RELATED: Every Main Final Fantasy Game Ranked On How Long They Take To Beat
Shadow of the Tomb Raider released in 2018 and marked the end of Lara’s rebooted origin trilogy; the franchise will almost certainly return in the future, though there has been no concrete word of a new main series game yet. For this reason, many people may be looking to revisit some of Lara’s past adventures to keep them busy in the meantime. To help such people out, we have ranked every main series Tomb Raider game by their Main Story completion time on howlongtobeat.com.
Updated January 29, 2022, by Jack Pursey: Unsurprisingly, an IP as significant as Tomb Raiderhas steered away from its main series on numerous occasions, often with the intent of spicing up the series’ tried and tested gunfighting, puzzle-solving, and exploration gameplay. The franchise’s many spin-off games have introduced gameplay mechanics or even new genres. There have been several excellent Tomb Raider games outside the main series, so this list has been updated to include every game in the franchise.
19 Lara Croft Go — 3.5 Hours
Lara Croft Go is the perfect game to kick off this updated list, as it exemplifies the previous point about the series trying new and exciting things. Lara Croft Go is a turn-based puzzle game from Square Enix and is a spiritual successor to Hitman Go from the same company.
As one would expect from the game that finishes last on this list, some people were disappointed by Lara Croft Go’s short runtime of just 3.5 hours. Despite this setback, many fans and critics were full of praise for the game, and it even won Mobile Game of the Year from IGN.
18 Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris — 5 Hours
Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris was developed by Crystal Dynamics and released in December 2014 on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Stadia, and Nintendo Switch. The game is the sequel to Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light and features a similar, arcade-inspired brand of action-adventure gameplay with a fixed isometric camera.
Like its predecessor, the game’s main strength is its cooperative play, with up to four players being able to join in on the action.
17 Tomb Raider: The Prophecy — 5.5 Hours
Tomb Raider: The Prophecy was released in November 2002 on the Game Boy Advance. Unlike the Game Boy Color games that came before it and had a side-scrolling perspective, The Prophecy offered an isometric viewpoint that gave the impression of a 3-dimensional space.
Unfortunately, the game struggled to impress, particularly because of how simple and repetitive its gameplay was — especially for such a short runtime.
16 Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light — 6 Hours
Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light first released in August 2010 as an Xbox 360 Arcade title, four years prior to its aforementioned sequel, Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris.
Like Temple of Osiris, 2010’s Guardian of Light features non-linear, arcade-inspired gameplay; though only two people can play cooperatively, as opposed to Temple of Osiris’ four-player co-op. Guardian of the Light was warmly received by fans and critics, exemplified by its 85 critic score and 8.4 user score on Metacritic.
15 Tomb Raider: Curse of the Sword — 6 Hours
It’s fair to say that the Game Boy Color isn’t the most natural home for a Tomb Raider game, but Core Design and THQ teamed up to release a game on the system nonetheless, which was actually their second Tomb Raider release on the handheld device.
To Core Design’s credit, the June 2001 release was well-received. The game featured some of the most impressive animations on the system at the time.
14 Tomb Raider: Legend — 7 Hours
Tomb Raider: Legend was released in 2006 by Square Enix Europe under their previous name, Eidos Interactive. The game was the first in the series to be developed by Crystal Dynamics, following the disappointment over Core Design’s Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness.
In hopes of revitalizing the series, Crystal Dynamics opted for a quality over quantity approach and consequently made Tomb Raider: Legend significantly shorter than The Angel of Darkness. The risk paid off, as despite the game only having eight levels, Tomb Raider: Legend was well-received both critically and commercially.
13 Lara Croft: Relic Run — 8 Hours
Lara Croft: Relic Run is an endless runner mobile game that was developed by Simutronics and released on Android, iOS, and Windows Phone 8.
Relic Run’s core gameplay is similar to the hit 2011 game Temple Run, though Simutronics tried to go above and beyond Imangi Studios’ game in 2015 by offering more detailed environments, engaging vehicle sections, and even boss fights.
12 Tomb Raider: Underworld — 10 Hours
Tomb Raider: Underworld was the third entry in Crystal Dynamics’ Legend trilogy, following the release of Tomb Raider: Anniversary the year prior. The game took a noticeably more modern approach to its gameplay, with destructible environments, more open levels, and an intricate weather system all implemented.
The game didn’t perform as well as its two predecessors critically. However, it still received respectable Metascores, which fell between 70 and 80 across its multiple releases.
11 Tomb Raider Chronicles — 11 Hours
Tomb Raider Chronicles’ announcement was somewhat of a surprise, as the previous main series game ended with Lara appearing to be killed after part of a temple came crashing down. However, the franchise’s success meant that Eidos Interactive didn’t want Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation to be the final main series game. Hence, Tomb Raider Chronicles hit stores almost exactly one year later.
Tomb Raider Chronicles begins with Lara’s friends reminiscing over her presumed death, with their stories becoming the playable levels.
10 Tomb Raider (2013) — 11.5 Hours
Following the success of the Legend trilogy, Square Enix decided to team up with Crystal Dynamics once again to create a rebooted origin story for Lara Croft. The first game in the rebooted trilogy was released in 2013 and took inspiration from other successful adventure games of its time, such as the Uncharted and Assassin’s Creed series.
RELATED: The Legend of Zelda: Every Game, Ranked By How Long They Take To Beat
The most notable changes to the series were the vastly more open levels that were littered with collectibles and side activities, as well as the emphasis on gritty, survival gameplay. “How long is Tomb Raider (2013)” was a common question at the time, as players didn’t want to have their fingers burnt by an underwhelming runtime. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case, as the 11.5 hours of main story content satisfied most players and seems to be the sweet spot for the franchise.
9 Shadow of the Tomb Raider — 12.5 Hours
The most recent entry in the series, Shadow of the Tomb Raider was released in 2018 and marked the end of Lara’s rebooted origin trilogy. The game’s development was credited to Eidos-Montréal, with Crystal Dynamics providing additional work.
The Tomb Raider franchise seems to have two consistent factors: the games can be categorized into groups of three, and the third game tends to be the weakest. Unfortunately, Shadow of the Tomb Raider isn’t an exception to the rule. Although the game wasn’t considered to be bad by any means, it’s viewed as the weakest entry in the rebooted trilogy.
8 Tomb Raider (2000) — 12.5 Hours
Tomb Raider (2000) was released on the Game Boy Color in June 2000, one year before the aforementioned Tomb Raider: Curse of the Sword.
Although Tomb Raider (2000) is branded as action-adventure, the gamehas many similarities to the cinematic platformer genre. In particular, it resembles the classic 1989 game Prince of Persia, the first release in the Prince of Persia franchise and the first cinematic platformer ever.
7 Tomb Raider: Anniversary — 13 Hours
The aforementioned Tomb Raider: Anniversary was the second entry in the franchise’s Legend trilogy. Despite being in the center of a trilogy, the game was a remake of the original Tomb Raider game from 1996.
The game was well-received by critics, though it struggled to perform commercially. This was likely due to the remake’s odd placement within the Legend trilogy, as well as its Anniversary name that implied it wasn’t a main series release.
6 Rise of the Tomb Raider — 13.5 Hours
From one game in the middle of a trilogy to another, Rise of the Tomb Raider was the second entry in rebooted origin trilogy. Crystal Dynamics didn’t try to reinvent the wheel with Rise of the Tomb Raider and kept the core gameplay similar to its 2013 predecessor.
Keeping the core gameplay similar allowed Crystal Dynamics to focus on improving the pre-existing mechanics, which was evidently a wise move. Today, the game is considered one of the iconic franchise’s best entries.
5 Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness — 14.5 Hours
As mentioned before, Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness is one of the worst-received main series entries in the Tomb Raider franchise, consequently making it the last game that Core Design developed.
Core Design seemed to have had the right idea when setting out their plan for the game. They wanted Angel of Darkness, which was Tomb Raider’s first PlayStation 2 release, to compete with other action games releasing at the time rather than reverting back to its PlayStation 1 style. However, despite multiple delays, The Angel of Darkness was released with numerous bugs and control issues, resulting in a PlayStation 2 Metascore of just 52.
4 Tomb Raider II — 15.5 Hours
A main story completion time of 15.5 hours is an incredible achievement for a PlayStation 1 adventure game. What’s more, the fact that it’s the first of the original trilogy to appear on this list shows just how ahead of their time the first three Tomb Raider games were.
Despite the impressive runtime, Core Design’s second Tomb Raider game certainly doesn’t prioritize quantity over quality. Tomb Raider II is still one of the franchise’s most well-received entries to this day.
3 Tomb Raider (1996) — 15.5 Hours
Core Design’s iconic original entry into the Tomb Raider series was initially released in 1996 on the Sega Saturn before coming to the PlayStation 1 and MS-Dos a couple of months later.
RELATED: Assassin’s Creed: Every Game, Ranked By How Long They Take To Beat
Although they may not seem like anything special today, the game’s 3D graphics were groundbreaking for the time of its release. The innovative graphics were likely a key factor behind the game’s whopping sales of over 7 million, which made it the PlayStation 1’s seventh highest-selling game of all time.
2 Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation — 16.5 Hours
Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation had a huge weight on its shoulders prior to the game’s 1999 release. Not only was it the first release after the original trilogy, but the disappointment over Tomb Raider III meant it could have been the franchise’s last entry if it failed to impress.
Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation isn’t considered to be among the series’ best entries. However, it was well-received nonetheless, and succeeded in its task of breathing new life into the series.
1 Tomb Raider III — 18.5 Hours
As mentioned before, Tomb Raider III was viewed as a disappointment upon release. However, this wasn’t because the game marked a noticeable drop in quality from its predecessors; it was because fans and critics felt that the game did very little to differentiate itself from the two previous releases.
Still, Tomb Raider III is enjoyable to play even today, with the vintage Tomb Raider formula taking place in numerous interesting locations such as London and Antarctica.
MORE Longest Action Games Of 2020 (According To How Long To Beat)
