Rise of the Tomb Raider

Rise of the Tomb Raider arrived on Xbox One as a timed exclusive and was the console's biggest trump card at the end of 2015. Lara Croft continues in her father's footsteps, searching for a lost city somewhere in the Siberian wilderness, with the Trinity organization on her heels. Compared to the series reboot, the game is considerably more open — instead of corridors you get sprawling areas worth exploring for supplies, skills, and above all optional tombs full of puzzles. The previous entry made Lara a vulnerable beginner; here she's already an experienced adventurer.

The tombs are the best thing the game offers: each is a self-contained mechanical puzzle about water, wind, fire, or pulleys, solved spatially and rewarded with a new skill. The main content remains a mix of climbing, stealth, and shootouts. Lara can be played quietly — a bow, poisoned arrows, and luring away guards work surprisingly well — or loudly, with crafted explosives. Crafting happens on the fly, so combat is never interrupted by menu digging, and the skill system allows specialization in hunting, combat, or surviving the cold. Alongside the campaign, the game offers an expeditions mode where modified sections are replayed with card-based modifiers, a popular way at the time to extend playtime.

The Siberian landscape is one of the visually most striking environments of its era — snow reacts to movement, ice caves are lit with care, and the shift from a blizzard into a heated Soviet base has real punch. The music works with choral motifs, lending the expedition a mystical edge. Reception was very good, the game was praised for its pacing and especially for the tombs, with reservations aimed at the story and somewhat cardboard villains. Today it still holds up wonderfully, and many consider it the most balanced entry in the modern trilogy — action-packed enough, but still genuinely about discovery. On Xbox One the game was first released in its base form and later in an expanded edition that added extra content, including a chapter set at the Croft family estate.