NVIDIA Shield continues console ambitions with new Tomb Raider release

Tomb Raider — not the 1996 original but the 2013 reboot — is now available in its console-grade entirety on the NVIDIA Shield Android TV. Square Enix and NVIDIA worked together to optimize the game for the nascent set-top platform, and for $15 you get the entire experience, optimized for the company's Tegra X1 processor and rendering at 720p.

The new title, which was released over three years ago on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles, is considerably darker, harder and more brutal than the original Lara Croft games, as the now-younger explorer finds herself alone on an island with few tools and no experience.

New NVIDIA Shield Android TV: Everything you need to know

Like the original, Tomb Raider was extremely successful, selling over 8 million units and gaining an aggregate score of 87% on Metacritic. The Shield version appears to be identical to its console counterparts — the Tegra X1 processor inside the Shield is quite a bit more powerful than that of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 — but it is limited to 720p output to ensure a high frame rate.

Will you be spending the $15 on this awesome game? I still haven't completed it since I got it for free as a free Xbox Live game a couple years back, but I can attest to its excellence.

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Daniel Bader

Daniel Bader was a former Android Central Editor-in-Chief and Executive Editor for iMore and Windows Central.