It’s tough being a lone female force of nature in a bizarre world clearly created for groups of gangly, reanimated demons and their ancient, power-hungry spirit god. Lucky for Lara, the woman in question, she doesn’t actually have to go it alone — she’s got her own chatty deity to grapple, tumble, and spear crap alongside while hunting down the game’s big baddie. And the company makes the completely revamped co-op tomb raider–ing in Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light an incredibly fresh, fun spin on the top-down arcade-shooter formula.
Lara pairs up with Totec, an oldie-moldy Mayan god with some serious abs and a stone-impaling divine spear. If you’re playing with a friend in local or online co-op (the latter, regrettably, won't be enabled until Sept. 28, via a free downloadable update that'll also add voice chat and full leaderboard support), you’ll split puzzle-solving and exploration duties. Totec’s spear allows Lara to nimbly navigate floorless chasms: he tosses them on walls, she uses them as jumping points. Lara, on the other hand, can use her trusty grappling hook (and some surprisingly robust upper-body strength) to latch onto predetermined points in the environment; then Totec can hop onto the grappling rope to make death-defying tightrope walks. The way the entire game world is designed to accommodate two players and each character’s disparate skill set is a mini-triumph in itself.
But if you don’t have a buddy to play with, single-player gifts Lara with Totec’s spear so she can kick every puzzle or demon squarely in the junk all by herself. It’s a more lonely experience, as you’re not even accompanied by an A.I.-controlled Totec, but Guardian of Light is absolutely beatable solo — something that games with optional co-op fumble with shocking regularity.
The puzzles range from easy to tricky as you hunt down the game’s numerous goodies. Relics and artifacts imbue Lara with superpowers and stat upgrades, while a healthy cache of unlockable weapons will have you manhandling everything from grenade launchers to flamethrowers; you’ll need all of it to wade through Guardian’s various enemies. The game’s 14 fairly large areas — including boss battles — also come packed with unique challenges such as rolling a boulder into a fiery hole, or earning a certain number of in-game points; your rewards are new weapons and collectibles. No one would ever accuse this game of skimping on secrets or goodies over its six- to 10-hour course.
We did find ourselves wishing for a bit more polish in aiming, both when wielding the spear and jumping through the environment. The isometric, top-down view lets you take in all the action, but it can also lead to plenty of plummeting deaths if you misjudge distance and direction. And you’ll want to mentally prepare for some cheap hits from boss monsters and stock enemies alike. There’ll be no controllers harmed during gameplay-death tantrums, but yelling at the screen is highly probable. You were warned.
Yet through it all, none of these minor quirks ever keeps a good adventurer down. Guardian of Light plays out like a deftly crafted, fun piece of arcade-style shooting and puzzling expressly made for buddy co-op night on Live. Who knew Lara was such a team player?
+ Devious puzzles, good pacing, and a metric ton of unlockables.
+ Co-op play makes for fun times.
- Some cheap hits; spotty aiming; perspective leads to misdirected jumps.
- Online co-op patched in a month after release. Boo.
? Mommy, do ancient demons really become shiny, points-giving diamonds when they die?
