a.k.a. Fear and Loathing in the Jungle!
Good day (or afternoon or evening or night or twilight or Frabjous Day, Callooh Callay!) to you all. I hope you’re having a groovy…time. Today we’re going to talk about Tomb Raider 2013, and then I’ll probably post some adorable cat videos to make up for how dark Xeawn’s Gaming Corner has been the past week. However, before we do that, we’re going to descend into madness just one more time!
For those of you reading this on http://www.dragonhousestudios.org, well, you’re used to my more literary side by now, so, no cat videos for you! Okay…maybe just a few…
Tomb Raider 2013, man, what’s there to lead up to that I haven’t already? There was controversy. Kind of a lot of it. The men that were in the interviews constantly kept, well, let me begin with my history with Tomb Raider and then my rollercoaster of emotions in regard to the remake. Then we’ll talk about the marketing missteps. Also the one commercial they got right.
Tomb Raider came out in 1996, which seems weird to me because I guess I got into the game when it first came out, yet it felt like it was around forever. Maybe that’s because I was introduced to a lot of games that I was into by my older cousins Marcus and Tre. Shout out to Dessert First by the by.
My cousins got me into Resident Evil, scaring the crap out of me, and then Dino Crisis, scaring the crap out of me, and then Silent Hill, scaring the, well I’m sure you see the trend by now. Ironic that of the three of us I’m now the only one hardcore into horror!
I got into Tomb Raider when I saw them playing it, and soon thereafter I somehow ended up with a copy of the game on our PC. About all that I understood about the franchise was that, to be blunt, Lara Croft was hot and no matter how dangerous a forbidden tomb was, the real danger was always the shoddy controls and incredibly aggressive wolf packs. Well, okay, and the occasional Kraken.
“What’s that Drake? You get chased by guys with guns? That must be SOOOO dangerous! Tell me more about all those mythological beasts you slay.”
I never got very far in the original Tomb Raider, as I was like, eight when it first came out. Also the controls, collision detection and hit boxes sucked. I gave Lara’s other adventures a chance over time, and found that what I’d learned as a kid held up. I.E., Lara Croft was hot and the controls still sucked.
Then Tomb Raider Legend remade the original with actually decent controls, albeit a Lara Croft that suddenly hated all men because we apparently show an empowered woman either by sexing her up or by making her a cold ice queen, and then Lara Croft fought the Dahaka and it was just as adorable as it was in Prince of Persia. I don’t remember which Tomb Raider that was. Maybe Underworld?
Lara Croft is a character that has pretty much been reinvented with every game with the development team constantly trying to figure out how to make her sell. Her race seemed to change all the time (I’m pretty sure she’s supposed to be White, but I always got more of a Latin vibe. Also Indian. Also Spanish. Also mixed. Which she could be since we’ve never seen her mother to my knowledge), the style and tone of the games has always changed, they couldn’t decide if they wanted to be shooters or puzzle games, and Lara kept hopping between “I WANNA CRAWL THROUGH TOMBS!” to “I WANNA CRAWL THROUGH JUNGLES!” to “I WANNA GO TO A CITY AND SHOOT MERCENARIES!”
I notice she has never really done much in the way of archaeology.
I suppose the overall point that I’m making here is that while I’ve always respected Lara Croft as gaming’s first bad girl, much the way that Chun Li is gaming’s first lady, I’ve never actually liked any of the games. Aside from the PSP remakes and the one were you fought the Dahaka.
When I saw we were doing a gritty remake I was like “This could be interesting.”
When I saw we were going for realism I was like “That’s cute, they can’t really do big budget action since now Tomb Raider is viewed as the Uncharted wannabe instead of the other way around”.
When I saw Crystal Dynamics was still doing it I was like “This is gonna be horrible.” When I saw Square Enix was helping I was like “This…is probably gonna be horrible.”
Finally I saw promotional art and got excited. Then interviewers started repeating the phrase “You’ll/you want to protect her!” and got concerned. I saw cool bow and arrow scenes that made me think about Far Cry 3 and got excited, then I kept hearing “she’s like a scared wild animal backed into a corner and you want to protect her”. I read about hunting mechanics and got excited, and then I kept reading “These men, they’ve got her backed into a corner like a scared animal. They want to rape her, and you’ll want to protect her”.
Yeah, I lost a lot of excitement around there. And, to be honest, I didn’t have much to begin with.
So, CainKarl and I got together and we spent some time with the game. By some time I mean we played it for like, five or six hours straight and then I played it for two or three more by myself. How does Tomb Raider stack up?
Okay, 2013 is still too young for me to say Game of the Year, and I also have quite a bit of time to spend with Miss Croft yet (also as far as I’m concerned Sleeping Dogs will be the Game of the Year for eternity), but let’s just say I was pleasantly surprised and like the game bunches and bunches.
It’s so much fun. So much fun.
“Just a small time girl! Living in a LONELY WORLD!”
In the new Tomb Raider we have Lara Croft at an ambiguously young age on her first solo-ish mission. She’s helping to make a show with an esteemed (and cocky and egotistical and foppish and lacking in any area of street smarts as well as being pretty dang spineless) archaeologist and going on a journey with her mentor and friends to discover a lost island that many have sought and failed to locate. The island is in a fictional bermuda triangle esque location, and Lara’s instinct and research leads the crew there without fail!
Well, no, their ship gets torn in half in a devastating storm and most everyone dies. But, ya know, aside from that it went pretty smoothly.
Lara, now alone and left to the mercy of the elements, must find her friends and sort out some way to escape. The theme that members of the development team kept trying to get across is that we’re going for a softer, more frightened, more realistic Lara Croft. What they didn’t communicate very well is that this isn’t like Japan’s many “re-envisionings” of female leads (all of which led to strong, powerful women being replaced with terrified or dimwitted shells of themselves that live to serve and/or be saved by men *cough cough* Parasite Eve, Metroid *cough cough*). Instead, this is a journey about empowerment, this is a journey that starkly makes you go “I can handle myself” and then go “OHMYGOODNESS I CAN’T HANDLE MYSELF” and then go “I’m going to learn to handle myself.”
After getting shipwrecked and trying desperately to get your crew to notice you, Lara is immediately sucker punched in the throat. She wakes up tied upside down in a sacrificial cult chamber with numerous bodies in much the same state. Lara is reasonably freaking out, which I’d like to go on record and state that every time Lara freaks out it feels extremely justified and reasonable. You’ve got no choice but to catch the nearest corpse on fire and use that fire to break your ropes. Unfortunately that fire also opens a hole in the ground below, which causes Lara to fall a ridiculous height.
As she falls, she gets impaled through the side, and there began my issues with the game. Looking at where she was stabbed, it would’ve gone through her kidneys. Even assuming it didn’t, this wound (and many more we’ll mention) was never, ever addressed. Running on adrenaline Lara manages to escape, hiding terrified from the mercenaries that are hunting her.
You don’t do this till much later, but I couldn’t really find a good place for this shot.
She barely manages to get away from a crazed guy who may or may not have been trying to help (pro tip: when you’ve got a scared girl in a state of shock fighting for her life, maybe pinning her to the ground and holding her legs screaming “STOP IT I’M TRYING TO HELP YOU” isn’t the best way to go about things…), and…somehow with a hole in her side manages to climb over things, jump across things, roll around things, etcetera. I’m willing to say adrenaline, but…
Anyways, you escape, you get a bow and arrow, you hunt which is pointless because you never get hungry and your health regens over time, you climb and scale and jump all over a mountain and an airplane, you fall and crack your head on the side of the mountain but its totally cool because Lara Croft is invincible I guess, and then you make camp and go to sleep.
The island, which is open world and a lot of fun to explore, is actively trying to kill you as you play. This is one of the greatest feelings the game gives you. Everything wants you dead and all of the odds are stacked against you. The island is trying to kill you, the weather is trying to kill you, the animals are trying to kill you, the men are trying to kill you, everything is trying to kill you.
Lara goes quickly from feeling self assured and confident to being realistically terrified of everything around her. Even so, she presses onward deeper into the pit of despair. Despair is a good word for a lot of the game. When you climb to the top of a mountain and see some of the most beautiful sunrises in gaming, you don’t feel joy or pleasure or wonder, you feel tired and ransacked and almost as though mother nature is flipping you off. You look at it and go “Great, just another reminder of the way life should be” moments before you descend back into the depths of hell.
“Oh joy, another sunrise. So nice of you to illuminate my pain and suffering mother nature…”
The combat in the game is realistic and satisfying. I like that the enemies react based on where they’re hit, such as an arrow to the knee (I’m sorry!) or a bullet to the throat. This sounds morbid, but you do get tired of the usual reactions in shooters where enemies absorb bullets like a sponge and keep on trekking. The very specific mention of the bullet to the throat came from a moment where a man leapt out of an air vent, kicked me down and came at me with machetes. Up to that point I’d been going all Oliver Queen (or is that Olivia Queen?) on em’ using my bow and arrow for every occasion because, why not?
I didn’t have time to knock back an arrow and take aim, so I ran like mad and drew my pistol. Two shots went wide, but the third found his throat and had him holding it, rasping for air before falling. That was pretty great attention to detail.
So yes, the combat is tight and controls well. Exploration is just as tight, as is traversal. You don’t get the feeling that the game is holding your hand like in Assassin’s Creed, and I can’t really think of any moments that I went to jump and failed. The game also doesn’t mind killing you if you do something stupid with exploration. I jumped off a mountain just to see if it would let me, and it did.
One major gripe is the quick time events. The first time one is thrown at you it’s not really clear what you’re supposed to do, and so I ended up quite dead. Later events became exceedingly easy. One thing nice about the game is it doesn’t really insult your intelligence. Everything is organic and the tutorials feel very non-obtrusive. From a gameplay perspective I was blown away, which is strange because Tomb Raider has always had pretty shoddy controls.
So before we talk about the hot topic, lets talk about two big things I didn’t like, as no game is perfect. First and foremost, it feels too easy much of the time. I played on normal, and as I mentioned earlier there’s really no point to hunting aside from achievements because your health regens and you never get hungry or sick or tired. Speaking of sick or tired, in the time I’d played (ignoring the obvious gameplay related stuff) I sustained a hole in my side from a rusty iron rod, a concussion from a fifteen foot drop, had my leg caught in a trap that should have broken it (even at forty pounds an animal trap would break your bones, and if it was made for the sort of big game the island would have it would actually tear you ankle from the rest of you on impact) and was chewed up by a wolf.
“What? That gaping open wound in my side? Naw, s’no big deal!”
Never once does Lara stop to address any of these injuries. Furthermore, she goes on to climb stuff, jump across great distances and fight with those injuries. She stops to address other people’s injuries, but never her own. This bugged me immensely, and every time Lara sustained a new injury I didn’t care. The point was to show how desperate her situation was and to make you feel connected, but I got a hole in my side and climbed a mountain no problem, I got a concussion and fought wild animals and mercs no problem, and I had a trap that should’ve either broken my ankle or torn it off spring on me and was cool after sitting down for like five minutes. In short, I never care when Lara gets hurt because it never actually affects her.
The other thing is, for all the realism they kept touting there isn’t much to be found. I’m nitpicking now, but I can cross a wooden beam covered in water without it making me slip and other niggling things that threw the immersion. More than that though, were the injuries. This especially sticks out because of the countless pieces of promotional art that imply you’ll spend a good deal of time in Snake Eater-esque injury dressing, but it feels like they made the script and made the cutscenes and then decided that actual bit of game design would’ve been too much effort and abandoned it part way through.
So let’s talk about the controversy. You already know what it is, so lets discuss how it was handled. I actually didn’t mind one bit. Either they revised some things or more logically the people in interviews who had hoped to use it as a ploy were exceedingly not the people who should’ve been getting interviewed.
Yes, you spend a good deal of your beginning time as a frightened little girl surrounded by powerful and ruthless men. Yes, you freak out and hide in the dark and hope you can get away safely. Yes, there is an attempted rape scene.
And it was all handled exceedingly well.
The game never made me feel like this was done facetiously. All of Lara’s reactions were logical, she’s alone, unarmed and facing the elements as well as ruthless men that want to hurt her. At one point because of the idiocy and spinelessness of her superior she’s captured by the top merc. One of her allies sacrifices himself when the merc starts getting grabby, and you spend a heart pounding time trying to hide in the shadows and get away.
The game does the usual trope of hiding just outside of their view in a shack and hoping they pass, but in a far more realistic turn the leader finds you and orders you out. It’s up to how good you are at quick time events to see how far this will go. CainKarl was playing this part, and the first time the event started he was promptly held in a stranglehold as Lara struggled and whimpered and the screen went black.
The second time he managed to have Lara knee him in the groin, and she was subsequently picked up and thrown to the ground. At that point she was mounted and managed to get at the guy’s pistol. She was pinned down again and it was exceedingly clear what he intended to do to her, as he attempted to do it. Lara managed to force her arm free and shoot the man in the throat.
After rolling away from the rasping dying man, Lara nearly threw up, then held herself and broke down sobbing.
The scene was exceedingly powerful, and served to knock away the last shred of “I can fix everything” that both Lara and the player had. The only real issue I had with it is that, likely due to all the controversy, Lara never calls it what it was when she spoke to her mentor later. Rather than saying “I’m not okay, this man just tried to rape me!” she says “I”m not okay, I just had to kill someone.” which is also something to realistically freak out about, but not necessarily the most logical reason at hand. Though fear and trauma are rarely logical in how they affect us…
Moving on, as I said in a conversation with CainKarl earlier in the week, I really didn’t have an issue with the idea of Lara fighting off rapists. Realistically speaking she’s an attractive women who goes cockily on solo missions all the time in less than practical clothing, and has since she was around fourteen. Realistically speaking, that has probably happened to her on more than one occasion. The problem was whether or not it was done in the game with a point and purpose, and whether it was done just to do it or done as a meaningful part of the story and character.
I personally feel that it was, and done so masterfully. What’s more, as Lara goes from “I’m not okay!” conversations with her mentor (who is one of a long line of males that she has to save and protect, a powerful message in and of itself) to becoming the increasingly more stentorian warrior that we know her to be, not only does Lara feel transformed and empowered, you feel transformed and empowered. The moment the men went from “FIND HER! I don’t care WHAT you do to her when you do, just find her!” to “She’s too big of a threat, kill her.” to “SHE’S JUST ONE GIRL! SHE’S JUST ONE STUPID LITTLE GIRL! HOW IS SHE KILLING ALL OF OUR MEN!” to “OH GOD, OH GOD SHE’S STILL ALIVE! GET MORE ARTILLERY DOWN HER SHE’S STILL ALIVE!” to “OH **** SHE FOUND US! GET THE **** OUT OF MY WAY!” you truly transform from victim to warrior.
“I took a poll with me, myself and I and decided being a helpless victim is OVERRATED SO WHEN YOU FIND YOUR BOY PARTS I’LL BE OVER HERE SHOOTING THE CRAP OUT OF YOUR FRIENDS!!!!”
Tomb Raider 2013 surprised me on numerous levels. For one, it was a Tomb Raider game that I liked, nay, loved. For another it controlled well both in combat and in exploration. For another the narrative was something I could focus on and enjoy. For another, everything was handled tastefully and very well done. I appreciate what they did as a gamer, as a reviewer, as a fighter, as a protector, as a writer and as a survivor.
Tomb Raider is out now for the Xbox 360, the PS3, and with some compatibility issues for the PC. Do yourself a favor and pick up a copy, you won’t regret it.
Xeawn, out.
Dragon House Studios 
For the whole “that man just tried to rape me” complaint, after watching a lot and I mean A LOT of SVU (I’m on my 3rd run through of the series) a lot of rape victims can be in denial about it and it’s a natural occurrence. So I find that believable.
Maybe it’s because I grew up a wrestling fan, it’s easy for me to have a major sense of disbelief, but I can easily look past all the injuries that should’ve killed her right away. If the arrow shot or animal trap or attack from wolves did things realistically that would’ve been the shortest game in my memory bank history. Also, movies are known for this (I’m looking at you John McClane).
With all the hype of “you’ll want to protect her and blah blah blah” I can believe that. I did find myself wanting to protect her. In fact, I haven’t felt myself this invested into a character in a long while.
I, personally, found the hunting to be one of the more fun parts of the game. Well, before I got too deep into the story. It was fun for me to shoot deer and rabbits with an arrow or a shotgun. It was also a quick way to build up XP.
I’m sure there is more to say. I’m surprisingly in love with this game. I played other TRs sparingly, but I got hooked into this one. I was going to just pick it up but I preordered the day before release just to get the MP maps and what not. But, this was definitely worth the full price. And this is the best TR movie released so far. That’s the thought I kept having is that it was an interactive movie.
I did play one round of MP. It’s now CoD, but I enjoyed and might check it out so more. I liked the more 3rd person feel to it.
Always great to hear from you Papaya!
While I certainly wouldn’t disagree that there are many survivors that have difficulty verbalizing their trauma, I don’t feel like that was the reason why Lara didn’t. Prior to the massive backlash to how callous and flippant the interviewees were, Crystal Dynamics was quite proud of their “progressive” moments in the game. After the director stepped in and began aggressively retconning every statement made, words like “helpless”, “assault”, “wild animal” and “victim” were no longer allowable to be used by the staff. Instead all of the language shifted to discussing the journey of empowerment and reaffirming that Lara would eventually be a snarky warrior again.
While the victim mentality may have been somewhere in the script writing, I feel that it was more of a “Tiny Tina” situation, where it became a matter of “Well, we were called on this and people didn’t react the way we were hoping they would, so let’s maybe steer their focus away from this a bit.” This point is further illustrated by the original statement implying that Lara was going to be beaten and alone against a group of men rather than scared and trying to fight off just one.
I don’t mind having to assume disbelief in situations, especially when we’re supposed to have larger than life heroes like Ryu Hayabusa or Nathan Drake, but I’ve got a language rule with my reviews. If your team repeatedly goes “realism realism realism realism”, that’s what I’ll judge your product by. If they hadn’t tossed that word around so liberally, I would consider being more forgiving. That’s the same reason why I let Battlefield get away with darn near everything in my review of that, but Call of Duty was cut zero slack.
Even so, I don’t need for Lara to be paraplegic after the opening sequence, but at the very least they could’ve had a little five second “Okay…I’ve got to take care of that wound…” and then fade to black. I honestly would have been placated if they had at least made some sort of vague attempt to put any form of meaning to the various injuries she sustains. Without that, there’s a massive disconnect formed that renders all future injuries without any impact. You’ll wince because getting stabbed or hitting your head sucks, but afterwards it’s difficult to care because you know she’ll just sit for a few, then go on about climbing mountains and leaping off of airplanes no problem.
I don’t mind when Drake does it, because Drake lives in a world where being Super Man is logical. Lara on the other hand is supposed to live in a gritty dark realistic world where awful things happen, so we’re told, but her actual interactions don’t reflect that beyond shivering by the fire every now and again.
I don’t so much mind the idea of them trying to make players want to protect Lara, as I do the fact that she needs to be protected in the first place. Nariko, for instance, I wouldn’t have minded being told “You want to protect her.” I didn’t have that feeling, but I wouldn’t have cared either because Nariko is an original character with no history to be cognizant of. Lara Croft on the other hand is gaming’s leading lady when it comes to being strong, charismatic and capable of doing for herself. The implication of suddenly wanting to turn her into a scared little girl that men will want to protect, robbing her of the strong capability that many girls could look to in a positive light, rings true of a disgusting trend in the gaming industry to systematically crush every strong female lead.
Samus Aran went from being the world’s deadliest bounty hunter to being a sniveling cry baby who asks her man permission to do everything from shoot enemies to defend herself from a fire. Which, because her man didn’t give her permission to use her special armor, she walked through an inferno for a good long while being burned to death instead.
Aya Brea went from confident, intelligent and full of vigor, grace and grit to being a weepy pixie doll who can’t do anything right unless a man tells her what to do and is there to coddle her every step of the way.
As a result, when they talk someone like Lara Croft and build their entire marketing strategy around “she’s scared and helpless and you want to protect her”, it makes my stomach turn. The actual experience achieved in the game is very well done, but it was yet another well written sequence of events marred by shoddy marketing attempts.
Overall I greatly enjoyed the game, and once I was able to more or less ignore the total disregard for injuries and get past the ridiculous marketing I found not only a surprisingly fantastic experience, but the first Tomb Raider game I’ve ever liked. I most definitely recommend it to anyone on the fence. I hope that in the future Crystal Dynamics is considerably smarter about how they try to market their products.
Fun fact, the original Tomb Raider 2013 reboot was actually supposed to be Shadow of the Colossus with guns. Lara was going to be in a sort of motherly role caring for a small girl with mystical powers, and they were going to be exploring an island with massive colossus bosses that Lara would have had to scale and destroy just like Wander. In the end they decided fans would get pissy and scrapped it. I hope they one day revive the project, it looked amazing.
They may have tried to backpedal on everything they said, but looking at the game in a vacuum, her reaction was pretty legit. Once again, I may be kind of more “objective” (I guess, can’t think of another word) because I didn’t see/read any interviews. So, I didn’t even really know of any controversy until an earlier article of yours.
There was one scene where her injuries were addressed. You had to find medical supplies and ended up getting the abilitity to shoot fire arrows. But, overall, that’s the only time I can remember it being addressed. I still think the injuries are a lot less cartoony then in earlier Tomb Raider games. So for that aspect, I can almost buy the “realism” (except for the bear trap…that even an illicit “come on” from me as I played).
I can see your point on the stripping Lara of her strength. It only really would work in this game. It’s a reboot, we can watch her grow. I just hope she doesn’t go all the way to a man-hating feminist. That’s something a girl doesn’t need to see as a role model. But, however, if the sequel still has her wanting to be protected or is shown as weak, that’s when they would have dropped the ball.
That game would be pretty awesome, I’m not sure if I’d want it to be a Tomb Raider. I like the Lara-Indy comparison, and I’m not sure of I want this new series to have a Crystal Skull and mystical powers would be up there. But, who knows, I haven’t finished this game and maybe there could be something fishy with Himiko. But, from what I’ve seen there’s nothing explicitly “magical” or “spiritual.”
Also, just curious if you caught any relationshipal undertones between Sam and Lara. I don’t know, just from some of the “body language” and stuff I felt that, at least, Sam had feelings for Lara. Or maybe it could just have been a sisterly bond. I’m not sure.
I didn’t notice anything overtly not kosher about the Sam/Lara interactions, but I do still have some time to spend with Ms. Croft and company. I certainly hope they don’t go that route, though I think with someone as high profile as Lara Croft that might be difficult to pull off.
Overall I notice it as a miss-communication in men writing women. There are times that very affectionate same sex interactions work with female characters, and there are plenty of girls that are the huggy feely type, but often men that don’t quite understand how to write how women would act go “This seems like what girls would do”. There’s also the possibility of the particular male’s desires and interests coming out in the way female characters interact, which is something I’ve certainly noticed in other games or novels. The way the protagonist in Dragon Age 2 can’t have more than one normal conversation without jumping all over a potential mate comes to mind, Mass Effect 2 as well.
That isn’t to say affectionate characters don’t have a place; I write Xea’s older sister in More Than a Fairytale to be very affectionate, but that’s just her personality type. A lot of words I guess to say that so far it hasn’t made me go “Wait…what?”, but my journey is only mostly over. I’m diving my game reviewer time between Tomb Raider and…
*shudders*
God of War Ascension. Though, eating a box of nails would be more fun that Kratos’ latest outing…
Rihanna Prachett is the lead writer for New Raider (my personal nickname) and she has said she would LOVE to make Lara a lesbian, and having almost finished the game, she did a very good job of making Lara/Sam a thing without overtly going “OMG LARA’S GAAAAY PEOPLE FTW LEGALIZE EQUAL MARRIAGE KTHXBAI”. It’s all very subtle and sweet and present, yet it’s all written so that it never CHALLENGES anything else. Lara is out to save Sam… but not JUST her. There’s no agenda. It’s just good storytelling.
There’s a bunch of little things in the game that give it away. Lara utterly rebuffs the idea of ever having a relationship with a guy in one dialog sequence, saying something like “It’d have to be one heck of a guy” or something to that extent, she holds Sam’s hand at every opportunity, in her cabin on the Endurance, the only photo she has is one of her and Sam, and the fact that Lara may be fighting tooth and nail for herself and everyone from the Endurance, but put Sam in danger and watch as Lara fights just a LITTLE. MORE. DESPERATELY. Also watch as the scenes where Lara is actively fighting for Sam tonally reflect in ways that other scenes don’t, that with amazingly awesome set-pieces, increasingly faster pacing, and more pitched battles against bigger odds than usual, slowing down again when the immediate danger is past.
Lara puts herself in harm’s way for Samantha without a second thought, whereas with the other crew members, she tends to hang back for just a half moment longer and spends more effort evaluating her options. With Sam, Lara just throws herself in. She just acts. No plan, no analysis. Lara sees the girl is in trouble, and immediately becomes Samantha’s Knight In…. bloodied and muddy khakis and a faded blue tank top.
And yet it’s written so that it’s there, but in the corner of your eye. You see it, but it doesn’t initially register. It’s GOOD WRITING, because the game knows the story it’s telling. It’s not telling the story of Lara and Samantha her waifu-for-life.
It’s telling the story of Lara Croft, the tough Archaelogist girl who was forged in fire, mud, and blood, not because she wanted it, but because she HAD to be. But Lara wouldn’t have survived, or even wanted to, if she had nothing and no one to return to. Rihanna Prachett is a smart enough writer (at least, I would hope so, given her father’s VERY productive career) to know that people do crazy things for the ones we love; we would tear the Earth apart to save our one true love, and through this adventure, Lara discovers what, in Zobek’s words from Lords of Shadow (sorry; not your favorite game I know), “what motivates a man to confront the things most of us would run from”.
The answer Zobek gave, by the way, was love.
Lara may not even realize at the start how she really feels about Sam; she may see her at the outset as just a really awesome friend.
But that’s the best kind of romance; where the people involved don’t even figure it out until they take a moment, catch their breath, and look back.
It just so happens that Lara’s… a little short on those moments in this game.
And having seen the Angelina Jolie films, I know for certain that Samantha’s only real competition for Lara’s affections is probably Gerard Butler, which means that… come to think of it… Sam has her work cut out for her!
I’ll be blunt here, I personally would not support Tomb Raider any longer if Lara Croft suddenly became a lesbian. I don’t hate homosexuals, however I’ve never shied away from the fact that I am a Christian and a Christian writer who stands on the principles and ideas of the Bible.
Similarly, as of Final Fantasy’s new “I heard the voice of God, who is facing a challenge He can’t handle and needs me to be the/His savior” storyline, I don’t support that franchise any longer.
I think with any written work, it’s easy to project whatever you want the characters to be to fit what you desire or would make you happy. With any work period. You can easily look at Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson/Jason Todd/Tim Drake and go “Oh, Bruce is gay and a pedophile.” For that matter, you can look at Bruce Wayne and Cassandra Caine/Carrie Kelly and go “Oh, he’s also into jailbait and is a pedophile.”
You can look at how Lord of the Rings was filmed and go “Oh, Sam and Frodo were totally dripping with homoeroticism” throughout the movie despite it being a Christian work. You can project your ideals and desires onto a story with relative ease, however that doesn’t make those desires the heart and soul of what the story is or ought to be.
If in fact this new writer wants to make Lara a lesbian, which serves little to no literary purpose beyond jumping on the “Let’s make old iconic characters gay now because everyone else is doing it” bandwagon that Marvel and DC have started, I find that very unfortunate. For years people have wanted Lara to be a lesbian if for no other reason than she would provide attractive erotic and powerful imagery to do so. Essentially, because she’s hot.
Lara Croft has always been about being a flirt with the boys and then showing them up mere moments later. In recent attempts to remake her character, she became an ice queen as a poorly executed attempt at showing she was a “tough independent woman”. In this most recent outing, the overall goal communicated is that Lara goes from being a scared and unsure little girl constantly abused by men to being the strong, confident woman we know her to be. What’s more, it’s entirely common for girls in a strictly platonic relationship to constantly hold hands, and be physically and verbally affectionate.
Let’s look at your statement and the set piece provided from two different perspectives. First and foremost, there’s the idea of being motivated to protect her same sex friend more than anyone else on the ship. I’ll posit a movie example, and a personal example.
In The Eagle there were many people attempting to say there was a homoerotic relationship going on between the Centurion and his slave. Watching the movie, there is nothing to support this desire projection whatsoever. The movie itself tells the story of two men that are bound by their word to one another, back when a man’s promise meant far more than it does today.
If one directly desired to read too deep into the bond of trust between them, you can absolutely state that they were secretly gay just as easily as you could say The Wonder Twins were incestuous. That doesn’t, however, make it the goal or point of those characters or that story.
My best friend is a male, one who I would be more than willing to lay my life down for should the need arise. Granted, I’d prefer not to die an untimely death, but for him, I’d do it without hesitation. If it came down to a ship full of people I sorta know and even one or two I directly trained under, and then him, who would I be most motivated to tear a legion of soldiers and demons and an ancient temple apart to save?
My best friend.
If I’m all jacked up on an island with holes in various places and more than a few concussions and Jack from engineering is like “Save me!” I’d be like “*groan* I’m coming.”
If about an hour later my best friend is like “I’m pinned down, I need help!” you better believe I’d go berserk like my name was Guts. Does this imply something homoerotic about the relationship? Only if you drastically have the need and desire to apply that feeling to the subject at hand.
There is, however, never have been and never will be evidence to support that projection.
As a Christian not only do I find it unfortunate that there’s such a strong desire to push agendas that are opposing to the beliefs I hold as my guide post and compass, I’m even more disappointed and grieved by the fact that we, Christians, are the only group that is without voice now. When I do an article about gaming, I get tons of views. When I talk about God, not so much.
When I’m with friends, nearly any of my friends, and they want to shoot the breeze or talk about their ever changing world views, I am to sit down and shut up lest I be offensive. The moment God enters the equation, suddenly it’s uncomfortable and close minded and overbearing and people just want to move on.
I would not be surprised if my response to this post creates a pariah situation generating more traffic than this blog has seen in recent months, but I also won’t shy away from it.
With all of that said, do I think we will one day, and one day soon, see a lesbian Lara Croft? It wouldn’t surprise me in the least. And, I can all but guarantee we’ll see that Lara before we ever see a Lara Croft or a Master Chief or a Marcus Fenix wearing a cross around their neck and professing Christ.
Will I support the franchise any longer if Lara comes out? No. Does that make me a bigot? Not in the least. Unless of course you’re willing to concede that the desire for a lesbian Lara makes those desiring it bigots as well.
Amen!