Lara Croft to get an extreme makeover?
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It seems that Tomb Raider: Underworld’s poor sales (1.5 million copies; and counting), may have led Eidos to make some decisions about the future of the Tomb Raider franchise.
Robert Brent, the chief financial officer of Eidos, told TimesOnline:
“We need to look at everything, as we develop the next game. Look at how Batman changed successfully, from the rather sad character of the Michael Keaton era to the noir style of The Dark Knight.â€
1.5 million copies isn’t a bad number, but given the fact that Tomb Raider: Legend sold a little bit more than 3 million, Eidos is worried. Is Lara’s starlight fading?
No. Lara is not the problem; it’s the game itself. How does someone expect to sell 2 million copies – that was Eidos’ goal – when you release a game more or less identical to the last two ones, with the only difference being the HD presentation and the improved visuals?
Some blame the economy for Underworld’s not good enough sales. Yes, maybe the economic crisis did play its role in all these, but it’s not the one to blame. Eidos – and more specifically Crystal Dynamics – must sit down and create a Tomb Raider game worthy of its past. When that happens, the sales will come. Until then, Underworld will be a good game that lacks originality.
So, is the next Tomb Raider game going to be full of new features or will it continue the trend of “recycled” products, that people have a tendency to buy (NFS: Undercover)? Tell us what you think in the comments section.
Eidos and Tomb Raider. They want to bring back a PS1 ‘classic’ and have it sell millions and millions of copies. It’s ridiculous at this point.
It is as ridiculous as Namco making a new Pac-Man which is almost identical to the original (except for a few graphical enhancements), slap a next-gen price tag, and expect it to sell 3 million plus copies.
Lara had a good run on PS1, and a rocky comeback in PS2 with Legend and Anniversary which was only fueled by nostalgia and the hunger for a decent game after Angel of Darkness.
The nostalgia is over and the trick of bad game/decent game/same game/bad game/decent game is never going to work. Ever again.
Lara is a gaming icon, retire her, place her in the hall of fame and maybe (just maybe) get her out of retirement after a decade or two.
Well,it could be the economic down turn in part,lord knows it affected gaming,and the world overall,but in my opinion,it was the tough competition it was faced with.
This game’s release fell in with the xmas 2008 it seems,and on PS3 alone it was faced with fierce gaming competition from Resistance 2,Motorstorm 2,Valkyria chronicles and of course little big planet.
Then on 360 (PS3 and the 360 were obviously the main consoles for this game) it went up against Gears of War 2,Fable 2 and The last remnant [it was only on 360 at that time].Then multi platform you had Fallout 3,Prince of Persia,Rockband,Guitar Hero 4 and continuing sales from Guitar Hero 3 and older games from 2008 for new console owners (if someone was getting a PS3 for xmas for example they could have had MGS4 and HAZE).
Tomb Raider Underworld is a good game.Just not good enough to compete with that.Let’s not forget aswell Uncharted is the new game in this genre,which is only on PS3.
Another slight reason could be it’s lack of trophy support,I know several people who chose not to get it because of that alone.
I’m surprised that Tomb Raider sold 1.5 million copies (in less than 2 months) considering the competition it had. I’m more surprised that Eidos is unhappy with this number. I think the economic down turn may have affected the game in more ways than one. From what I’ve read it appears that production schedule was rushed to meet the ship date. As a result levels were cut (Which are now DLC for the xbox
), PS3 Trophies weren’t added, and a few bugs remain in the game. And due to the economy Crystal Dynamics just went through it own round of layoffs which included Tomb Raider Underworld’s Creative Director Eric Lindstrom.