Tomb Raider IV V VI Remastered PC Review

The original adventures of Lara Croft got a very much-needed modern coat of paint and were released in 2023 with the Tomb Raider I – III Remastered collection. Now, a year later, Aspyr and Crystal Dynamics have followed up with the second Tomb Raider trilogy, bringing IV, V, and VI to modern platforms with all the same upgrades seen in the previous release.

Lara’s second trio of releases was where the series started to lose a little of its charm compared to the first three games. Much of the emphasis on raiding tombs, dealing with wild animals, and mystical artefacts was swapped out for increasingly urbanised locations filled with human enemies.

While this is still the case, these are the same games after all, the updates made have breathed a fresh lease of life into the sequel trilogy, and after having not touched them for the best part of two decades, they don’t feel quite so stale and formulaic anymore.

From a technical perspective, this remaster is a faithful translation of the final two PS1 titles and the first PS2 Tomb Raider game. Everything you’d expect to be here is present. New Visuals, unlocked framerates, support for high resolutions, and all the content released for the games all in one succinct package.

At the press of a button, the visuals can be changed from the modern, remixed graphics, back to the original blocky graphics and low-resolution textures. It’s a feature that serves no real purpose other than to highlight how far technology has come over the years, but I’m glad it’s here. With that said, the modern graphics make heavy use of AI to modernise the textures, and moral issues of this aside, the results are a little hit-and-miss at times. Generally, everything looks fine, but occasionally there’s the odd texture that just looks wrong, where something has clearly gone awry in the process. Thankfully though, these textures are the exception rather than the rule.

Early entries in the Tomb Raider series are characterised by sprawling, puzzle-filled levels, and clunky tank controls. Born largely out of necessity in a pre-analog stick world, they worked surprisingly well at the time. It was always very easy to get into a flow state once familiarity with the controls was achieved. This control scheme is present for those wanting an experience as close to the original release. Along with this, there’s a new ‘modern’ control scheme that aims, as the name suggests, to bring controlling Lara up to the standard of current-gen games.

The takes the form of free movement rather than the grid-based, tank controls of old, and along with the camera being freely moved with the right stick, this allows Lara to be piloted around the levels far easier. Mostly.

While it’s much smoother and easier to navigate in a general sense, a lot of the accuracy of the original controls has been lost. Accuracy was necessary to make many of the platforming challenges that the games provided. For example, originally tapping down on the controller would make Lara hop backward, giving the exact amount of space necessary to set up a running jump. However, the modern controls simply spin Lara around when the back is pressed.

The freedom of movement has the negative effect of reducing accuracy substantially. Walking can only be performed while holding down a button, rather than by smaller movement of the left stick. Actions that are otherwise unchanged between control styles are remapped to completely different buttons for seemingly no reason. As a result, I found myself bouncing between modern and classic controls far more than I expected to. It isn’t entirely without merit, however. For example swimming is far easier and much more natural using the modern controls. On the plus side, controls can be remapped, and changing between the presets only takes a few seconds. It would have been nice if it wasn’t necessary at all though.

Performance is, as you might expect, rock solid. In Tomb Raider IV and V, the frame rate never wavered at 165fps, the limit of my monitor, and in Tomb Raider VI it never once showed any signs of being anything other than a locked 60fps. I’m unsure as to why Angel of Darkness sits at a lower frame rate, I can only assume that it’s some limitation of the engine in the original, this being Lara’s first PS2 adventure.

Final Thoughts

There’s a certain amount of jank present in Tomb Raider IV V VI Remastered. Much of this stems from the games being over twenty years old at this point and is just inherently a part of many games from this era. They all run perfectly, including on the Steam Deck, which is how I spent most of my time with them. This remaster of the later entries into the series, like the previous game, serves as an excellent way to experience these old games.

Steam Deck: Does Tomb Raider IV V VI Remastered work on the Valve’s Steam Deck? The short answer is yes and at 90 frames per second. The Deck experience mirrors the PC but just in pocket form!