Tomb Raider (2013) as actual survival action game

This is an expanded version of the post I wrote a few months ago.

One of the cutscenes from Tomb Raider (2013) was Lara getting impaled, which, at first, was seemingly a hugely important plot point, hamfisting the theme "this game is about SURVIVAL Y'all". A half hour later, it gets completely forgotten after the opening by making Lara Croft female Rambo. It has no bearing effect afterward in both gameplay and story. But a few hours later, the game suddenly pulls that plot point again and shows the cauterization scene without a proper context building for it, almost as if the game's saying "oh, yeah, this was the 'survival' game." And the game's back to normal pew pew shooter again.

It is not the worst thing in the game, but this plot point showcases the reboot series' missed potential. Adding the grounded aspects of survival to Tomb Raider reboot is a great idea to separate other modern adventure games like Uncharted and early Tomb Raider games, but the game only pretends to be a survival game while pandering to the same modern AAA gaming crowds.

I'm not proposing Tomb Raider should have gone Minecraft or DayZ, but having actual survival systems similar to the ones from Metal Gear Solid 3 would have helped immensely. Here are my three ideas:

• Stamina meter

In earlier Tomb Raider games, platforming was a challenge. It was something the player had to master, and also added some realism to it. While this was due to the developers' lack of knowledge on how to do the third person platforming for 90s 3D games, it is unfortunate all the challenge is gone in newer Tomb Raider games, which is ironic since the reboot aims to make Lara Croft a realistic character while also making her invincible who can do impossible moves in climbing and combat.

My alternative on imposing the difficulty in platforming is not adding a complicated set of control, but a stamina meter similar to Breath of the Wild and Shadows of the Colossus.

How much stamina Lara has affects the health regeneration speed, the movement speed, climbing and aiming. Her grip meter is limited to the current stamina which will run out faster if the player's stamina is low when climbing.

How much a stamina the player has is different per difficulty level, but it should take about 20-40 seconds to empty the wheel depending on how the player acts. If the player takes time and climbs things patiently, the stamina decreases less. It decreases faster if the player moves faster, actively climbing left right and constantly jumping for the upper platform for the speed.

• Fully fledged Hunting

Lara gets to hunt a deer and it is treated as an important plot point to highlight how this game is different from other shooters... Once. In the story event.

As I talked about the stamina, to refill the meter, Lara needs to become Bear Grylls and hunt and eat. Lara can found many preys to eat and charge her stamina. Preys don't have to be deer. Lara can eat anything: birds, rabbits, bugs, rats, honey.

• Surgery

Just like "Show, don't tell" is how the visual storytelling works, "Play, don't show" is how the interactive storytelling works. Aforementioned 'surgery' cutscene only cheapens the theme as the game just regenerates your health automatically. There is no medkit like The Last of Us or Far Cry 3 heal animations to complement the theme of survival.

So you get shot and brutally injured from the enemy (for example a close-quarter shotgun blast), and while your health still regenerates, your maximum health decreased. Similar to Souls games, the health max health limit is shrunken, worst at capped at 25% of your original max health. To revert back to the default maximum health, Lara needs to reach the Base Camps and treat herself, using the supplies player found on numerous levels.

Obviously, there should be a drastic balancing for this to work like the enemy rarely having an automatic rifle or a huge change in enemy accuracy and health. But it could make the game that truly differentiates from other modern and the general audience still can enjoy.