Tomb Raider I- III Remastered was released on 14th February 2024. Developed and published by Aspyr Media Inc., with cooperation from Crystal Dynamics, the three games, originally developed by Core Design back in the ’90s, have been remastered with improved graphics, game controls, and UI for the modern era. As many readers will know, I’m a Tomb Raider fan, have been playing the games since 1996 when Tomb Raider (I) was released and I’ve played all the subsequent games. Imagine my surprise then at seeing the above virtue signaling from Crystal Dynamics in a ‘warning’ that pops up in the remastered games’ intro.
Crystal Dynamics’ Agenda
Let’s dissect this statement for a second and see how inappropriate it is, bearing in mind that Crystal Dynamics is not even the publisher of the new remastered trilogy. The company claims that the collection contains ‘offensive depictions of people and cultures’ but doesn’t mention cruelty to animals or gratuitous murder.
I can confirm that, in the original Tomb Raider trilogy, many animals were killed. I myself, acting as Lara Croft’s proxy, was responsible for the deaths of dozens of Bengal Tigers, Baboons, Condors, Grizzly Bears, and other such fauna. I should qualify this by stating that Lara was under attack by these ferocious beasts at the time, so it was kill or be killed, and every time she dies, it’s game over.
The same can be said for Lara’s human enemies, of which there are many – Jacqueline Natla (Duplicitous American businesswoman), Pierre Dupont (French archaeologist), Larson (Dumb American mercenary of low intelligence), Marco Bartoli ( Italian mob boss and cultist) and hundreds of other human adversaries throughout the series. Again, Lara needs to either avoid or kill such characters or it’s game over.
But if I’m not mistaken, what Crystal Dynamics is really driving at is the portrayal of other characters, mainly NPCs (non-playable characters) such as African tribesmen, bumbling Scotsmen, aggressive Tibetan monks, dodgy Londoners, and Italian mobsters. The statement also refers to ‘racial and ethnic prejudices’ but does not elucidate further and goes on to say that ‘these stereotypes are deeply harmful and inexcusable…’, later going on to infer that the games impact harmfully and do not align with its core values. What the…?
If You’ve Got Nothing To Say, Don’t Say Anything!
Crystal Dynamics took over the reins of the Tomb Raider franchise in 2003, Releasing Tomb Raider: Legend in 2006, and has developed or been associated with the franchise ever since. We all know that times have changed since the 90s and early 2000s, but frankly, I find this hypocritical warning, disguised as a statement, to be out of context in the extreme. It’s a bit rich for a game developer to whine about racial and ethnic prejudices, not to mention the tagging of the three games as being ‘harmfully impacting’ when the same company has continued to portray Lara Croft as a murderous, bloodthirsty archaeologist for hire in all the games it’s had a hand in. As an aside, I’ve inserted the above statement from the Hitman 3 intro from a different studio as another example of “Do we really need to know this?”
The fact remains that Crystal Dynamics inherited the franchise, all the baggage that came with it, and the millions of revenue generated, and only now it begins its virtue signalling campaign in a direct assault on the ground-breaking work developed by the team at Core Design in the 90s. The original Tomb Raider games of that era should be viewed in their historical, fictional context, that does not require a mental health warning, leaving little doubt as to the dubious future of Tomb Raider as we know it.
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This is an excellent five star post. Thank you for posting. I am so fed up with virtue signalling. I do neither games nor watch most modern movies released within the past eight years or so. But I know enough to know Lara Croft is not Barbie.
My sentiments exactly, Robert and thanks for posting.
In this day and age too many people are offended by too many little things. If they are offended by what is in a game then they DO NOT need to be playing it. Mostly seems to be a very vocal minority of people that are trying to make everyone as uptight as themselves. I feel that the majority of people that enjoy the game should tell the minority to flake-off and get a life. IT IS JUST A BLEEDING GAME PEOPLE. I have my doubts if this gets published as it may “offend” some people.
Jerry, the irony here is that the very company who owns the Tomb Raider IP, Crystal Dynamics, appears to be offended by its own material, having already portrayed Lara Croft as a posh, overprivileged, bloodthirsty, murderous artefact thief. Yet in hindsight, decides to shoot itself in the foot.
We welcome your comments, Jerry, so keep them coming.