Tomb Raider Delays Worry Eidos

Thanks to several readers for pointing to a Yahoo/Reuters report discussing the continued delays to Lara Croft: The Angel Of Darkness, the latest in Eidos Interactive's Tomb Raider series. As the article mentions, "Already delayed twice, 'Lara Croft: The Angel of Darkness' is slotted for a release on June 20th. But that's looking less likely.. the game has to be in stores by June 30th in order for the company to recognize sales [estimated to be 1.5 to 2.5 million units] for its current financial year." With rumors of a delay into July for another long-awaited title, Republic: The Revolution, Eidos definitely has cause for financial concern. But of course, gamers will probably forgive and forget if both of these titles turn out well, even after so many delays.

Comments

I really hope...

[Suicide]

that one day, these idiots pushing games out the door start to understand htat we want finished games, not "sort of, but not really, but only because we said its not a beta" software.

Yes, you hype a game before it comes out, if you hype too early, then people will lose interest, thats the risk you take when you start guessing at completion dates. Push out an early product, you may get more sales because more people are still interested, but they will not be happy with purchasing an unfinished product, and will tell their friends, post ot the net, etc...

Yes, all choices with release dates are a gamble, unless you actually choose a realistic date with padding for safety. Then either hold release once finished until the chosen date, or just release early, giving the people who preordered a nice surprise.

I'll wait for a good, finished game, and I think most others would too. But don't sell me unfinished junk, and expect me to wait for the patch, because I'll have already returned it, and will never look back.

This is that "dark" one advertised ages ago, right

[Kris_J]

. But of course, gamers will probably forgive and forget if both of these titles turn out well, even after so many delays.

Hence the concern at Eidos.

Yet another illustration of why you shouldn't advertise products that aren't finished.

Eidos financal power

[neglige]

I honestly don't think that the existance of Eidos depends on these two titles. And I get the feeling that delayed games are common nowadays (and I won't mention that tall, blonde dude that lets god sort them out...).

It may even be better for Eidos: the longer the wait, the more people pre-order a title. And those will get the game before they can read any review. If the game is decent, well, no problem. If not, it is too late for the buyer and the company cashes in.

Loss of reputation? Come on... you buy a game, not a game from a company. If a reputation could really be damaged from a bad game, Sierra would have died after "Outpost" (the only game that made me write a letter to the publisher).

I thought we were done with this

[lidocaineus]

Has anyone really cared about Tomb Raider since the first one? I mean the first one was somewhat original (and even kind of cool if you played the funky Saturn version). Tomb Raider 2 wasn't bad, but it was already going downhill at that point. By the time The Last Revelation came out, most people had a serious hatred or Lara Croft.

Then again, those are more avid gamers, not the casual ones, who seem to enjoy Lara's adventits... I mean adventures. When I heard about Angel of Darkness, I wasn't even mildly interested. Has there been some kind of groundbreaking graphical and gameplay developments that have lifted the series out of the mire?

As to whether it's vital for Eidos, I dunno. Like I said, the casual gamer clearly knows who Lara Croft is, and maybe it's just an easy way to maintain market mindshare. Those who aren't really into games more than fleetingly haven't really heard of things like "Deus Ex".

Re:Not true at all, Simon.

[D.A. Zollinger]

I have to disagree, because Half Life shipped over a year late, and it went on to become arguably the best game ever made. I fully believe with all my heart what Gabe Newell said when justifying the delay of the game, "A game can only be late once, but it can suck forever."

Diakatana slipped for the wrong reason, and instead of making it right, they rushed it out the door. I am not sure if the same can be said about Duke, after all, Perhaps by not rushing it out the door after changing the 3D engines, they may have refocused themselves on developing a first class game. But after seeing the HL2 technology demonstration, Duke Nukem would have to jump out of my monitor and punch me in the face to impress me.

Half Life won big because when it shipped, it was just about perfect. It made its money serindipitously by being a mod makers heaven, which attracted more players and more developers, and kept feeding off of itself. I know people who play TFC and CS, DoD and NS (all very popular HL mods) who have never played the original single player game all of this technology is based off of. Hell, less than a week before I heard any rumblings about HL2, mod makers for the original were still coming up with original ideas for modifications that looked enjoyable and fun to play! I suspect that Valve is going to repeat their feat by coming out with an incredible game, and providing people like you and I the tools we need to make our own modified versions of the game.