LEVEL 2: THE RACE FOR THE IRIS

Secrets: 0

The length and difficulty of the race course in this level depends on the number of golden skulls you found in the previous level.  Finding all eight skulls opens up the longer, more difficult course.

In either case, you'll probably want to take the course slowly, following Von Croy's lead, the first time or two.  When you learn the twists and turns, you'll be able to go faster.  In the easier course, Von Croy stops at the big doors and waits for Lara to open them.  To do this, step up to the small, rectangular niche on the wall to the right of the door and press Action.  Lara will reach in and operate a mechanism to open the door.  (This is new to TR4, and you'll be doing it frequently in later levels.)

At the end of each course is a cut scene in which Lara and Von Croy discover the Iris.  If Lara beats Von Croy to this chamber, he will say:

Von Croy: And so, the pupil excels the master.  I congratulate you on your agility.  Take your prize from the plinth.  You have earned it.

Lara: In the time you took to find your way here, I've examined the inscriptions.  It warns of vengeance on those who remove it.

If Von Croy beats Lara to this chamber, the dialogue differs slightly:

Von Croy: Ha! I am not such an old man after all, ya? Come here, child.  The mechanism will require us both to release it.

Lara: The plinth inscription warns vengeance on those who remove it.

Von Croy: Ah, ancient hocus pocus.  Forget this nonsense and come over here!

Lara: I don't count poison darts and triggered entombment your average child's tea party.  I feel we should lend this some respect.

Von Croy: Ah, and you are the world-famous archeologist-adventurer, Lara Croft, ja? No, no, I am the reknown archeologist-adventurer, Werner Von Croy, and you will do as I say! Go to wall, and pull the lever!

Lara: What was it that you said? Disrespect is the route to carelessness?

Von Croy: I am weary of this.  Pull the lever now, Miss Croft.

Lara: On your head be it.  .  .  Von Croy.

When they pull the levers, the large sphere opens, revealing the artifact on a pedestal at the center.  A bridge then unfurls toward the platform in the middle of the room.  Von Croy makes his way across the bridge.

Von Croy: Have faith in experience, child, and you will learn more than simple.  .  .  (gasps)

But as Von Croy reaches for the Iris, in classic Indiana Jones style, the temple begins to crumble.

Lara: You were saying?

Von Croy loses his footing and slips off the edge, his foot wedged in a crack in the platform.

Von Croy: My leg! My leg! I am trapped! My leg is trapped! Help me Lara! Help me!

Lara: Hold on! I'm coming back to get you! Werner!

Lara attempts a rescue, but the sphere closes around Von Croy.  At the last minute, she flees, barely escaping with her life.

The moral of the story: Greed and arrogance don't pay.  The other moral: Never abandon a cranky old man in a desolate ruin, or you'll probably live to regret it.

Introductory Movie: Flash forward to present-day Egypt.  Lara, dressed in Bedouin garb, follows a guide on camel back.  He leads her to some ruins, all but concealed by shifting sand dunes.  Lara dismounts and finds a piece of crumbing statuary, along with a nest of poisonous nasties.  (A little foreshadowing, anybody?) After making a strategic retreat, she locates a handle-like mechanism.  Activating it sends Lara and the guide on a wild slide into The Tomb of Seth.

After taking a moment to recover from the rough landing, Lara scrambles up, the Tomb Raider theme music swells, and she whisks off her robe.  She's baaack!

*There are 70 secrets in the entire game.  These are marked "(x/70)" in this walkthrough.  To check your progress in-game, press Pause and choose Statistics.

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Copyright © 2000 - Stellalune (e-mail stella@tombraiders.net).  Special thanks are given to the participants in the alt.games.tombraider newsgroup, without whom some parts of this walkthrough couldn't have been written, and to Brian C.  from Tomb Raiders Traveler's Guide, for the transcript of the Race for the Iris cut scene.  Feel free to copy, distribute and quote this walkthrough, but please include this credit line so people can send me their corrections, comments and suggestions.  Also, if you'd like to offer this on your own web site, kindly ask permission first.

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