At last week’s Game Awards, Crystal Dynamics announced not one, but two Tomb Raider games. One is the next chapter in Lara Croft’s adventures, called Tomb Raider Catalyst; the other is a remake of the original game titled Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis. Both games are being published by Amazon Game Studios, the same company working on the Sophie Turner-led live-action series. All of this is in an effort to turn Lara into a multimedia superstar with multiple projects running under one roof. With Amazon’s known history of being terrible, fans are probably wondering how deeply its claws are stuck into the Tomb Raider series, and Crystal Dynamics has spoken a little bit about the partnership.
Tomb Raider under Amazon
In a group Q&A session that Kotaku was present for, Crystal Dynamics studio head Scot Amos and game director Will Kerslake spoke about Amazon’s role in both the upcoming Tomb Raider games and the show. Tomb Raider has been a cross-media franchise for decades, with the Angelina Jolie films being some of the earliest examples of a video game adaptation doing well at the box office, but now Amazon and Crystal Dynamics are trying to make something interconnected, though Crystal Dynamics wouldn’t confirm if Catalyst would be tied to the upcoming series when it launches in 2027.
“Our Amazon partners have been tremendous,” Amos said. “From the beginning, they’ve gotten the idea of this vision we have for this cross-media franchise that crossed both the live-action things during the series and the two games that we’re making right now, but we’re not here to talk about any details and anything else in the future about the TV series until later on.”
As far as how deep this partnership goes, Amos said collaborating with Amazon’s own set of creative directors, narrative writers, and producers has been like speaking into a “mirror” as the two groups have worked together to pave the way for the future of the series as this multimedia franchise, and that the team is meeting with Amazon folks “daily,” including on-site visits from Amazon to run through the latest development milestones.
“On the development side, we have partners across all the different disciplines that we work with directly,” Kerslake said. “So as a member of the dev team, it’s been great to have collaborative partners focused on the quality of the game that trust the team to find the answers to those problems.”
Is the past getting in the way of the future?
By the time Tomb Raider Catalyst launches in 2027, it will have been nine years since the last mainline Tomb Raider game. Shadow of the Tomb Raider launched in 2018 to good but not great reviews, though it did eventually go on to sell over 8.9 million copies. Since then, Tomb Raider has had a lot of re-releases of old games. Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis is coming out before Catalyst, and this isn’t even the first time the original game has been remade, as Tomb Raider: Anniversary also brought that first adventure to modern audiences back in 2007. When asked if Catalyst might be taking longer to come out because Crystal Dynamics is putting more resources into the remake, Amos said “absolutely not,” that the remake had been planned for the franchise’s 30th anniversary next year and is being handled by a different team than Catalyst. Shadow Warrior developer Flying Wild Hog is working on Legacy of Atlantis, but Amos says the team is still “connected” to Crystal Dynamics and the broader Tomb Raider development team.
“We actually share technology, we share resources, we share assets, but we have one leadership team, a visionary team over top of that, that makes sure everything is on track, everything is within canon, everything makes sense in the various games and the storytelling,” Amos said.
Amos said the partnership was made possible by the Fellowship Entertainment subsidiary of the Embracer Group, which is one of the many arms of the company that houses its too-goddamn-many IP like Tomb Raider and Lord of the Rings. Consolidation of media aside, Amos says this partnership has allowed both teams to fully dedicate their time to their respective games in parallel development without siphoning resources from one another.
Tomb Raider Catalyst finally moves the timeline forward
After years of Tomb Raider games looking back at Lara’s survivalist origins, Catalyst is finally moving the timeline forward, though the studio says it has designed Catalyst so players can jump in with “no homework required.” Dragon Age and Assassin’s Creed actor Alix Wilton Regan is voicing the treasure hunter now, and the way Crystal Dynamics describes the game makes it sound like it’s a new era for her and the series, so perhaps a new voice is another sign of that. However, Crystal Dynamics has also made clear that this isn’t another reboot or a different timeline. This is the same Lara Croft fans have known and loved for decades, just in a “different time” in her life. So perhaps it’s not a bad time to revisit the original game and its more traditional action-adventure roots before finally nudging Lara forward after a decade of survivalist prequels.
Crystal Dynamics has been put through the wringer over the past few years ever since Square Enix sold it off to Embracer Group, with layoffs happening as recently as last month. It’s a damn shame those affected workers won’t be around to bring Catalyst past the finish line, but hopefully the end result is able to shine through all that inner turmoil when it launches in 2027.
