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Old 17-01-19, 09:58   #1
Avalon SARL
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Smile What is the Story Exactly About?

I have just replayed TR3 and what an outstanding experience.

These guys really know how to put pressure on the player. I can't believe how many times I got lost or missed the correct pathway despite the fact that I have played TR3 many many times before; but it is fantastic how much stuff you get to forget.

Anyway, I just have a major problem with it and that is its story.
It is very weak. The writers did not even care to think of many stuff they were doing and there were much less creativity regarding the characters (unlike TR1 and especially 2).

The meteor crash idea was brilliant and the stuff it does is also nice, but nothing was built upon this... I did not understand how did these artefacts exist?
Were they made from the material that came with the meteorite or what?

Second thing that bugged me... what the hell is the SPHINX doing there underneath London Streets or whatever museum they were talking about?

Then comes the evolution of the species which I find rather stupid how it was executed.
They just wanted to show spooky scary supernatural enemies and that was all they came up with.

Then comes the final boss, fun to play, but what the heck was that guy even going after?
What he evolved into was something super ugly and speaks of laziness from the developpers.

What a hideous creature that can barely walk. Why would anyone want to become like that????
The previous bosses Lara fought felt more interesting.

In the end, TR3 is definitley a masterpiece, and perhaps the hardest of all the TR games on par with TR4

I would like to read some ideas or perhaps explanation regarding the story of this game.

Last edited by Avalon SARL; 17-01-19 at 10:00.
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Old 17-01-19, 10:15   #2
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from what I understood, the artifacts were made from the meteor which has magical powers.

There's severals plot holes in the game around the artifacts: the first artifact makes tony mad (even before he puts it into his chest)
Sophia gets the artifact powers but doesn't get "mad" because of it (she just test it on other people and kill those who stand in her way, that could be the case without the artifact too so...) and both of them don't transform into mutant at all. The pacific island one turns the owner into some sort of "god". Lara gets them all and doesn't go crazy or transforms either. But all of the mutants of antartica are supposed to be mutant because they were esposed to the artifact... And the Willard too.

I guess Willard talk about evolution in the sens of being more powerful creatures than just humans being.

So yeah, doesn't make any sens in my opinion.

The game is great but anybody could have come up with a story line that weak. It could have been a so much more cool story if it had time to be developped a bit more...
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Old 17-01-19, 10:58   #3
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I personally liked the storyline a lot, but I might be biased.

A meteorite fell from the sky and contained extremely rare substances which we know as the artifacts. They contain a lot of energy that can be used to gain great power. Only once the owner has all 4 elements he can use it to change his DNA built which results in becoming a whole other being. Each artefact separately has different yet similar powers. Lara is not affected by them at all because she does nothing more than collecting them, she does not activate them to try and use it's powers. How do you activate them? Well that is not really explained, but I guess it has something to do with willpower.

As for why Dr. Willard transformed himself into a spider.. I guess it was just a temporary 'test' which he quickly tried because Lara was on his tail. I guess that he chose that form because it suited the area they were in. Afterwards he would probably collect the artifacts again and change into another creature, since the artifacts allow DNA modifications like that. Bottom line is that those transformations are a lot stronger than a regular human being. This is also the reason why all the henchmen are becoming aliens too, because they wanted to change, they exposed themself voluntarily to the artifacts, as Willard explained in the snow cabin cutscene. They were given a different transformation than Willard chose for himself.

As for Tony getting mad... I guess he was already mad without the artifact. I don't necessarily think that the artifact itself had much to do with that directly. He was a power hungry guy who's mind was slipping by his narcissistic obsession of becoming stronger than everyone else.

I really like the story as you can see. And in my opinion, there aren't many plot holes. The storyline was simple, yet captivating and allows the player to use his/her mind to shape the possibilities a little to his mindset.
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Old 17-01-19, 14:07   #4
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Regarding Dr. Willard's transformation, I always imagined it as being direct proof of why he was wrong to want to use the meteorite artefacts for transhumanist purposes - as Lara pointed out (over soup and toast), he had no control over any of it. Maybe he believed he'd become some superhuman godlike creature, maybe he knew he'd become a grotesque monster anyway, maybe he had no idea what would happen - either way, it wouldn't have done anything to change his fate. Only direct abstinence (hitching the next chopper ride out) could've saved him.

I do agree with OP that the spider-like design was a bit lazy, and the devs could've used that opportunity to make something really originally grotesque, but the design as-is is still fairly unnerving. Especially with those pained screams in the cutscene
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Old 17-01-19, 14:13   #5
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The story was a lazy rewrite of TR1
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Old 17-01-19, 19:42   #6
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I like the story, or the premise of it at least, but it does seem incredibly messy and just slapped together. The characters do seem to lack the creativity they had going with TR1 and TR2, but I did like Sophia and Tony. The meteorite artifacts, their locations, and the meteorite’s backstory is really great and probably the best out of everything. But, there isn’t a whole lot else to salvage.

TR3 is the one game in the classics that has a barely cohesive story that you can tell was coming out of Core’s tipping point of being sick of TR imo. It has great ideas, but almost all of them were lousily thrown together.
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Old 17-01-19, 21:47   #7
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I think its more so needing to know the past parts of the games origin to understand the story so here is what I know:

Introduction

The story itself revolves around when a meteorite crash landed in ancient Antarctica that was made of an unknown material which then was left for many years until Polynesians discovered the crash site and learned of its mysterious energy while building the City of Tinnos around it and then on took 4 pieces from the meteorite itself and fashioned 4 different objects from them which all had different properties inside that produced supernatural powers.

Over time, the radiation from the meteorite affected the Polynesians, causing mass mutations in the form of the mutants you see towards the end of the game and upon discovering this, the remaining Polynesians fled from ancient Antarctica and ended up settling down in the South Pacific along with the remaining people who survived.

A little less into the past, a group of sailors working under the famous Charles Darwin were aboard a ship somewhere in the sea near towards the events of the previous events in Antarctica where they decided to stop for land in order to find themselves a decent meal as they had not been eating much more than broth.

What they entered after was the Meteorite Cavern, or an area very close to it in the City of Tinnos which is where they stumbled upon the abandoned 4 objects that were carved from the meteorite many years ago: the Infada Stone, Ora Dagger, Element 115 and Eye of Isis and they each took one of their own, except for one sailor.

Unfortunately, the sailor known as Paul was savaged by a wolf as he and Steven fell out the cavern not long after, only for the sailors to decide not to tell of Paul's death to Darwin other than he died during an accident before being buried in the thick snow, leaving only a wooden cross where he was laid to rest as respect.

After that, they returned home and each of the four sailors went their own ways with an artifact each: one sailor, Smythe with the Ora Dagger ended up in the South Pacific where he met the future members of Polynesians that fled from Antarctica originally, though unfortunately he met his fate and was eaten while that time was dubbed as the feast of Smythe.

Another sailor, in possession of the Infada Stone apparently went and sold his off around the Black Market which went from one person to another where it eventually ended up in India at the hands of a tribe whom worshiped the god Shiva until of their eventual disappearance, where then after it was lost to time.

I'm unsure how the other sailor winded up with Element 115 in Nevada but I can assume he got abducted by aliens at some point while the aliens took Element 115 themselves and used it as a power source for only people in Area 51 to discover the ship not long after, most likely shooting it down or the artifact causing it to crash.

Steven, the final sailor with the Eye of Isis, heard of the deaths of the other sailors and decided to sell off the artifact in London to none other than Sophia Lee, reason being she is still alive during the game is because the experiments she done on the artifact, she learned of its supernatural ability to provide the user with immortality.

Present Day

In Antarctica, a mining company named RX Tech were digging for what I assume would be minerals and materials for day to day use, under the guidance of a man in a yellow coat: Dr Willard, the antagonist of the game in an area that was close towards the remains of the buried City of Tinnos where Willard was informed of something unusual.

He was taken a little further out to investigate and they stumbled upon some leaning statues, this actually was presumed to be the top of the Meteorite Cavern from the end of the game and one of his lackeys ordered a controlled explosion which then revealed the resting place of the dead sailor, Paul whom was mauled to death by the wolf mentioned previously.

This sparks his interest and proceeds to excavate that area, discovering the Meteorite Cavern and the City of Tinnos in the process but learns that to raise the lost meteorite, he needed something specifically to power the four chambers of the cavern, so that furthered his research into the area to the point he learns of the 4 artifacts that was made there.

During the time after this, he must have been having issues trying to locate or retrieve any of the four artifacts due to the lack of skill his team had so at this point it is safe to assume that he looked into people that had a nick for these types of work and Lara must have came across as an ideal candidate that would be suited to finding them.

Lara has no idea of any of this, except that she learns of a one of the kind artifact that is presumably hidden in the depths of the jungles of India, that artifact being the Infada Stone, then after the events of the India section, Willard meets Lara on the boat and gets her up to date on the things that have happened in the past and asks her to help him out.

Similarity to TR1

Willard wanted to promote the evolution of mankind via inhumane ways but needed a power source for best results and hires Lara to find the artifacts for him, much like Natla did by using Atlantean Mutants to cause wars to promote evolution but needed the Scion to use The Great Pyramid efficiently so she hired Lara to recover it for her, ironically hiring Lara was both a fatal mistake made by Willard and Natla.

Another little fun fact is that usually when you search for fan art of the classic games or their villains, a lot of the time you will see Willard and Natla paired together attempting to kill one another or just full on disagreeing with their disputes and the reason being is most likely the fact of how similar TR1 and TR3 are with Natla and Willards ideals.

This is what I built together from the information in the game itself and I tried packing it in order to make sense so I hope this helps!

Last edited by TombRaiderTim; 17-01-19 at 22:12.
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Old 17-01-19, 22:06   #8
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Everybody here so far has forgotten that TR III was made by a different team of people because the original TR staff were burned out after two games. I don't think the story is lazy at all, or hastily slapped together. It has multiple threads with multiple characters (too many, really) that aren't as fleshed out as the singular plot threads from TR I and II. The characters come and go and they all have different connections to the meteorite artifacts. There aren't a lot of plot holes either, it just takes a while for things to be explained.

There's no intro cutscene that explains what Lara is doing in the jungles of India, much like TR II where we don't really know what she is doing at the Great Wall, however the difference is that the big opening of TR II has a sharp focus on the Dagger of Xian, while TR III's intro FMV doesn't click until the end of the fourth level, and only IF you were really paying attention to the characters in the opening; Willard isn't wholly recognizable between his appearance in the intro FMV and when he picks Lara up outside the Caves of Kaliya.

The plot unfolds as you go, unlike any of the other games. It tends to keep the player in the dark on important points until you get to the end of the first Antarctica level, where it all comes together. Nevada was the worst offender as far as plot incoherence goes. How the bloody hell did an artifact end up in a honest-to-god UFO being studied at Area 51? That's just bizarre. The original script has the artifact being studied for its anti-gravitational effects, a decent continuation of the plot themes which for some reason was ditched in favor of one big Doctor Who reference

OP wasn't paying much attention at all. All of the questions they raised are explained properly. Also, it was never Willard's plan to throw himself into the meteorite crater, he wanted to further study the effects of the radiation on his staff; a bit of a d*ck move, but hey, villains will be villains. Lara pretty much pressured him into taking drastic measures by chasing him all the way down there.

I like the morally grey areas of the story. We know that the meteorite radiation causes severe mutation and psychological problems in people, but as Sofia found out, it can also be harnessed for immortality and preservation of "beauty" if processed in the right way, things which some humans are obsessed with in real life. Puna and Tony managed to weaponize the power, something which all of our bloody governments would very much enjoy, and going back to the butchered Nevada plot, there was also significant potential for it to be used for anti-gravity applications in scientific research.
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Old 17-01-19, 22:26   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Helegad View Post
Also, it was never Willard's plan to throw himself into the meteorite crater, he wanted to further study the effects of the radiation on his staff; a bit of a d*ck move, but hey, villains will be villains. Lara pretty much pressured him into taking drastic measures by chasing him all the way down there.
He knew he was going to die down there if Lara caught up, so might as well take the risk of mutation and go out with a bang instead and it is revealed the effects wear off and he returns to his human form before Lara leaves the outside of the Meteorite Cavern as Lara snags his wallet which triggers the events of The Lost Artifact.
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Old 18-01-19, 00:09   #10
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I never understood the spider mutant form. Willard claims that the partial mutations Lara sees on his staff are from the material in the crater, not the core. So the core should transform him into the 'true' form.

Willard should have turned into the large mutant model we see through Tinnos, and been the only one with that model (partially transformed researchers and dogs populating tinnos instead) so that he would have been the big reveal of what a fully evolved human looked like.

As it is, the spider mutant is partially formed with two human faces on it. It doesn't match what we had seen up to that point.
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