so-FEE-uh. Sophia's use of an outdated pronunciation gives away the fact that she is much older than she looks.
• Spikes of Doom: Present everywhere, often requiring slow traversal through them, and to avoid jumping on them at any cost. In more industrialized areas they are replaced with barbed wire (which can still kill you instantly if you drop onto it, but if you walk through it you're fine, which for barbed wire makes no sense whatsoever).
• Spoiler Opening: The loading screen for the South Pacific shows a raptor, lone soldier and Lara in kayak, none of which show up until later in this section (the first two in the second level; the kayak in the third). Made even more egregious since the first raptor that shows up is treated as a big surprise intended to shock players. On the other hand the loading screen doesn't suggest the existence of a hostile native population.
• Spy Catsuit: Lara wears a short-sleeved one in London.
• Standard Female Grab Area: Downplayed. After Lara lands from an unspecified height in the hideout of the Damned, one of them instantly grabs her by her arm and twists it. She struggles for a while to get free.
• Stationary Boss: Both Tony and Puna. They never move from their starting positions, and in the case of Tony the fact that he is stationary is part of the challenge, as he already occupies one of the few safe spots in the chamber where the boss fight happens.
• Stripperiffic: Lara's outfit for the South Pacific is one of the skimpiest she's ever worn, with her trademark shorts and a bra top that bares her entire midriff. But then in Antarctica she wears heavier clothes than anything she'd had up to this point.
• Stupidity Is the Only Option: After encountering the animated statues a few times, you collect their scimitars and have to put them in the hands of a non-moving statue. It only opens the door and the statue remains in place.
• Super Drowning Skills: Justified. If Lara falls into the rapids from Madubu Gorge, it's an instant game over. The River Ganges won't instantly kill you, but it's impossible to surface or climb out.
• Survivor Guilt: Stephen Barr suffered from it when he became the only one of his group left alive. Out of guilt and superstition he sold the Eye of Isis, being convinced that the artifacts brought bad luck to their owners.
• Suspiciously Specific Denial: Tony is very specific about "not touching the stuff myself" when asked about the Infada stone and the subject of magic.
• Suspicious Videogame Generosity:
  • Unlike TR2, flares are everywhere and there is no real point to saving them.
  • The harpoon gun from the South Pacific is found in the very same pool that contains the first crocodiles.
• Tank Controls: As per usual for the series, but the camera can make the controls difficult at times, especially since Sprint and Crouch were added to Lara's moveset.
• Temple of Doom: Temple Ruins in India, and the unnamed temple in the South Pacific.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: See the entry for More Dakka. MP5+rockets are effective to say the least.
• Timed Mission: By a trainload. Many puzzles require a perfect sequence to finish in time.
• Too Awesome to Use:
  • The rocket launcher, as there are only about 15 rockets in the whole game, and the enemies against which you'd most want to use them can easily soak them up. The save crystals in the PlayStation version also become this due to their being few in number, and the majority of them being hidden in secret areas.
  • There are exactly 100 rounds to the Desert Eagle that can be fired and that assuming the "correct" order of doing levels. To beat the final boss in anything even resembling efficient, non-frustrating way, you will need 50. Oh, and 70 of all of those rounds are secrets. However, unlike typical example, Desert Eagle is worth using in every chance you can... it's that you most definitely want to preserve as much of its ammunition for both the final boss and preferably also the final section of the game, given it's populated by Incredibly Durable Enemies.
• Trophy Room: Like in II, Lara's mansion contains a secret treasure room housing the artifacts she's collected over the years. Getting there isn't as obscure as it was in TRII. Lara shows off the remaining bits of the Scion, the Dagger of Xian, a golden skull from the first Indiana Jones film, and even the Iris artifact, at this point unnamed and its significance unknown. There's also a T-Rex head mounted on the wall.
• Unique Enemy:
  • The six-armed statues. They only show up in Temple Ruins level (fitting the role of yaksha) and there are only four of them - two in the same room. Ironically, they are so iconic most players will mention them instantly when asked about enemies from this game.
  • There are only 4 crows in the game and they show up in Thames Wharf, the only London level with open sky.
• Universal Ammunition: Averted. Lara carries two mini Uzis and a MP5 submachine gun. Both guns have separate ammo count, even though in real life they use the same 9mm Parabellum bullet.
• Unobtanium: The meteorite has some special, but unspecified physical properties.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight:
  • Five men have just entered a gigantic ice cave with marvelous sights. Not only that, but the cave clearly contains some ancient ruins with impressive sculptures. Their main interest? Looking for the animal they were hunting.
  • Lara effectively breaks into Sophia Leigh's office through an air vent. Rather than calling for security or attacking Lara herself, Sophia asks Lara to sign a deal with her within her cosmetics company.
• Urban Legends: Played for Laughs in London. Lara meets sewer alligators and finds a masonic lodge right next to the closed Aldwych metro station.
• Vain Sorceress: Sophia Leigh is a modernized version. She's Really 700 Years Old, a beauty-obsessed owner of a cosmetics company and of a magic scepter, powered by a neatly-carved piece of Magic Meteor. It's implied that she uses that scepter to meddle with her company's experiments, and picks the best results for herself. In the script she's described as "a woman who pays much attention to her looks".
• Video Game Cruelty Potential:
  • Locking Winston in the freezer wasn't cruel enough? How about using him for target practice?
  • In the first level the monkeys are no threat to Lara unless she attacks them first. And the snakes in later levels are immobile, meaning that, except in areas where you have to pass close by them, you can simply avoid them. Or you can gun down these innocent creatures for no reason. Up to you.
  • You can also shoot your fellow prisoners at the High Security Compound and Area 51 levels for no reason other than to be a jerk. Ditto for the soldiers in the Crash Site level that are trying to defend themselves from the raptors, but it's doubly worse for them since most of the soldiers that die drop ammo for the MP5.
• Videogame Flamethrowers Suck: No, they don't. The flamethrower is the most powerful weapon in the game, dropping down mutants like flies. Too bad Lara can't use one, but at least the flamethrower miners are on her side.
• Violation of Common Sense:
  • When triggering certain boulder traps in India and Pacific, you must violate all instinct by sprinting towards the object about to crush Lara before ducking at a small raised step on its path, allowing the boulder to pass over Lara safely.
  • The fastest and most effective way of fighting against Tony is to land on the platform he's occupying and use shotgun at a point-blank range. He goes down so fast this way, he won't be able to attack even once.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: Puna. While Tony is a relatively weak Stationary Boss and defeating Sophia is more of a puzzle to solve than an actual boss fight, Puna requires players to be well-armed and proficient in controlling Lara's movement (which is also checked by their ability to even reach Puna in his temple), aware of how auto-aim works in the game and have enough split awareness to also deal with his summons. All while Puna's only form of attack is a One-Hit Kill, just like Willard.
• Was Once a Man: The mutants in Antarctica. There is also a fan theory that the Tinnos guards and Dragonette might have been humans at some point in the past.
• Watch for Rolling Objects: There are sections where Lara must dodge giant boulders. They come in two sizes: either a "one cube" sized ones that start showing right from the first level and truly giant ones that "chase" Lara inside the Temple of Puna, completely blocking the massive corridor behind her.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Out of universe, as no one brings this up in the game. The very final cut-scene has Lara infamously shoot a random pilot just because she needed his helicopter. As if telling him to simply get out at gunpoint wouldn't have sufficed.
• Who Forgot The Lights?: The PlayStation version of the game is known for being infamously dark and having flares that don't even last 30 seconds. The PC version has the same issue, but its gamma adjustment feature quickly renders the problem a moot point and can even make flares unnecessary - except for the remaster, which is darker than the PS version, and lacks the in-game video settings, forcing players to flip back-and-forth to the original graphics just to see what's going on in certain areas.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: The Damned are skinless and deformed, with their rotting flesh requiring embalming fluid, yet they are also immortal thanks to the experiment they participated in.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Tony went quite overboard under the influence of the Infada Stone.
• World of Snark: Every single character with spoken lines is a qualified Deadpan Snarker and a sizable chunk of dialogue is made of snark battles.
• Would Hit a Girl: Encountered male enemies aside, Willard has no problems whatsoever kicking Lara in the face, and the hitman from London is on the job.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: Get the embalming fluid for the Damned... and shoot them right after that.
• You No Take Candle: The cannibal with whom Lara has a conversation after Crash Site speaks this way.
• Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: After witnessing what exactly Sophia is responsible for, Lara is full of disgust after learning that Miss Leigh is a fan of her, waiting with a book for Lara to sign an autograph.
• Years Too Early: Lara tries to claim the Eye of Isis artifact from Sophia with the latter then snatching it away as she drops this gem:
  Lara: All I want is the artifact.
  Sophia: Ha ha ha ha ha....Right. In your next life!
  Lara: *Un-holsters her pistols as Sophia flees* We'll see.

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