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One year on, Rise of the Tomb Raider is finally available on PlayStation 4. For many, hopes were high for this one - perhaps based on the vast performance improvement for Sony's platform we witnessed in Tomb Raider: The Definitive Edition. However, the bottom line is that we're looking at more iterative improvements this time around, with the big boosts to image quality and performance reserved for the upcoming PlayStation 4 Pro edition.There are content differences, however. PS4 owners get the full 20th anniversary celebration package, meaning that the base Rise of the Tomb Raider adventure is bolstered by additional material - namely a new level set in Croft Manor (also playable from a first person perspective in PlayStation VR), which also plays host to a nightmare mode, where Lara takes on waves of zombies within her ancestral home. There's also a new endurance mode - a survival-based affair where players can play together in co-op for the first time. All of these extras - bar the VR element - are available to PC and Xbox One owners as DLC for just £6.99/$9.99.
However, our focus here is on the technical elements, where it's safe to say that Rise of the Tomb Raider takes the strong console foundation found in the Xbox One game and introduces further technical refinements, mostly derived from conversion-smith Nixxes' existing work on the excellent PC game, or else sensible upgrades to leverage the PS4's additional GPU power. For example, while both PS4 and Xbox One releases operate at full 1080p during gameplay, only PS4 retains the full pixel-count during cut-scenes - the Microsoft platform drops here to 1440x1080. The differences are minor though, owing to the heavily post-processed image.
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