This was a great read. The book contains extra info on how the game was built up, how the developers started with many ideas, a horroristic game with monsters, and how they ended up with a survival story. It was a long road and you can find many interesting concept arts about this in the book. If you're really into the game, you'll surely enjoy seeing all the awesome behind the scenes stuff.

The Final Hours of Tomb Raider offers lots of cool, in-depth content complete with plenty of interactivity. Nicely done.

Before I begin the review I have one simple question for the developers: HOW THE ♥♥♥♥ COULD YOU LEAVE THE PET MONKEY OUT OF THE GAME?! There's countries in the world where people are thrown off buildings for lesser "crimes".

Now that those unpleasantries are out of the way, I'll review the quality of the actual product on sale here. First up, it's a mobile app which doesn't appear to go full screen, so getting used to the somewhat "windowed" presentation is a bit of a pain. It also doesn't "save" or "bookmark" the last page you were at, meaning you have to remember this for yourself, then use the Contents page to fast-track back to it. Not exactly ideal.

There's some novel interactive touches, like polls which feed back instant internet-based survey results, and photos you can pan around 360 degrees; a spirit of innovation which is regrettably sullied by the videos which lazily link out to YouTube, meaning you'd better have some extra bandwidth up your sleeve if you wanna get the full experience.

This said, the content is nice enough, and of evident interest to anyone who either adored the game or plans on making games of their own. Is it worth two bucks? Guess so. Half that price on sale, easy. Though the more penny-pinching among you could probably save yourself the money by just Googling and Youtubing much the same information. For the rest of us who don't mind paying a small price for the quasi-convenience of it all, it's a nice enough package, if quite a ways from "essential".

Verdict: 6/10.

Fans and gamers were spoilt with Tomb Raider - the rebooted origin tale of the titular Lara Croft - and this wonderful behind-the-scenes digital book companion will offer great insight into how it all happened. Veteran journalist Geoff Keighley provides a relatively comprehensive look at the design process, showcasing many concepts that never made it to the finished game, as well as artwork, sketches, interviews and reports on how Crystal Dynamics recreated the video game icon.

This well designed application is best used on a tablet computer, but can be enjoyed just as easily on a desktop. Additionally, there are interactive elements, such as panoramas of the developer's studio and a music mixer. Much of the video content is actually streamed rather than downloaded with the application, but I found the content both new and good quality.

While everything is well designed and easy to navigate, I found the content lacking. The whole book can be read in just over an hour, and there is little beyond the abandoned concepts that proves truly captivating. For those who have followed previews, the content could be considered lightweight. And for those who haven't, there isn't a great deal on offer to make this a must-buy.

For Lara Croft fans, this is a fine addition to a wonderful game, and for those interested in the development process, Tomb Raider - The Final Hours offers a glimpse behind the curtain into the industry and the pressure to reboot gaming royalty. Overall, however, this is just an optional add on that offers little value for money and should only be purchased as part of a collector's edition. There just isn't enough content to justify its asking price.

For the fans.

6.5/10.

Not much I can say, about this book.

It follows on the development of the Tomb Raider reboot. All the different versions, the controversy and stuff like that.

If you liked the game and want to learn more about it, get this, if you are a big fan of Tomb Raider, get this.

Overall it was an interesting read and I can say I enjoyed my time with it.

Final Rating:
7/10 - A fun read

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but it has some problems.

• videos get streamed from Youtube. Which obviously means you can't watch them offline! Nor any time later if they remove the videos.
  
• the interface is really annoying. No scaling options for the text, i.e. the "book" goes fullscreen, but only takes a quarter of the screen, which is quite bad for users with any common 1080p display, and even worse if above.
  
• the "ingame" video-player doesn't have basic options like a pause button.
  
• readability of some text is awful.

If you like the game, and you're interested in some more content about it, i'd say it's absolutely worth the 0.49 on sale (or 1.99 regular). The delivered content is very good, the price is absolutely okay, but sadly they ruined their great work with a really bad interface.


5/10 - good & worthy content, but bad delivery.



P.S.: you can watch the videos from the "book" here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXD6VRSrUxQ

Well, some people might say that this would be a waste of Money.
I strongly disagree.

Sure this could have been free Bonus content, but im still happy about this purchase.

First of all, this is not a Game, obviously.
I would call it an interactive Guide about the 2013 release of Tomb Raider.

It features some interesting background Stories about Tomb Raider itself and its developement, about the Developers, the Music and Soundeffects of the Game and also shows deleted Scenes.
It contains Videos as well as reading Passages, interactive Tours through Parts the Game, some insights of the Crystal Dynamic Studios, Polls and a lot of amazing Artwork.

Only negative aspect is the Price, you can argue that it might be a little too high for about 1 Hour of content.

Anyway, i would suggest buying this for everyone who loved playing Tomb Raider, or for People that are unsure about purchasing it.

Highly recommended. Inside sneak peek on the development of this highly regarded survival game.

TL;DR:
5/10 - good & worthy content, but bad delivery.

P.S.: you can watch the videos from the "book" here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXD6VRSrUxQ

This interactive book is close to a decade old now, but it's still a nice insight to the reboot of the Tomb Raider series and it's protagonist Lara Croft. It was a much needed revival and the 2013 game pretty much saved the franchise.