Tomb Raider Information & Discussions

Tomb Raider is a media franchise consisting of action-adventure games, comic books, novels, theme park rides, and movies, centring around the adventures of the fictional British archaeologist Lara Croft. Since the release of the original Tomb Raider in 1996, the series developed into a lucrative franchise of related media, and Lara went on to become a major icon of the virtual gaming industry. The Guinness Book of World Records has recognised Lara Croft as the "Most Successful Human Virtual Game Heroine" in 2006. The first six games in the series were developed by Core Design, whilst Crystal Dynamics developed the latest four; their fifth game is currently in production. To date two movies, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life, have been produced starring American actress Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft. In the original game, Alison Carroll, a British gymnast portrays Lara Croft.


Lara Croft

Main article: Lara Croft

A map indicating places visited by Lara Croft during the video games:

Tomb Raider World Map Video games: Tomb Raider / Anniversary Tomb Raider II Tomb Raider III Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation Tomb Raider Chronicles Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness Tomb Raider: Legend Tomb Raider: Underworld Tomb Raider (2012) Vilcabamba Greece Egypt Atlantis Maria Doria Venice The Great Wall Tibet England Antarctica South Pacific India Nevada Angkor Wat Rome New York Ireland Zapadnaya Litsa Prague Paris Tiwanaku Paraíso Japan Ghana Nepal Kazakhstan Thailand Mexico Jan Mayen Island Andaman Sea Arctic Sea

Alison Carroll, the 6th and final of the official Lara Croft models (2008-2010)






The central character in Tomb Raider is the British archaeologist Lara Croft, a female adventurer
in search of ancient relics used by Thor, the God of Thunder, King
Arthur and many others. Lara was created by one-time Core designer Toby Gard,^[1]
and grew out of a number of ideas discarded in early concepts. She
appears almost invariably with brown shorts, boots and small backpack, a
dark green or blue sleeveless top, holsters on both sides of her hip
for dual wielded pistols which carry around 30 bullets together. Over
the course of the series, her 3D model has undergone gradual graphical improvements, as well as enlarged (and later reduced) breast size.
Over the course of time, the Tomb Raider series' canon has undergone various changes or retcons.
These changes correspond to the series entering a new medium, such as
comic books or film, or being taken over by another game developer. For
example, in the first Tomb Raider game manual, Lara Croft is said to
have survived a plane crash in the Himalayas at the age of twenty one,
and was later disowned by her parents, who are still living.^[2]
However, in the comics, Lara lost both her parents and her fiancé in
the crash. The films make no mention of a plane crash, Lara's mother
died when she was too young to remember, and her father died under
different circumstances. When development of Tomb Raider was transferred
from Core Design to Crystal Dynamics, Lara's biography, only ever
mentioned in instruction manuals, was contradicted by a new biography
which supported an in-game sub-plot concerning the deaths of Lara's
parents.^[3][4]
Several actresses and models have taken on the role of Lara Croft in real life for publicity purposes, including the British model Nell McAndrew, as an official model, and Rhona Mitra, in the early days of the games' success. In addition, playing Lara at game conventions is a popular type of modelling work. Alison Carroll is the current official portrayer of Lara, who is a British gymnast. American actress Angelina Jolie was cast as Lara Croft in the Tomb Raider movies (Tomb Raider and Tomb Raider II - The Cradle Of Life).
Nearly fifteen years after the release of the original game, Lara is
still one of the most durable and recognisable video game characters. On
the other hand, she is viewed as a feminist icon or sexual fantasy. The
impact of her character on popular culture is undeniable.^[5]
Video games

Main article: List of Tomb Raider media














The Tomb Raider video games have together sold over 35 million units,^[6][7]if you don't include the sales of the portables, TV remote-controlled versions and mobile phone releases, making it one of the best-selling video game series of all time.^[8]
The original game, titled Tomb Raider, made its début on the Sega Saturn, PlayStation, and PC. Despite being released on the Saturn first alongside PC,^[9][10] it was one of the titles responsible for the PlayStation's success in the mid 1990s. The games present a world in 3D: a series of tombs,
and other locations, through which the player must guide Lara. On the
way, she must kill dangerous creatures or other humans, while collecting
objects and solving puzzles to gain access to an ultimate prize,
usually a powerful artefact.
Tomb Raider, an early example of the 3D genre, uses third-person shooter mechanics. The player's camera follows her, usually over her shoulder or from behind. Until Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness, the game's environments were largely orthogonal, as a result of the creators' decision to extend the 2D platform game genre to a 3D world. This is shown through Tomb Raider's gameplay, which is very reminiscent of older platform games like Prince of Persia and Flashback that had a heavy focus on timed jumping interspersed with combat.
Each game has introduced new weapons and moves; by the fourth game,
Lara could back flip off ropes and turn around in mid-air to grab a
ledge behind her. Tomb Raider: Legend introduced an
electromagnetic grapple that Lara can attach to metal objects and can,
amongst other things, be used to make rope swings and pull metal objects
(and enemies) toward her. Standard moves in Lara's range of abilities
include the somersault, a roll, climbing techniques, the ability to
swim, a swan dive manoeuvre, and a handstand. In Tomb Raider III,
a sprinting move was introduced that allowed Lara to quickly speed up
while a bar in the lower corner of the screen drained her stamina. In Tomb Raider: Chronicles, Lara was able to bar-swing and somersault/roll out of crawl spaces higher than ground level.

Toby Gard, the creator of Tomb Raider





The storyline is usually driven by the quest for a powerful artefact,
with Lara in a race against a sinister shadow league who want to obtain
the relic for their own purposes. These artefacts usually possess
mystical powers and may be of supernatural, or even alien, origin. Often
in the series, the antagonist uses the artefact or bits of it to create
terrifying mystical monsters, creatures, and mutants which Lara must
defeat throughout the journey.
Originally, the Tomb Raider Games were developed by Core Design,
and a game was released annually. However, the pressure grew so much on
the team that they decided to kill Lara Croft off at the end of the
fourth game. Still, a fifth game was released, which consisted of a
series of flashbacks with Lara Croft's funeral serving as framing story
for the various tales. The sixth instalment Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness
revived the character and was to start a trilogy. The game infamously
featured a darker more city-based setting and included stealth-elements
and also introduced a new playable character for a short time in the
game. The game was a failure, thus ending the Core Design Era.
In the early 2000s, a series of hand-held titles were released for the GAME BOY color and GAME BOY Advance,
which were developed by other developers, neither Core Design (except
the second GameBoy game) nor Crystal Dynamics and are therefore not
considered to be part of the series.
Crystal Dynamics, known for their work on the Legacy of Kain series, relaunched the series with Tomb Raider: Legend which brought the character back to its tomb raiding roots. It was the first time since the original Tomb Raider
that Lara Croft's original creator, Toby Gard returned to work on a
sequel. The game heavily expanded on Lara Croft's background, detailing
on the loss of her mother in early childhood and how she followed her
father's footsteps to find her (therefore beginning her archaeology
career). Following the success of Legend a remake of the original was produced and released almost a year later, called Tomb Raider: Anniversary. The game expanded on some of the plot lines, further setting up the follow-up to Legend, which was released in late 2008: Tomb Raider: Underworld. The game featured the conclusion of a loose Trilogy that forms Anniversary, Legend and Underworld.
Following that, the Structure in Crystal Dynamics changed and part of the team worked on a new spin-off, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, while another began working on a reboot of the franchise.
On August 18, 2010, Crystal Dynamics and Square Enix released a download-only title, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, the first game in the series not to bear the name Tomb Raider. The omission of the Tomb Raider branding was said to separate Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light from the "pillar" Tomb Raider games, which are also still being produced.^[11]
In an interview with GamingIndians.com, Ian Livingstone, Life President of Eidos Interactive,^[12]
announced that the next Tomb Raider was currently in the works.
Livingstone stated "I think [it] will surprise a lot of people and
reinvigorate the franchise."^[13] The official site revealed the next Tomb Raider game which is simply titled Tomb Raider, It is described as a reboot of Lara Croft. It's expected to be released in the third quarter of 2012.^{[citation needed]}
Music


All the scores to the Tomb Raider saga are produced by respective composers using software instrumentation, such as recording samples and electronic synthesizers. The exception is Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness which was recorded live by the London Symphony Orchestra at Abbey Road Studios, London, in 2002.^[14]
A few Tomb Raider soundtracks have had official releases made (see: Soundtracks). However, the majority of the in-game music has yet to be commercialized. Eidos
has expressed no concern (despite considerable fan demand) in 15 years
of publishing the franchise. Even though score commercialization became
common ground during the late 2000s (with music being sold from blockbuster titles such as the Halo, Assassin's Creed, and Mass Effect series), soundtracks to the Tomb Raider saga remain unreleased. This may be due to Eidos's lack of a music sub-group, such as rival companies' Ubisoft Music or EA Trax.
The composers are unable to sell their music independently because under employment as in-house composers (at either Crystal Dynamics or Core Design),
they are also tied to Eidos (as the parent company) by contract.
Subsequently, Eidos owns the licensing rights to the composers'
material.^{[citation needed]} An example of this exploitation is Troels Folmann's recycled music from Tomb Raider: Legend and Anniversary (plus O'Malley's Underworld) present in the 2010 game Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, ^[15] and Aleksandar Dimitrijevic's inability to sell his discarded music for Tomb Raider (2012) ^[16]

The new Tomb Raider game is revealed in this trailer, complete with beautiful pre-rendered visuals. Watch as the new Lara Croft begins her fight for survival.

The famous Tomb Raider game gets revitalized. Check out the series' daring new vision in the IGN live demo at E3 2011