Core Design Loses Grip On Lara

Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing to an Eidos press release discussing major changes to the Tomb Raider franchise. Following the recent resignation of the managing director of Tomb Raider developers Core Design, seemingly due to the disappointing reception for Tomb Raider:Angel Of Darkness, Eidos has announced that "...in recognition of the Company's need continually to enhance the value and maximize the commercial opportunity of one of its key franchises, for which all intellectual property rights belong to Eidos, the Board has concluded that it will transfer development of the franchise to its Crystal Dynamics studio in the U.S." Crystal Dynamics are probably best known for the recent titles in the Legacy Of Kain series, so it'll be interesting to see what they make of the latterly lackluster Tomb Raider franchise.

Comments

Good choice

[cgenman]

Crystal Dynamics has a lot of history with both Franchises (Gex, Kain, Pandemonium, etc) and with darkness (Akuji: The Heartless, Soul Reaver: Legacy of Kain, Disney's Magical Racing Tour...).

Unlike Eidos proper, they tend to make deep games that rely upon a combination of exploiting good engines and telling a story that at some fundamental level shocks the player. If Laura Craft is going to move away from "Walk to the edge. Hop back. Take two running steps and jump." style gameplay, it needs to be moved away from the group that has been working on it for years.

They need to give Laura a harder edge and a totally revamped control scheme. So long as she remains in a world overpopulated by keys and locked doors, the series will stagnate. If on the other hand she has to assassinate a mob boss who has seen her face and survive the escape attempt, the series could take on a whole new level.

Of course this being Crystal Dynamics, who have never put out a truly episodic game in their lives, the gameplay will probably be heavily based in exploration rather than in missions. But still, such open worlds could cut to the heart of what Laura Croft is about.

Now we need to find a good producer to pull the movies out of the doldrums. Cameron, anyone?

Honestly

[luekj]

I trust that Crystal Dynamics could make a very original and probably good game based on the TR franchise, and core has pretty much just been milking the cow for the previous 3 or 4 sequals anyways. Though many devotees would disagree because some really did seem to like more of the same.

Anyways, CD may make a tight TR game, but it's hard to predit whether the spirit of the original will be lost or discarded in favor of var(currenttrendinvideogameindustry) or float(increasing age of video game players).

Maybe they'll just take some pictures of Jolie and start tying in directly with the movie characters. Heheh, I'm sure that will improve teh quality of the next TR movie immensely.

Though it seems that all this 'movie sucks because game' sucks crap is why this change has occured.

Stupid industry(/ies)

Re:fp (what they need to do)

[lidocaineus]

While I agree with some of your points, you seemed to be all over the map. Let's pick it apart in a more logical fashion, shall we?

Originally it did well because it was a fun action adventure where you play a chick with gigantic breasts.

True. However, it *also* had a new type of gameplay, namely a 3D platformer melded with a bit of action and a lot of exploring. Very cool when it first came out; the T&A were simply bonuses on top of that (though to me, that was always lame - polygons don't really do anything for me).

Its not original, its the same formula.

Once again, true. Though new moves and some slightly different locales were added, TR is the exact same thing, with little innovation.

Now here's where you start getting confusing.

Nowadays there are hundreds of games with that same premise, the demand is being filled.

What, with vast, 3d environments coupled with exploratory and platform elements, with a dash of action? Sure. And the well designed ones sell well, or at least get critical praise (Jax & Daxter, Ratchet & Clank, Metroid Prime, even ICO way back when, and on and on). Or are you referring to breast size? Well... no game really springs to mind, though I guess BMX XXX fits the bill, and that really didn't sell very well or fill any sort of demand. NOLF2? I guess... sort of. But since it was an FPS, you only saw Cate during cut scenes and the gameplay was very well done anyway. So if you're referring to the former, you're right on. If you're referring to the latter, I dunno where you're coming from.

So to go back to my original point they need to shelve Tomb Raider and only bring it back when the market is salivating for a new game in the series.

What a bizzare position, though you're welcome to take it. Honestly, I think you're way off here. People will salivate when the next game looks good and promises great new gameplay. Simply putting it on the shelf and letting it age won't make people want it. Did you get excited when Namco released the new Pacman 3D? We haven't seen him in a real video game in awhile, and for the length of time he was gone, we should've been storming down Namco HQ in anticipation.

The problem is not 'stale grey gameplay, with no quality control' (see Resident Evil for example)...

Uh, that's *EXACTLY* the problem. Notice Resident Evil is still selling well and getting those saliva glands working for fans... because Capcom took the original, and steadily moved it forward in terms of graphical prowess and gameplay elements. I am hardly a fan of Resident Evil, but if you haven't sat down with the GCN version of Zero, you really don't know how far the series has moved. Of course there are plenty of problems, most notably the controls, but unlike TR, Res Evil hasn't stayed on what is basically the same engine for years, nor does it have a weak story (at best), and the quality control blows TR's out of the water (read: BUGS EVERYWHERE, across the series, not just on AOD).

...the problem is people don't care about Tomb Raider like they used to.

What, do you think this is because we can get strange sized breasts elsewhere, for much easier, more often? Face it. It's because Core lacks any sort of innovation and has released products that weren't ready for the market with regards to code quality.

A game can still sell well if it sucks, such as Enter the Matrix, but if the market demands it then people will buy it.

Well of course. It's called hype. Star Wars: Galaxies sold insanely well and some of the people didn't even know what an MMORPG was when they snatched it up. Final Fantasy can have an adventure in a toilet and still sell well over a million copies. But sometimes, common sense actually crushes the hype monster down. TR is getting crushed not because of lack of hype (there's a movie out at the same time for chrissakes!) OR availability of p