I remember this game for one very specific reason. My dad got stuck on the temple level where you have to whip-swing to the next area. He died several times because he didn’t have the timing right and assumed the game was glitched and he put down the controller. I gave it a shot and got across the platforms first try, and he gave me the biggest “WTF” face I’ve ever seen from him. For the rest of the game he forced me to do the platform sections for him 😂
Lol. I replayed this a couple months ago and got stuck here. I didn't realize, until your comment, why I was stuck and what I'm supposed to do. I stopped playing because I couldn't figure it out. I'm slipping in my old age... 🤦♂️
That is funny. It took me like 70 tries before I got the timing right. I literally had to get one of my friends to come over to show me how to get past it!
I’m so glad this is shared. I still 20 years later, still have an irrational fear to jump in water in video games if I know there’s something that could eat me.
The lack of in-level save feature really plays against the game. I know I've waited years to actually play it because I really hate to restart a level again and again. Fortunately, the levels are not that long, but it was a very weird choice from the devs, as it was not even a standard anymore when the game was released.
@@Guywithnonamereviews never played it but the video makes it seem pretty well rated tbh a lot of interesting stuff got indie fans but also a lot of 5-6th generation jank you had to deal with but tbh looks miles better then the new one which minus graphics looks painfully bland
@@captainviggo4575 yeah don’t get me wrong, it’s got its drawbacks. 100% agree the save system is dumb. But I gotta say I still revisit it fairly often. Also, not sure how someone would possibly play the game without a walkthrough lol. But that being said, I highly recommend it!
@@Guywithnonamereviews seem to be going through a retro phase of games i missed out on back then lol so might do i just need to get some sort of Xbox one day? I have a 360 but it wouldn't let me download the original xbox emulator because it has a 3rd party drive? Which i dont get as im sure back in the day i played original xbox games on my black 360
Club Obi Wan is the setting for the opening of Temple of Doom, which also looks completely different from this Black Lotus club. Idk why so many people think they're the same when they look so different 😐
Thank you for mentioning the manual! It's so fun to look through and find all the little references to the movie series. They really put a lot of effort into making it look like Indy's journal. I miss the days when you'd get a beautiful manual to go with a game.
@@Wade_Tyler It’s awesome. Especially if you’re a Trek fan, as you get to use a variety of phasers (and phaser settings), tricorders, and other tech from the various series. Plus, it controls just like Emperor’s Tomb - the jumping, scaling, swimming, etc. It’s all there. Oh, and you get to play three different characters (Sisko, Kira, and Worf) whose stories overlap so you get one big, epic saga. The settings are darker than you might expect from Star Trek, but the game takes place in the DS9 corner of the Trek universe so it makes sense. You visit a prison asteroid, a burned-out moon with ancient temples, a few different starships under attack, a crashed starship in the middle of a jungle, and an enemy outpost on a snowy planet. It’s a blast.
@@Wade_Tyler You don’t have to be a fan to enjoy the game. It gives you all the information you need. That said, if you are a Trek fan, you’ll be able to pick up on all the neat little details that are included in The Fallen. The Collective clearly did their homework.
I personally was amazed by this game as a kid, just the first act in Ceylon, the mechanics and combat was super fun and honestly the soundtrack is underrated. Plus using a table leg as a weapon always makes me laugh and throwing enemies off the edge was always hilarious. 😂
As someone who grew up playing this game and Infernal Machine I was confused why Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was seen as jumping the shark for a lot of people when I was a kid.
I re-watched crystal skull recently with my kids while showing them the whole series. The first half or so isn't actually bad. I actually found myself sitting there enjoying it and wondering if I had remembered it wrong. Then you hit the second half. Yikes.
I actually loved this game so much I created my first playthrough FAQ for it on GameFAQs... only to get immediately flamed by an entire mob of users asking why would I ever be writing a FAQ for a shoddy Tomb Raider clone.
That sure sounds like the GameFAQs I remember. An incredible archive for super-helpful tips for all kinds of games... and an incredible archive of the worst kinds of human behaviours you can think of.
My old PC would take forever to load the levels. Imagine how frustrating it was to die in this game. The memories are... bittersweet. An amazing game regardless! Great review, lol'd quite a few times.
So we got an Indiana Jones game that ends with Indy fighting an actual dragon... and yet people got pissed when an Indiana Jones film released five years later involved aliens. Huh.
I mean, very different audiences from one another. People watching a movie probably only know the other films; people playing the games probably know more of the games. Additionally, there were plenty of issues with the film that are independent of the aliens plot.
That’s what I always said! Even on the day I watched crystal skull for the first time Indy experiences some pretty mythical stuff in this game yet aliens is completely out of the question?
THIS GAME IS A MASTERPIECE!!! As a kid I taught myself how to set an internal alarm clock so I could wake up early to play this game 😂😂😂 I still use that skill to this day
This game was my introduction to Indy. I got this game before even seeing the movies, and I was hooked. What's funny is I didn't know you needed a memory card for the PS2 (I was so young) So I would boot up the game and start from the beginning every time and just went as far as I could get. I got VERY familiar with that opening level lol. Watched the movies shortly after getting the game and have been a lifelong Indy fan every since. Very nostalgic game and still really fun.
The game gets it all kind of wrong when it comes to the Prague levels. Not only do they place it into Austria on the map (rather than the capital of Czechia) but they fill it with Nazis when in real life, Prague wouldn't get occupied by Germany until 1939, 4 years after the game takes place. Not to mention how they took famous Prague sights such as the Astrological Clock and the statue of Wenceslaus on a horse and crammed them into the castle. It's so wrong it's actually endearing :D
I don't think prague was occupied by nazis. I always though for the trenchcoats and hats they were gestapo agents on a secret mission to take the castle
@@raidenstark315 Not very secret when they're walking around the street in the open. And where are all the civilians? Still makes no sense whatsoever in 1935.
Good god, it’s been over 20 years? When did I get so old??? I chose poorly and drank from the wrong cup! Emperor’s Tomb was one of my favorites- I started way back on Fate of Atlantis (the version with voice acting!), and I loved it, but got frustrated by the puzzles quickly, and felt like I was cheating when I consulted the manual religiously to make it through the game. I got hung up on Infernal Machine for the longest time until I enabled cheat codes and just immortaled by way through it. I was a kid, I was scared by some of the content at the time, and I have no shame. Emperor’s Tomb was when I was finally old enough to enjoy an Indy Game on its own merits, and I loved it. I remember thinking that the Prague boss fight, escape in Istanbul, brawl in the Golden Lotus, chase scene in the rickshaw, and infiltration of the fortress were all the best parts at the time. I’m sure that, with the benefit of 20+ years worth of advancements, the gameplay would feel dated and repetitive by today’s standards- but as a teenager, it was an absolute joy to play through it all. Punching someone and watching them fly across the room to break a table, then picking up a table leg to beat the tar out of them? It was one of my favorite things in the game! There was enough variety in how to best people up (picking up weapons that broke, grabbing them and tossing them off of ledges, whipping them around the neck and dragging them into a face punch, basic combos, a wide variety of consumable throwable weapons like ninja knives and glass bottles) that I never got bored with it.
Oh, that damn tank level. How many times I had to replay it until I learned the timing. Still, and it’ll never happen at this point, I’d play a full on remake.
My favorite game of all time and it’s not even close. Collective couldn’t miss in 2002-2003 between this and Buffy the Vampire slayer another underrated gem on original Xbox 2 of my favorite games ever.
that drill pissed me off so much when I was a kid. Took literal days to finally beat it. Flash forward to when I was in college, my roommate was playing Emperor's Tomb and made it to the drill. He slammed down the controller in frustration as I laughed and he bet me I couldn't beat it in 5 tries. 2nd try was the charm!
I remember being incredibly excited for this back in 2003. I actually figured out the puzzles without any strategy guide and beat the game twice that year. The eclectic range of enemies was part of the charm, but it did get a little hard for the wrong reasons in spots. Overall though, it was the highlight of my Summer that year and still have quite the soft spot for this game.
I think we need to talk more about the manual. It's AMAZING. Literally every single thing about it is crafted to be in-universe in some way. The instructions on fighting are pages from a combat manual, for example. It's got all sorts of little bits and bobs to make it seem more authentic, like fliers for the Golden Lotus or maps of where Indy's headed. Even the copyright notice at the end supposedly comes from "American Bullwhip Manufacture". It's probably the single best manual ever.
Honestly I really liked this game after my first time beating it on PS2 this year while it's not a 10/10 flawless masterpiece but if you're an Indiana Jones fans it's really worth a play
I replayed it over the weekend before the great circle comes out this week And I can’t lie I fucking love this games and its inclusion in the Indiana Jones franchise Was a childhood game of mine that I still play a lot
I have fond memories of watching my dad play this game back in the early 2000s. I never got past the first mission, mostly because it wasn't the kind of game a 5 year old had much chance to competing...
Will you be taking a look at Indiana Jones and The Staff of Kings too? That's got an interesting history, it's a demake of a cancelled PS3/Xbox 360 game! Loads of footage of the cancelled game online too!
Great retrospective as usual! I never played this back in the day. Didn't realise it was on PS2 as well. Was too busy focusing on Star Wars as a 12/13 year old back then.
Being Eaten by the Kraken caused me to have a trauma of any kind of squids and octopuses for a decade. I loved this game as a kid. The chase sequence mad eme so mad that i just waited a whole day after school to get back on it, calm and collected lol. Underrated and an excellent game.
I remember I bought this game on Steam around the time Dial of Destiny came out. I already played both the LEGO games when I was younger and watched all the movies dozens of times throughout my life, so I wanted to try one of the older video games, even knowing it might be a rougher experience compared to a modern video game. That being said, I was willing to put up with it due to my love for the Indiana Jones series as a whole. Of course, because the game was 20 years old (it actually came out the year and month I was born, which I thought was cool as well), there were a lot of frustrating things playing on PC with mouse and keyboard. The biggest and most annoying thing for me (other than the horrendous lack of save points after dying and having to restart as mentioned in the video, and the occasional glitches) was the part where your getting chased by Von Beck in the tank while trying to whip your way to the next level. I must have attempted that shit at least 50 times, if not more, until I finally got it because the whip mechanics and movement were so inconsistent and buggy. No joke, I literally almost uninstalled the game, but I was eventually able to do it after a lot of rage and regret LMAO. Gamers back in 03 had to have been tougher than nails to get past that section! I still had a decent amount of fun with the game, but in my opinion, it needs a remaster to help fix a lot of its problems. If that somehow happens one day, the game would be next level, even with the bizarre plot and mythical creatures lol. In the meantime, I'm looking forward to playing The Great Circle game now that its out. The lack of Indiana Jones video games in the last 15 years or so has been unfortunate, but The Great Circle actually looks amazing. If the game is a success, they should make a similar game but make it based on the original three movies, that would be awesome!
i remember my dad got me this gem back in summer 2003, i was second grade at school, barely knew any english because it is not my first language and i played it so much itfelt like an eternity. too bad i got stuck at the kraken battle because my 8rd old brain didnt understand the mechanics how to beat it and we didnt have any internet back then so it was up to us figure things out, no walktroughs or youtube. but yeah, i think it was an awesome game at the time. did it age well ? i think not, at least in the controls department i still remember it felt so clunky but maybe it was designed to be played with an controller.
This really brings me back so much memories when I played The Emperor's Tomb. It really is an improvement of The Infernal Machine. I hope that Bethesda's take on Indiana Jones will be good.
I miss the early 2000s when movie tie in videogames were awesome. Emperors Tomb, Everything or Nothing, and the 2005 king kong game are all certified bangers.
Like Infernal Machine, this is an Indiana Jones game I really liked to play (a bit less than Infernal Machine), but I know I would absolutely hate it if it was an actual Indiana Jones movie. I don't know why so many "expanded universe" Indy stories lean so much and so heavily on the fantasy side. The movies (at least the good ones) have the perfect balance of a pretty real story with a bit of fantasy in the end.
My guess is that because video games needs a steady stream of opponents and puzzles, and designers having to keep a balance of like, 80 % real 20 % fantasy means having to make puzzles and combat encounters grounded affairs until the very finale, is seen as limiting. They'd want to create variety in every level, and so they're much quicker to resort to giant crocodiles, zombies and flaming ghosts because they need to fill ten hours or so of game with rising challenges whereas a movie is "just" two or so hours. TL;DR- a game needs to have more and varied filler than a movie, so they're quicker to dip into the fantasy bowl.
Love this game and still play it every few years, though it is a lot tougher visually on HD screens. It would be cool if Great Circle kicked off a revival that included an HD remaster of Emperor's Tomb with some quality of life adjustments.
I loved this game. Very good for its time, and the combat feels like the type of thing you’d actually expect in the films, a lot of back and forth grappling
I remember being stuck on the level with the giant croc because he was always a 1 hit death. I didnt know you could cage him nor use the skulls to lure him away
The part when you run from the tank made me quit the game for several months. My brother also told me that to this day, he has never seen me get as angry as I did playing this game.
OMG memories, I could never complete it as a kid, the hardest missions the Kraken! or the fortress, an iconic game, finally completed it couple years back
This is one of my favourite games of all time. Years after I played it, I played the Xbox exclusive Buffy game, which was made by the same studio (The Collective) with the same engine. To my surprise, the Buffy game (which came out before Emperor's Tomb) has a lot of the same gameplay mechanics and the same controls. So if anyone wants more of this type of gameplayAnd it makes me wonder if Emperor's Tomb leans far more heavily into the supernatural themes than other Indy games because of The Collective's experience with the far more supernatural Buffy universe.
I briefly played this game as a kid, and remember it possibly bugging on me? It was the level with the big crocodile in the pools below, and I believe you had to trap it in order to escape the level. But after 'trapping' it, it was still swimming in the pool below where I needed to be, instead of the other basin, causing me to get stuck there. Never touched the game again..
As a kid, my potato of a computer would take 5 minutes to reload a checkpoint after dying. The tank chase fight? I kept falling. Over and over and over! I read entire books during the reloads trying to finish that part!
Almost finished with this game. Also watching all the movies since I didn't as a kid. All this before I get into the great circle but I do love emperor's tomb. The voice actor sounds somewhat similar to Ford in some spots but he's definitely missing the dry humor aspect
I was determined to beat it and i did. Its a wonderful game in lots of ways but some movements are very stiff. But overall its fun and the voice acting is impressive. Would really love to see a Playstation 5 3rd person game. Indy is a great character and adventure games are important.
Still not a Fate of Atlantis, but one may argue that it's an improvement from the last platformer game. Helps that its creators made the surprisingly good if still difficult Revenge of the Sith video fame adaptation. And yes, folks, this is a prequel to the entire original film trilogy; that ending is how Temple of Doom begins, which doesn't bode well for Indy's friend.
That rikshaw puller outrunning motorcycles and cars, forget Dr Jones let HIM fight the dragon, bet he could just punch it's teeth and claws out and save the day by himself.
Love this game! And yes, IMO its the best game manual by far. I miss when games would have creative, fun to read manual booklets. Such a shame we didnt get a true successor to Emperor's Tomb.
I adore this game. I played it a ton as a kid on my OG Xbox. Also, is it just me, or is Indy's yell when he falls to his death not the most hilarious sound ever? I laughed so hard every time he fell to his doom - whether intentionally or unintentionally. lol
When I first played this game man was it fun, I know I didn’t get very far through it cause all that mid to late game content I never saw but it was really cool game i would certainly give a playthrough.
Worth noting that this game got a patch a few years ago to run at 4K on Xbox consoles, but it was delisted from the Xbox Store...so you'll need a physical copy if you don't already own it.
I absolutely loved this game! The first game I ever beat at 7? years old. Didn't 100% a game for many years after that, as it was a struggle especially at that age for me. Also I didn't have the walkthrough and didn't have PC access at the time, so I painstakingly went through puzzles blindly.
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
I remember this game for one very specific reason.
My dad got stuck on the temple level where you have to whip-swing to the next area. He died several times because he didn’t have the timing right and assumed the game was glitched and he put down the controller.
I gave it a shot and got across the platforms first try, and he gave me the biggest “WTF” face I’ve ever seen from him.
For the rest of the game he forced me to do the platform sections for him 😂
Lol. I replayed this a couple months ago and got stuck here. I didn't realize, until your comment, why I was stuck and what I'm supposed to do. I stopped playing because I couldn't figure it out. I'm slipping in my old age... 🤦♂️
I had to get my son to beat Deathstroke for me on PC in Batman: Arkham Origins.
That is funny. It took me like 70 tries before I got the timing right. I literally had to get one of my friends to come over to show me how to get past it!
@@MouthBreatherGaming That was a tough fight but the feeling you get when you parry his attacks just right is the best
The big croc at the begining was literally my first horror game experience
The amount of anxiety when platforming about the croc's pool is tantamount. Then you finally manage to trap for it you break out
mine too! :O
I’m so glad this is shared. I still 20 years later, still have an irrational fear to jump in water in video games if I know there’s something that could eat me.
Me too 😅
Yeah he sucks big time. Luckily for me he got stuck on a spot and gave me enough time to swim into the trap area and lure him in
It’s an underrated game honestly
The lack of in-level save feature really plays against the game. I know I've waited years to actually play it because I really hate to restart a level again and again.
Fortunately, the levels are not that long, but it was a very weird choice from the devs, as it was not even a standard anymore when the game was released.
@@Guywithnonamereviews never played it but the video makes it seem pretty well rated tbh a lot of interesting stuff got indie fans but also a lot of 5-6th generation jank you had to deal with but tbh looks miles better then the new one which minus graphics looks painfully bland
@@captainviggo4575 yeah don’t get me wrong, it’s got its drawbacks. 100% agree the save system is dumb. But I gotta say I still revisit it fairly often. Also, not sure how someone would possibly play the game without a walkthrough lol. But that being said, I highly recommend it!
@@dun0790 yeah honestly I would recommend it! It’s not at all a perfect game, but ultimately, it’s really fun which can be hard to come by
@@Guywithnonamereviews seem to be going through a retro phase of games i missed out on back then lol so might do i just need to get some sort of Xbox one day? I have a 360 but it wouldn't let me download the original xbox emulator because it has a 3rd party drive? Which i dont get as im sure back in the day i played original xbox games on my black 360
Club Obi Wan is the setting for the opening of Temple of Doom, which also looks completely different from this Black Lotus club. Idk why so many people think they're the same when they look so different 😐
Thanks for pointing this out. I thought the same thing!
The flyer for Willie Scott's performance at Club Obi Wan is shown in the video in the instruction manual - the name is right there!
@@MakopoweredGaming Yes, it says Club Obi Wan
Exactly . This level was in Hong Kong. Club Obi-Wan is in Shanghai.
Ah this was Uncharted before Uncharted even existed :)
Charted
Uhm ackshually the Uncharted Before Uncharted is Uncharted Waters for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System! 🤓☝️
@@cattrucker8257 LoL
@@SECONDQUEST Ooh, well I never was a Nintendo person. My knowledge really only covers PC stuff
Thank you for mentioning the manual! It's so fun to look through and find all the little references to the movie series. They really put a lot of effort into making it look like Indy's journal. I miss the days when you'd get a beautiful manual to go with a game.
Everyone hunting that puny magic pearl, while they had the guy pulling the cart right in front of them.
The Collective made the Revenge of the Sith game
And DS9: The Fallen.
@ What’s that game like? Any good?
@@Wade_Tyler It’s awesome. Especially if you’re a Trek fan, as you get to use a variety of phasers (and phaser settings), tricorders, and other tech from the various series. Plus, it controls just like Emperor’s Tomb - the jumping, scaling, swimming, etc. It’s all there. Oh, and you get to play three different characters (Sisko, Kira, and Worf) whose stories overlap so you get one big, epic saga. The settings are darker than you might expect from Star Trek, but the game takes place in the DS9 corner of the Trek universe so it makes sense. You visit a prison asteroid, a burned-out moon with ancient temples, a few different starships under attack, a crashed starship in the middle of a jungle, and an enemy outpost on a snowy planet. It’s a blast.
@ Ah okay. I’m honestly not a Trekkie but I’m really interested in learning more about the franchise, especially with the video games.
@@Wade_Tyler You don’t have to be a fan to enjoy the game. It gives you all the information you need. That said, if you are a Trek fan, you’ll be able to pick up on all the neat little details that are included in The Fallen. The Collective clearly did their homework.
I personally was amazed by this game as a kid, just the first act in Ceylon, the mechanics and combat was super fun and honestly the soundtrack is underrated. Plus using a table leg as a weapon always makes me laugh and throwing enemies off the edge was always hilarious. 😂
As someone who grew up playing this game and Infernal Machine I was confused why Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was seen as jumping the shark for a lot of people when I was a kid.
The film was disliked because it lacked a compelling story and devolved into cartoonish parody.
@jacklawsen6390 Yeah, I understand that nowadays. I was referring to when the film first came out back when I was a kid.
I re-watched crystal skull recently with my kids while showing them the whole series. The first half or so isn't actually bad. I actually found myself sitting there enjoying it and wondering if I had remembered it wrong.
Then you hit the second half. Yikes.
@@MoldyMojoMonkeyShia labeouf swinging with the monkeys...
@@MoldyMojoMonkeyPaAaart time!
Playing on the Xbox 1 is a blast, very underrated game.
I actually loved this game so much I created my first playthrough FAQ for it on GameFAQs... only to get immediately flamed by an entire mob of users asking why would I ever be writing a FAQ for a shoddy Tomb Raider clone.
That sure sounds like the GameFAQs I remember. An incredible archive for super-helpful tips for all kinds of games... and an incredible archive of the worst kinds of human behaviours you can think of.
My old PC would take forever to load the levels. Imagine how frustrating it was to die in this game. The memories are... bittersweet. An amazing game regardless!
Great review, lol'd quite a few times.
So we got an Indiana Jones game that ends with Indy fighting an actual dragon... and yet people got pissed when an Indiana Jones film released five years later involved aliens. Huh.
I mean, very different audiences from one another. People watching a movie probably only know the other films; people playing the games probably know more of the games.
Additionally, there were plenty of issues with the film that are independent of the aliens plot.
Yuuuuuup Tomb & Skull >>> Dial
That’s what I always said! Even on the day I watched crystal skull for the first time
Indy experiences some pretty mythical stuff in this game yet aliens is completely out of the question?
Comparing a game and a film is just moronic, come on man
@@ALISTGAMERS1Mythical and sci-fi are NOT the same.
1:16 has Indy standing on nothing and 5:49 has him falling through something. Truly amazing.
Yin and Yang, as it were.
THIS GAME IS A MASTERPIECE!!!
As a kid I taught myself how to set an internal alarm clock so I could wake up early to play this game 😂😂😂
I still use that skill to this day
A great video game is the best motivator to get me out of bed.
I played this for the first time a couple of years ago and had a blast! So many moments I had in combat felt like they were straight out of a movie.
One of my fav Indiana Jones game of all time
Loved this game. I remember playing the demo over and over again. When I got the full game, I was the happiest kid alive.
This game was my introduction to Indy. I got this game before even seeing the movies, and I was hooked. What's funny is I didn't know you needed a memory card for the PS2 (I was so young) So I would boot up the game and start from the beginning every time and just went as far as I could get. I got VERY familiar with that opening level lol. Watched the movies shortly after getting the game and have been a lifelong Indy fan every since. Very nostalgic game and still really fun.
Indiana Jones and the Emperors Tomb is a fun game!
This game is so cool. Nothing more to say except that it is a classic like Sands of Time and Tomb Raider Legends
The game gets it all kind of wrong when it comes to the Prague levels. Not only do they place it into Austria on the map (rather than the capital of Czechia) but they fill it with Nazis when in real life, Prague wouldn't get occupied by Germany until 1939, 4 years after the game takes place. Not to mention how they took famous Prague sights such as the Astrological Clock and the statue of Wenceslaus on a horse and crammed them into the castle. It's so wrong it's actually endearing :D
I don't think prague was occupied by nazis.
I always though for the trenchcoats and hats they were gestapo agents on a secret mission to take the castle
@@raidenstark315 Not very secret when they're walking around the street in the open. And where are all the civilians? Still makes no sense whatsoever in 1935.
@@the_kovic that was the street in front of the castle, they were custodiating the main entrance to the castle
They place it in Bavaria on the map, not Austria.
Hahaha the map is awesome indeed, in many respects. 😂
Good god, it’s been over 20 years? When did I get so old??? I chose poorly and drank from the wrong cup!
Emperor’s Tomb was one of my favorites- I started way back on Fate of Atlantis (the version with voice acting!), and I loved it, but got frustrated by the puzzles quickly, and felt like I was cheating when I consulted the manual religiously to make it through the game.
I got hung up on Infernal Machine for the longest time until I enabled cheat codes and just immortaled by way through it. I was a kid, I was scared by some of the content at the time, and I have no shame.
Emperor’s Tomb was when I was finally old enough to enjoy an Indy Game on its own merits, and I loved it. I remember thinking that the Prague boss fight, escape in Istanbul, brawl in the Golden Lotus, chase scene in the rickshaw, and infiltration of the fortress were all the best parts at the time.
I’m sure that, with the benefit of 20+ years worth of advancements, the gameplay would feel dated and repetitive by today’s standards- but as a teenager, it was an absolute joy to play through it all. Punching someone and watching them fly across the room to break a table, then picking up a table leg to beat the tar out of them? It was one of my favorite things in the game!
There was enough variety in how to best people up (picking up weapons that broke, grabbing them and tossing them off of ledges, whipping them around the neck and dragging them into a face punch, basic combos, a wide variety of consumable throwable weapons like ninja knives and glass bottles) that I never got bored with it.
4:55 There's also a nice bit of continuity here - the rickshaw driver is the companion who dies at the start of Temple of Doom.
I hope the Emperor’s Tomb gets a Switch release on the Nintendo Eshop.
That would be sick!
Oh, that damn tank level. How many times I had to replay it until I learned the timing. Still, and it’ll never happen at this point, I’d play a full on remake.
I remember the combat mechanics being incredibly ambitious for the time
We need a Remaster of this Indy game☝️🤠🗺
My favorite game of all time and it’s not even close. Collective couldn’t miss in 2002-2003 between this and Buffy the Vampire slayer another underrated gem on original Xbox 2 of my favorite games ever.
Maybe the real treasure is the drill we escaped on our way!
that drill pissed me off so much when I was a kid. Took literal days to finally beat it. Flash forward to when I was in college, my roommate was playing Emperor's Tomb and made it to the drill. He slammed down the controller in frustration as I laughed and he bet me I couldn't beat it in 5 tries. 2nd try was the charm!
If you can get past how it chronologically doesn't make sense with how it ties into the movies, it's still a pretty fun game and adventure.
Game was a huge part of my childhood. I really hope it gets a remaster
I had this as a kid, but my computer wasn't good enough to run it, so I never actually got to play it. I'd forgotten about this until just now.
I remember being incredibly excited for this back in 2003. I actually figured out the puzzles without any strategy guide and beat the game twice that year. The eclectic range of enemies was part of the charm, but it did get a little hard for the wrong reasons in spots. Overall though, it was the highlight of my Summer that year and still have quite the soft spot for this game.
It’s a Masterpiece and always one of my favorite Indiana Jones Games! I still hope for a remake or a remaster!
I think we need to talk more about the manual. It's AMAZING. Literally every single thing about it is crafted to be in-universe in some way. The instructions on fighting are pages from a combat manual, for example. It's got all sorts of little bits and bobs to make it seem more authentic, like fliers for the Golden Lotus or maps of where Indy's headed. Even the copyright notice at the end supposedly comes from "American Bullwhip Manufacture". It's probably the single best manual ever.
Honestly I really liked this game after my first time beating it on PS2 this year while it's not a 10/10 flawless masterpiece but if you're an Indiana Jones fans it's really worth a play
I replayed it over the weekend before the great circle comes out this week
And I can’t lie I fucking love this games and its inclusion in the Indiana Jones franchise
Was a childhood game of mine that I still play a lot
As a kid, I was never able to make it past the giant crocodile at the beginning so the rest of this story is completely new to me
What a hidden gem
I remember that played it on PS2,and I loved it.
Looking forward to the next video❤
I have fond memories of watching my dad play this game back in the early 2000s. I never got past the first mission, mostly because it wasn't the kind of game a 5 year old had much chance to competing...
Will you be taking a look at Indiana Jones and The Staff of Kings too? That's got an interesting history, it's a demake of a cancelled PS3/Xbox 360 game! Loads of footage of the cancelled game online too!
This game still looks pretty good.
As a BIG Tomb Raider fan, this game... is allright.
It may not be as great as other games in the genre but it's still a good time.
The Prague mission looked practically real life to me back then
Great retrospective as usual! I never played this back in the day. Didn't realise it was on PS2 as well. Was too busy focusing on Star Wars as a 12/13 year old back then.
21 years already? Time really flies by. I still have the Disk for PC and I think I never made it past the first Level.
Being Eaten by the Kraken caused me to have a trauma of any kind of squids and octopuses for a decade.
I loved this game as a kid. The chase sequence mad eme so mad that i just waited a whole day after school to get back on it, calm and collected lol. Underrated and an excellent game.
Club Obi Wan is actually the club from the opening of Temple of Doom!
I remember playing this as a kid and being absolutely terrified of the big crocodile.
For me this game is totally a hidden gem! Just as good as Classic Tomb Raider, but has its own unique charm.
I remember I bought this game on Steam around the time Dial of Destiny came out. I already played both the LEGO games when I was younger and watched all the movies dozens of times throughout my life, so I wanted to try one of the older video games, even knowing it might be a rougher experience compared to a modern video game. That being said, I was willing to put up with it due to my love for the Indiana Jones series as a whole. Of course, because the game was 20 years old (it actually came out the year and month I was born, which I thought was cool as well), there were a lot of frustrating things playing on PC with mouse and keyboard. The biggest and most annoying thing for me (other than the horrendous lack of save points after dying and having to restart as mentioned in the video, and the occasional glitches) was the part where your getting chased by Von Beck in the tank while trying to whip your way to the next level. I must have attempted that shit at least 50 times, if not more, until I finally got it because the whip mechanics and movement were so inconsistent and buggy. No joke, I literally almost uninstalled the game, but I was eventually able to do it after a lot of rage and regret LMAO. Gamers back in 03 had to have been tougher than nails to get past that section! I still had a decent amount of fun with the game, but in my opinion, it needs a remaster to help fix a lot of its problems. If that somehow happens one day, the game would be next level, even with the bizarre plot and mythical creatures lol. In the meantime, I'm looking forward to playing The Great Circle game now that its out. The lack of Indiana Jones video games in the last 15 years or so has been unfortunate, but The Great Circle actually looks amazing. If the game is a success, they should make a similar game but make it based on the original three movies, that would be awesome!
5:31 even my copy that I ordered on Amazon came with the strategy guide with a note telling me "I was gonna need it"... the seller wasn't lying
i remember my dad got me this gem back in summer 2003, i was second grade at school, barely knew any english because it is not my first language and i played it so much itfelt like an eternity. too bad i got stuck at the kraken battle because my 8rd old brain didnt understand the mechanics how to beat it and we didnt have any internet back then so it was up to us figure things out, no walktroughs or youtube. but yeah, i think it was an awesome game at the time. did it age well ? i think not, at least in the controls department i still remember it felt so clunky but maybe it was designed to be played with an controller.
8:04 And people think the time-travel finale in “Dial of Destiny” is far-fetched! 😂
I could watch theses videos all day
i played it but can't remember it looking like this. i thought it was first person camera
Getting used to this game is rough. Production values are high, but man, those controls.
This really brings me back so much memories when I played The Emperor's Tomb. It really is an improvement of The Infernal Machine. I hope that Bethesda's take on Indiana Jones will be good.
I miss the early 2000s when movie tie in videogames were awesome. Emperors Tomb, Everything or Nothing, and the 2005 king kong game are all certified bangers.
Like Infernal Machine, this is an Indiana Jones game I really liked to play (a bit less than Infernal Machine), but I know I would absolutely hate it if it was an actual Indiana Jones movie.
I don't know why so many "expanded universe" Indy stories lean so much and so heavily on the fantasy side.
The movies (at least the good ones) have the perfect balance of a pretty real story with a bit of fantasy in the end.
This… this is Emperor’s Tomb
@@expendableindigo9639 You're right. I shouldn't comment this late… :)
My guess is that because video games needs a steady stream of opponents and puzzles, and designers having to keep a balance of like, 80 % real 20 % fantasy means having to make puzzles and combat encounters grounded affairs until the very finale, is seen as limiting. They'd want to create variety in every level, and so they're much quicker to resort to giant crocodiles, zombies and flaming ghosts because they need to fill ten hours or so of game with rising challenges whereas a movie is "just" two or so hours.
TL;DR- a game needs to have more and varied filler than a movie, so they're quicker to dip into the fantasy bowl.
Tbf, The Great Circle seems to strike that balance well.
This game has more in common with the great circle than you’d think
Love this game and still play it every few years, though it is a lot tougher visually on HD screens. It would be cool if Great Circle kicked off a revival that included an HD remaster of Emperor's Tomb with some quality of life adjustments.
Dam some of those original xbox games look really impressive still
I loved this game.
Very good for its time, and the combat feels like the type of thing you’d actually expect in the films, a lot of back and forth grappling
I remember being stuck on the level with the giant croc because he was always a 1 hit death. I didnt know you could cage him nor use the skulls to lure him away
Fortune and Glory here i come !!!
Bro just described the Shang Chi movie and pretended we wouldnt notice
The part when you run from the tank made me quit the game for several months. My brother also told me that to this day, he has never seen me get as angry as I did playing this game.
OMG memories, I could never complete it as a kid, the hardest missions the Kraken! or the fortress, an iconic game, finally completed it couple years back
This is one of my favourite games of all time. Years after I played it, I played the Xbox exclusive Buffy game, which was made by the same studio (The Collective) with the same engine. To my surprise, the Buffy game (which came out before Emperor's Tomb) has a lot of the same gameplay mechanics and the same controls. So if anyone wants more of this type of gameplayAnd it makes me wonder if Emperor's Tomb leans far more heavily into the supernatural themes than other Indy games because of The Collective's experience with the far more supernatural Buffy universe.
That tank mission was infuriating 😂
I briefly played this game as a kid, and remember it possibly bugging on me? It was the level with the big crocodile in the pools below, and I believe you had to trap it in order to escape the level. But after 'trapping' it, it was still swimming in the pool below where I needed to be, instead of the other basin, causing me to get stuck there. Never touched the game again..
As a kid, my potato of a computer would take 5 minutes to reload a checkpoint after dying. The tank chase fight? I kept falling. Over and over and over! I read entire books during the reloads trying to finish that part!
Almost finished with this game. Also watching all the movies since I didn't as a kid. All this before I get into the great circle but I do love emperor's tomb. The voice actor sounds somewhat similar to Ford in some spots but he's definitely missing the dry humor aspect
3:13 Lol why is this a 21st Century map?
ah of course, Prague.
The Heart of German Bavaria.
Czechoslovakia was occupied by the Germans at that time.
absolute classic
I remember playing this as a kid and finding it too tough. Never got past the Kraken level.
Classic 100% throughout the years of 360 , Xbox one and series X I’ve went back and played this game too many times to count
I have fond memories of playing this game many.... many years ago.
I was determined to beat it and i did. Its a wonderful game in lots of ways but some movements are very stiff. But overall its fun and the voice acting is impressive. Would really love to see a Playstation 5 3rd person game. Indy is a great character and adventure games are important.
Picked up a physical copy a couple years ago. The manual is super sick
One of my all time favs. Hope the great circle is good too
I remember playing the demo on the OG Xbox and thinking the graphics were amazing. Picked up on steam and should really play it again
Still not a Fate of Atlantis, but one may argue that it's an improvement from the last platformer game. Helps that its creators made the surprisingly good if still difficult Revenge of the Sith video fame adaptation.
And yes, folks, this is a prequel to the entire original film trilogy; that ending is how Temple of Doom begins, which doesn't bode well for Indy's friend.
That rikshaw puller outrunning motorcycles and cars, forget Dr Jones let HIM fight the dragon, bet he could just punch it's teeth and claws out and save the day by himself.
Love this game! And yes, IMO its the best game manual by far. I miss when games would have creative, fun to read manual booklets.
Such a shame we didnt get a true successor to Emperor's Tomb.
I like Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb
One of my favorite games of all time haha
This game is amazing (kinda, it does have issues)
I adore this game. I played it a ton as a kid on my OG Xbox. Also, is it just me, or is Indy's yell when he falls to his death not the most hilarious sound ever? I laughed so hard every time he fell to his doom - whether intentionally or unintentionally. lol
Minor nitpick, but it always bothered me that they got Indy's hat wrong in this game!
When I first played this game man was it fun, I know I didn’t get very far through it cause all that mid to late game content I never saw but it was really cool game i would certainly give a playthrough.
I replayed this game twice and its still great
Worth noting that this game got a patch a few years ago to run at 4K on Xbox consoles, but it was delisted from the Xbox Store...so you'll need a physical copy if you don't already own it.
I absolutely loved this game! The first game I ever beat at 7? years old. Didn't 100% a game for many years after that, as it was a struggle especially at that age for me. Also I didn't have the walkthrough and didn't have PC access at the time, so I painstakingly went through puzzles blindly.
The Indiana Jones franchise is so interesting to me, because even though one would think that such a well known IP would sell well, it doesn’t!
Great video like always!
Have a nice day!