What is Tomb Raider III?

Lara Croft, like Weird Al Yankovic, refuses to change with the times. Al’s lyrical stylings are trapped forever in a haze of eighties zaniness, while Lara is trapped in the limited polygonal builds of the mid-nineties. Mac game players are used to long waits for ports, but Tomb Raider III was starting to look old at its PC release almost a year ago. The Mac version is every bit as good (if not better), but hardly up to the graphical standards of the current state of the art (Quake 3).

The gameplay makes up for its lack of depth with sheer quantity. If you’re unfamiliar with the Tomb Raider series (perhaps you’re unfamiliar with Pac-Man, too), let us enlighten you. Lara Croft is an aristocratic young lady who likes nothing better than running around exotic locales, solving puzzles, battling villains, and exploring lost civilizations — Indiana Jones with an overstuffed bra, if you will.

This third game in the series has a well-defined plot, almost compelling enough to make some of the longer levels interesting. The story involves the discovery of a crystalline meteorite and its link to an ancient Antarctic culture and human evolution. Like any mythical crystal worth its salt, the meteorite has been spfit into four artifacts, and they’re all hidden away in a safe deposit box off the New Jersey Turnpike. Oh, wait — no, they’re not. They are in fact scattered to Earth’s four corners under the watchful eye of various villains — so get your passport.

There are 19 levels in all, set in locations as far-flung as India, Antarctica, and the South Pacific. This means you can explore a large variety of locales, such as jungle swamps and underground bunkers in Area 51. Lara also has to deal with a diverse bunch of miscreants, from simple gun-toting thugs to a slavering T-Rex (also featured in Lara’s last outing). The third-person action and pace remains intact. Lara has plenty of abilities, but is hardly fast on her feet. Occasionally the meandering levels and slow pace can be frustrating.

To brighten this fugue, Eidos (the original developer) has thoughtfully included a number of new abilities and vehicles. Lara can climb and clamber, duck and crawl, shoot and harpoon, but more important, she can drive. Tomb Raider II has lots of vehicles. She can paddle a kayak (strangely relaxing), ride a quad bike, pilot a boat or an underwater propulsion unit — and what adventure would be complete without a mine cart? She can’t steer it, but she can pull the brake.

Controls and interfaces are exactly the same as those in the previous game, including the novel but clunky passport interface. That means the counterintuitive sidestepping and jumping are intact. Ease of control was never Tomb Raider’s strong point. Upon completion of the first level (India), you can enter the other locations in any order — very useful if you find yourself stuck or wandering in circles on a tough level.

There are few things wrong with this game, and for series fans, it represents a passable upgrade. Unfortunately, you may also need to upgrade your hardware, since Tomb Raider really requires a G3 or iMac to run well. A 603e can choke it out, but the game looks pretty horrible without 3D acceleration.

O'Connor, Frank. (February 2000). Tomb Raider III. MacAddict. (pg. 49).

Download Tomb Raider III for Mac

Architecture

IBM PowerPC

System Requirements

From Mac OS 7.5 up to Mac OS 9.2

Compatibility notes

• PowerPC 603e - 180 MHz
• Mac OS 8.6 to 9.2.2
• 16 MB RAM
• 4x CD-ROM

Emulating this? It could probably run under: SheepShaver