Tomb Raider: The Lost City of Topaz

Level by marcor

Walkthrough by marcor

Part 1: Temple oft he Minotaur

Proceed south, taking care of two baddies that go out from the right and attack Lara. On the left side of the level, where the sand is reddish, take the large medikit. Go then south up to the big rock wall, pull the boulder and place it on the tile with the book on the left. The second boulder is on the small reddish mountain: it can be pushed down to the ground. After the push, put it on the second tile with the book on the right. The door opens. Jump, grabbing the wall in front, and go down entering the next underground area.

Note: depending on the path the player takes in the outside area, two more baddies can be triggered and attack Lara.

Take care of a few bats, then run north to the opposite side of the room, to the black big boulder. Notice it has a book sculpted on it, and the tile with the same book on the floor near it. Push the boulder onto the tile: it triggers one (out of three) of the bits that open the door in the small room on the left, the one with three books sculpted on top of the gate.

From this point, it is possible to reach the first secret. Go west, reaching the corner of the room, then look up: a small hole with some dim light is visible. Climb the walls (the lava-stone wall is climbable even if not shown explicitly: it’s a secret after all) and reach the small temple on the top. Collect the rose and the small medikit (first secret).

Go back down, to the main level of the room. Walk east, to the corner near the big mosaics on the wall and the column. You have to climb up to the small room on top. To do that, grab the ledge of the column (you have to do it pointing Lara to the

north), then do a shimmy and turn 90 degrees twice. Jump up, grabbing the upper ledge, climb on the column. Notice the small, orange-ish fracture on the wall: jump and grab it, then perform a ledge jump to grab the upper ledge and enter the room. Manage the bats attacking Lara, then pull the lever to open the gate in the room located in another area. Go down and fight the centaur. Go north, to the reddish climbable wall, climb up to the room and enter the temple that contains the topaz. Before going back to the ground level, you can get the second secret. For this, go out of the small temple and turn left, then left again, go north, jump and grab the rose and the small medikit.

With the topaz in the inventory, go back to the ground level and use it to open the gate of the first room on the left (looking from the entrance of the level). The room seems quite empty, with a big mosaic on the main wall, three floating fires in the air, and a latin text sculpted on the wall. Loosely speaking, the translation of the text is “Have faith and do not be fooled by the appearances”. This text, together with the mosaic on the wall, should remind the jump of faith seen in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, as well as a secret in the Ice Palace level of TR2. So, it is required that the player performs a jump of faith to proceed in the level. To do this, notice the light blue breaches in the black lava stone wall. Grab it, do a little shimmy to the left, then ledge jump up to the higher fracture, do another shimmy to the left, then the jump of faith: ledge jump back, where it seems that there is only empty space plus some floating fires. Three rock platforms will materialize immediately, allowing Lara to walk up to the lever in front of her. The fires are still visible, but they do not harm Lara. Just be careful that one platform is missing, so Lara has to stop at the end of the third platform and jump to the lever, that opens the gate in the swimming pool. Pull the lever, opening the gate, then jump back where the platforms were (they are no longer visible after Lara enters the area of the lever) and jump into the pool. At this point, before moving to the next area, go out of the swimming pool and push the big light-brown boulder to the corner (if you jump on the boulder before pushing it, you will notice a book sculpted on the floor, similarly to what happened to the first boulder).

Dive into the pool and follow the water channel until you reach the big pool in the other room. Grab the east ledge, take the small medikit, then move south to the hidden corner of the room, where a third black boulder with a book sculptured on it sits. Push the boulder to the next tile on the floor: if you pushed correctly the three boulders in the level, a camera will show the opening of the gate in the small room. For now ignore it, there is a major task to accomplish before visiting that room.

Grab the ledge of the shortest broken column, then ledge-jump back and grab the taller ledge on the second column. Do a shimmy and turn 90 degrees twice (going clockwise or counterclockwise leads to the same point) until Lara gives her back to the tallest column in the room. Firstly ledge-jump up, grab the higher ledge, then ledge-jump back and grab the ledge of the taller column. Climb to the platform and pull the lever, which opens the main gate of the room. Dive into the pool and swim until you can grab the ledge near the gate you just opened.

Now be careful. If you go out of the room through the gate without your weapons drawn, nothing will happen. In order to understand why, carefully observe the big mosaic on the wall of the room (which looks like an elegant arena, for a reason): it shows a woman fighting against a minotaur. Moreover, just out of the gate, there is a latin sentence carved into the floor which loosely translates to “only who fights the minotaur can proceed”. You can further notice that near the gate, just where you grab the ledge, there is a small mosaic showing again a woman fighting against the minotaur. All these clues should suggest that in order to proceed, Lara needs to fight the minotaur but has to trigger him. To do so, go to the tile near the gate, the one with the blue small mosaic, and extract the pistols (this puts Lara in combat mode; technically, this switches a combat trigger), then run as fast as you can to the edge of the mosaic arena, as (innocuous) fires will appear and the minotaur will follow. Lara needs to fight and defeat him in order to get the key and proceed.

The minotaur is the demigod of TR4, which in the classic game is immortal (besides a trick that can be done with the motorbike). In this level, I made the minotaur mortal, so Lara can kill him. Fight against the minotaur, being careful to jump when he beats his hammer on the floor creating shockwaves that quite harm Lara. When Lara hits him, the health of the minotaur will decrease, as highlighted by the blue health bar that appears onscreen.

When the minotaur is defeated, a gold seraph (that in the game is called Clavis Malachi) is released. Grab it. If you want you can put it already in the hole near the gate, but the gate will not open yet, as it is a door with two keys.

In order to unlock the gate, notice the black book on the floor near the gate. It is the same book that is drawn on the big boulder located in the small west room, that was opened by putting the three other boulders in the level. Visit the room and pull the black boulder on the tile. If you have put the gold seraph already in the hole, pulling the boulder onto the tile opens the gate. Otherwise, go to the gate, then go back to the gate and put the seraph in its hole in order to open the gate. In both cases, crossing the gate eventually brings you to the next area of the level.

Part 2: Temple of the Centaur

Enter the cavern. Collect the shotgun and its ammo, as well as the large medikit on the right corner of the entrance. Deal with the bat, then walk north to the end of the gallery, where you find a vertical canal. One of the walls of the canal is climbable: it is easy to recognize as it is reddish. Grab the climbable wall and go down until you reach the base. Enter the new area in which a reddish lava stone is dominant. For now, notice the small, grey square door on your left. Also notice the gate at the end of the stairs with the two ramps, and two topaz stones on the lapislazzuli walls. The main purpose of this area is to open the gate by two topaz stones that are hidden inside this part of Topaz City.

On the right there is a slightly hidden area made of black lava stone: follow it, being careful to not fall into the hole (which would bring Lara to a certain death). You will reach the hidden entrance of an underwater area. Dive into the water and swim into the big square opening, turn right then go out of the water. You reach a small room with a lever. Pull the lever: it opens a little underwater gate that you will visit in a moment. Dive back into the water, until you reach the big area you came from, then swim into the small rectangular opening. Follow the underwater channel until you cross the gate you just opened: you recognize it because it is characterized by a magic flower texture. Keep diving until you reach the opening that leads to another small room, with another lever. Pull the lever, that opens a door you noticed when you entered in the main area above. A camera shows the door opening. In order to go back to the main area, you need to dive into the second hole in the room you are in (the first hole is the one you came from). Swim following the canal, then in the big underwater room go south, paying attention to the ceiling, until you notice a small opening in the ceiling: cross it, then follow the water tunnel until you can grab the ledge and go out of the water. Walk to the opening, pull the lever, that opens the big stone doors that give access to the next sector of this second area.

Cross the doors that just opened, follow the path until you reach the green platform with the red flowers. Notice these flowers as they are important to solve the next puzzle. The room contains many floating platforms with flowers sculptured on them. On the left there is a lever: it opens the gate on the opposite side of the room. This lever is timed, namely after you pull it, the gate opens then closes in about 15 seconds.

Notice that the flowers on the platforms come with several colors: however, notice that there is a continuous green line with red flowers on the walls of the room, that connect the platform of the lever to the platform of the gate. This suggests that the red flowers are the path to follow from the lever to the gate. Platforms other than the ones with the red flowers will lead to instant death if Lara jumps on them.

Pull the lever, then jump onto the first floating platform with red flowers, then on the second one, then finally onto the green platform and cross the gate. In case you do not arrive to the gate in time and it closes, go back to the initial platform jumping onto the platforms with red flowers. Once in the corridor, walk to the next gate, that opens up as Lara approaches it, then it closes when Lara enters the next room.

This path leads to a tall topaz building. Lara has to arrive up to the ceiling of this area, where the access to the temple that contains two topaz stones is located. Grab the lowest ledge, then the second ledge (it is the only one you can grab from the first one), then jump onto the third ledge, the one that has the big black boulder on it. Jump on the ledge. Notice two black book tiles on the two sides of the walls: looking at the ledge from the lower one (the second one you jumped on) the two tiles are on your left and on your right. The boulder has to be moved until it touches the tile on the left: this opens the small wooden door of the small temple at the ceiling level.

You now have to reach that door, in order to take the two topaz stones. To do that, enter the opening you just discovered moving the boulder: it is the entrance of a labyrinth. There are many ways in which the labyrinth can be faced, depending on how many pick ups you are interested in. Here I explain only the main path that leads to the exit of the labyrinth, leaving to the player the pleasure to explore it. I just emphasize that while there are paths that bring back Lara to the timed gate in the previous room, there are others that are lethal.

From the entrance, follow the path until you reach a black boulder. Push it once. This opens a path on your left. Turn left, then right as soon as you can, then right again. Grab the shotgun ammo, then jump into the lower level. Follow the path until you reach another boulder. Push it twice. This opens a path both on the left and on the right. Turn right, then left, then right. Go straight. If you followed the correct path, you arrive at a gate that lets you grasp a view of the main altar that you will visit later. From that position, above you can see a way out. Grab the bluish wall (it is climbable), then climb up to the next floor of the labyrinth. On top of it, make a classic running jump to grab the ledge in front of you, climb, then follow the path until you reach the orange topaz (imperial topaz) area of the room. You will see the open wooden door in front of you. Jump and grab the platform, climb onto the platform the enter the little temple: it contains the two topaz stones you need to open the gate in the main area. Take them. Notice a black boulder near the corner: as usual, push it towards the wall: this puts the boulder on a sculptured tile, and opens the gate that you will use to exit this sector and go back to the main area. This door is located on the ground floor of this sector.

There are two ways to go back and exit the sector: either via the labyrinth, or jumping onto the floating platform then onto the other platforms in the building. I explain here only the latter. Go out of the temple, turn left on the platform, then jump onto the lower black platform. Put Lara’s back against the wall, then perform a simple jump: if done properly, Lara will land safely onto the floating, flowered platform. From there, jump onto the lower platform located in front of the flowered one, then side jump onto the lower platform. Do a classic TR ling jump to grab the ledge opposite to the one Lara is standing now (namely, the one with the boulder on, where the entrance of the labyrinth is located). Grab the ledge, climb onto the platform, walk left. Jump onto

the lower platform, then onto the lowest one, and finally land onto the floor. Walk to the open gate and then in the corridor. The other gate you encounter in the corridor automatically opens when Lara approaches it. Take care of the bat, then jump onto the red-flowered platforms, and go back to the main area.

The two topaz stones need to be put into holes that are located on the right and left of the gate they open. Just follow the two corridors until you reach the two little rooms that contain the holes the stones have to be put in. The gate opens. Walk to this gate, take care of the bat, then cross the gate. You reach another vertical corridor. Grab the reddish wall, which is climbable, go down until you reach the base, namely a tile where a centaur is represented. This is an anticipation of the boss you are going to fight soon. Notice the area on the right: a gate, that Lara needs to open to access the third area of the level, and a corridor that contains the hole for the topaz stone Lara needs to retrieve. Walk ahead of you: the two doors open automatically, but lock as soon as Lara enters the area.

This area is the temple of the centaur. Lara has to open the big door of the temple, let the centaur come out, fight him and defeat him, in order to recover the topaz stone needed to open the gate. Notice two Atlantean guards on top of the temple. They both can be triggered, depending on the path Lara follows to open the door of the temple (my experience with the level shows that at least the guardian on the right is always triggered). Walk to the opposite right corner of the cavern (and fight the Atlantean guard/guards in case they are triggered), grab the lower ledge on the right (it is the only one you can grab), then ledge-jump back and grab the higher ledge. Climb on the stone and jump onto the ceiling of the temple. Notice the lever on the ceiling: it opens the door of the temple. Pull the lever, then go back through the path you just followed) and fight against the centaur (do not attempt to climb and walk on the ceiling as Lara will die instantly). As the centaur is defeated, it releases a topaz stone. Take it, then walk into the centaur temple and pull the lever that opens the gate you have to use to exit this sector.

Before going out of the sector, as soon as you exit the temple of the centaur, turn right then right and walk to the left corner of the cavern: notice a small square door. This is the access to the third secret. Memorize its position as you will have to do some backtracking to access it later in the game.

Walk back to the entrance. Now the doors you came through are closed. However, on the left you see another gate is open (it has been open by the lever in the temple of the centaur). Go out of the room grabbing the ledge.

Walk to the corridor and place the topaz into the hole. This opens the gate that gives access to the third and last area of the level.

Part 3: Altar of Saint Malachy

Walk ahead: you reach a small room with four mosaics that represent topaz stones on the floor, and a closed gate. In order to open the gate, Lara needs to jump onto the four mosaics. The order does not matter.

Jump onto the four mosaics consequently, then walk in the corridor accessible from the open gate. Reach a lever and pull it, opening another gate. As soon as the gate opens, take care of the bat, then walk until you reach a lever.

Before pulling the lever, walk a few steps ahead and carefully observe the room. It contains floating platforms, and on the opposite side there is a big door. As n the second area, only a few platforms can be jumped on, while the others kill Lara instantly. The big door is timed, namely as soon as the lever is pulled, you have a limited amount of time to jump over the correct platforms, reach the door and go through it. As before, the platforms with red flowers are the correct ones. Pull the lever, then perform the jumps on the platforms with the red flowers in order to reach the other side of the room and cross the door. It’s not over yet, as you have to perform a long jump and grab the ledge on the other side, climb and enter the other room. Do it quickly as the second big door closes with the first one when the time is over. Be careful when you jump as not grabbing properly the ledge results in Lara falling to her certain death.

Enter the second room and wait that the big door closes. Notice a gate on your right, that brings to another small room guarded by two Atlanteans guardians. Lara has to open that gate in order to proceed.

In this room there is a boulder, as well as four levers. The levers open the timed gate to the room with the Atlanteans. On the floor notice tiles with books. When the boulder is put onto the central tile, it acts as a heavy trigger to open the gate. When it is located on the tile on your right (the one where the image of the book is partly covered), it opens the small door of the third secret. The strategy in this room is to firstly put the boulder on this tile, to open the door for the third secret. Then move it to the central tile (the door of the secret will remain open, but ignore the secret for now as you cannot reach it yet). Finally, pull in sequence the four levers. Putting Lara in such a way she looks at the gate leading at the Atlanteans, the best strategy I found is to open the first lever on the left, then run to its opposite, then run to the lever on the left, then to its opposite, then run to the gate.

Enter the new sector and fight against the Atlanteans (depending on how Lara moves in this sector, it is also possible that the two Atlanteans remain trapped in the previous area as the gate usually closes a few seconds after Lara entered: if so, you do not need to care about them). When the area is cleared, notice a light-brown boulder on the upper ledge. Jump onto the ledge and push the boulder down so it falls onto the floor. Push the boulder until it is close enough to the small openings on the opposite wall, so that Lara can jump on it then jump into the opening. Pull the lever: a camera shows it opens a small door in the main altar room. Jump back to the ground, turn right and walk in the corridor. At the end of it, grab the wall on the right and prepare yourself for the final fight. As you reach the top level, grab the large medikit then run to the end of this corridor. At this point, it is important that you do not stop running, or jump: just keep running as usual (on a pc with tank commands, this means keep pushing the up arrow: solutions other than this will causa Laura’s hard landing onto the ground and her instant death). If everything is done properly, Lara will land smoothly onto a slope that will lead her onto another slope in the main altar room. If you wanna rock, grab the pistols just before the opening or on one of the two slopes.

Two Tinnos monsters will go out of their houses to give Lara the welcome she deserves. Inside their houses there are two seraphs that are needed to open the tomb of Saint Malachy. Technically speaking, Lara can grab them without defeating the Tinnos monsters. Moreover, in order to take the third secret, the altar area has to be backtracked. Taking into account that the two monsters are extremely aggressive and fast and make a lot of damage to Lara, it is almost mandatory that Lara defeats them before doing anything else. Therefore, I assume here that the player decides to fight against the two monsters.

After the monsters are defeated, grab the two Seraphs. Then walk to the top of the altar, where the door you opened before leads to a small room with a lever. Pull the lever: it opens the access to the tomb of Saint Malachy, on the right.

The lever also opens a gate on the opposite side of the room, near the white-green house of one of the Tinnos monsters. That is the gateway to the third secret. Walk to the gate, then backtrack to the centaur room and to the secret room that you noticed before. After you grab the secret, back-backtrack to the altar room, enter the small room you came from, then grab the reddish wall and go down. Land safely, take care of the bat, then walk on the stairs until the two holes where you can place the seraphs. As soon as the seraphs are in their locations, the door of the tomb opens. Welcome to the tomb of Saint Malachy.

In the tomb there are a few mosaics: the explain the story of three books, that exist since the beginning of time. They were created by three forces of nature. Atlanteans and people from Tinnos knew about these forces and the books, and did a pact to hide the books in three different places on Earth, knowing their obscure power. One of these books was then given to Saint Malachy many centuries after the pact, with the specific request that he kept the book secret and well hidden. On the last pages of this book, Malachy wrote his famous prophecies on the popes. Then, Malachy was buried there, in the bowels of Topaz City, where the book was also hidden. Lara also finds about the two other books and decides to start a new quest to find them, to avoid people with bad intentions put their hands on them and use them to recite the ritual of the spiritual resurrection.

The book of Malachy is on the right side of the entrance of the room: it is grabbable. On the left of the entrance, near the mosaics, there is a lever, that opens the gate that brings to the end of the level. If Lara goes through the gate with the book in the

inventory, the level ends, so the fourth secret is gone. In order to take this secret, Lara has to open the door but ignore the book. Once the gate is open, enter the cavern. A Tinnos monster will attack Lara: take care of it, then run to the opposite side of the cavern, right corner: the fourth secret is hidden there. After you grab the secret, go back to the tomb of Malachy, grab the book, then go through the gate again.

The level ends.