There’s a TOMB RAIDER RPG Coming!

An official Tomb Raider RPG will be released in time for the holidays this year as part of the 25th Anniversary of the property.

Thank You to the Fans - 25 Years of Tomb Raider! - Tomb raider Blog

This week marks the 25th anniversary of Lara Croft raiding her first tomb. On behalf of Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal, Core Design, and many other talented teams who have brought Lara to life across entertainment mediums – thank you for going on 25 years of adventure with us. While we have...

tombraider25.square-enix-games.com

Tabletop RPG Reveal: Lara Croft’s Tomb Raiders​

We’re super excited to reveal Lara Croft’s Tomb Raiders, a tabletop adventure that lets you team up with Lara.

Lara Croft’s Tomb Raiders is a passion project of Senior Technical Designer Matthew Gaston, who has been developing it since 2007 and playtesting internally since 2009.

In Lara Croft’s Tomb Raiders, players will assume the roles of fictional characters in the mysterious world of Tomb Raider. These characters work for Lara Croft, who has more leads to follow than she has time to follow them.

Players will explore ancient sites to discover information and artifacts – guided by the campaign’s Raid Master. Campaigns will focus on knowledge, language, and investigative skills in addition to action-oriented skills to keep it true to the franchise roots.

Pulling from our talented community, we have brought on professional concept artist Kameliya Minkova and concept/comic artist Johann BLAIS to tackle interior art for the RPG. A full reveal of the cover art by Brenoch Adams will be revealed later, but you can find a sneak-preview of the interior below to hold you over.

 

[Tonguez]

So is it using a custom system?
Anyone want to guess what the Attributes are?
B.E.Q.P.C.W.D ?

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

I wonder if this can be a test to know the feedback and the reaction of the fandom, and then to publish more TTRPGs based in famous franchises. Why? AAA videogames need a lot of money and time, and the RPG can help to promote the brand.

 

[Marc_C]

Developed since 2007. Tested since 2009. So many things have happened since then in the RPG world. Reading the monster entries seems like a crunchy system. It better be very good without any obvious loop holes and design mistakes. Most games barely get internal testing with friends of the designer.

 

[R_Chance]

"B" for "body"? The bear has the highest "B", and body would make sense for that. The rest?

 

[Tonguez]

"B" for "body"? The bear has the highest "B", and body would make sense for that. The rest?

Yeah I was thinking Brawn, Endurance, Quickness(?) not sure about the rest

 

[Imaculata]

Yes, it's Brawn. I really like the amount of crunch that this system seems to have.

The idea of having the players play the part of a character who works for Lara Croft is a bit odd though. I suppose Lara is an npc in her own rpg then? Why not make the pc's substitute Lara's? I get that they want Lara to exist within her own rpg, but isn't it more fun to be Lara, rather than to be in her shadow?

 

[R_Chance]

Yes, it's Brawn. I really like the amount of crunch that this system seems to have.

The idea of having the players play the part of a character who works for Lara Croft is a bit odd though. I suppose Lara is an npc in her own rpg then? Why not make the pc's substitute Lara's? I get that they want Lara to exist within her own rpg, but isn't it more fun to be Lara, rather than to be in her shadow?

There can be only one This saves the trouble of who gets to be the central character and avoids clashes with "cannon" (is there cannon in TR?).

 

[Tantavalist]

I'm finding it hard to be excited about this. It strikes me as a license being released just for the sake of releasing a license, because Tomb Raider will sell. What exactly will it bring that another RPG couldn't?

There are already quite a few systems around that could be used to create a Tomb Raider-style adventure. Does Lara Croft's universe really have that much lore to it? I haven't played the games much but I got the impression that they were basically "Indiana Jones in modern day with female protagonist". That's a very cool elevator pitch, but just how hard could it be for any GM to just run a Tomb Raider plot using an existing system?

On top of this is the core concept- that Lara Croft will exist as an NPC and the players are assumed to be her gofers. Really? We're going to be paying for the right to say that a fictional character is officially in the game we're running? That and Lara's picture on the front cover when you see it on a gaming store shelf of course, which is presumably what this is hoping to get impulse buys through. But then, is that actually a thing that's happening as often these days?

Now, I don't know anything about the system it'll be using. It could turn out to be amazing. I'll just say that it will have to be, because as I see things that's literally the only reason any gamer could have for buying this.

Tomb Raider is a great concept, but that's all it is- a concept that's easily summed up. It's fine if someone is excited about the news, but for me the burden of making me care about this is very much on the people behind the game and they've got an uphill struggle on their hands.

 

[Marc_C]

My wife is a fan of the game, plays rpgs and is not interested. Quote: "you can do this with just about any modern era rpg. It's a campaign setting."

 

[schneeland]

I tend to say: it's not even a campaign setting. To me, it's a modern pulp setting centered around Lara Croft as the protagonist. Which is perfectly fine for video games, but not that great for RPGs. So unless it's a solo game, I'd rather just play Broken Compass.

 

[innerdude]

I've played every Tomb Raider video game released since 2006, enjoyed all of them to varying degrees.

I even enjoyed the wildly uneven Alicia Vikander movie.

And this announcement elicits a resounding, massive "meh" for me. I just don't see the point.

I guess if it was done as a tightly constructed PbtA playbook, I might find it interesting, maybe.

 

[MGibster]

I saw the thread title and I immediately thought of FATAL.

The idea of having the players play the part of a character who works for Lara Croft is a bit odd though. I suppose Lara is an npc in her own rpg then? Why not make the pc's substitute Lara's? I get that they want Lara to exist within her own rpg, but isn't it more fun to be Lara, rather than to be in her shadow?

I've played in Star Wars campaign in which the likes of Wedge Antilles gave us our marching orders. So long as Lara isn't tagging along and hogging the spotlight I don't think there's much worry about being in her shadow.

 

[Tonguez]

I'm finding it hard to be excited about this. It strikes me as a license being released just for the sake of releasing a license, because Tomb Raider will sell. What exactly will it bring that another RPG couldn't?

There are already quite a few systems around that could be used to create a Tomb Raider-style adventure. Does Lara Croft's universe really have that much lore to it? I haven't played the games much but I got the impression that they were basically "Indiana Jones in modern day with female protagonist". That's a very cool elevator pitch, but just how hard could it be for any GM to just run a Tomb Raider plot using an existing system?

On top of this is the core concept- that Lara Croft will exist as an NPC and the players are assumed to be her gofers. Really? We're going to be paying for the right to say that a fictional character is officially in the game we're running? That and Lara's picture on the front cover when you see it on a gaming store shelf of course, which is presumably what this is hoping to get impulse buys through. But then, is that actually a thing that's happening as often these days?

Now, I don't know anything about the system it'll be using. It could turn out to be amazing. I'll just say that it will have to be, because as I see things that's literally the only reason any gamer could have for buying this.

Tomb Raider is a great concept, but that's all it is- a concept that's easily summed up. It's fine if someone is excited about the news, but for me the burden of making me care about this is very much on the people behind the game and they've got an uphill struggle on their hands.

Laras been around for 24 years across multiple games, 3 movies, 2 comic series and an animated series. The main story focuses on her but there have always been more than one adventurer in the world and a number of the games have her organising expeditions and featuring her friends and allies helping with some missions - so having the PCs take the roles of such allies is Well within the Tombraider lore.

and Yes although its clearly inspired by Indiana Jones, the ‘pulp explorer’ genre as a whole is still valid, especially with Uncharted coming up soon, thus a rule set that allows PCs to raid ancient cities for magical artifacts might attract the demographic beyond just Tombraider fans.

Lara’s world itself includes adventuring in ancient tombs, secret cabals, mystical powers, supernatural beings, dinosaurs, corporate espionage, undead, assasins and Atlantean monsters. The Comics also had her team up with the Witchblade crew, so arcane superheroics is in too

its got potential …

 

[Ixal]

Tomb Raider was always 90% Lara Croft. I don't see how you can make a multi person RPG out of that which doesn't be insanely generic.

 

[Laurefindel]

So is it using a custom system?
Anyone want to guess what the Attributes are?
B.E.Q.P.C.W.D ?

I’m gonna chance…
Brawn
Endurance
Quickness
Perception
Cunning (could also be charisma)
Willpower (could also be wits)
D…

hum, i don’t know what the D could stand for.

 

[J.Quondam]

I don't know much of anything about Tomb Raider, as I never really got into the games.
But i dig that the "zombie" illustration looks like an undead anthropomorphic naked mole rat.

Spoiler

 

[Bill Zebub]

"B" for "body"?

/cough

 

[payn]

My wife is a fan of the game, plays rpgs and is not interested. Quote: "you can do this with just about any modern era rpg. It's a campaign setting."

I think we are going to go through this often with new RPGs. On one hand, I get the reservation about another RPG system, on the other, I say keep them coming because I dont like generic systems. I always keep an ear to the ground in case there are some rules mechanics I want to test out when I dont care for the theme like this Tomb Raider one.

 

[Davies]

I’m gonna chance…
Brawn
Endurance
Quickness
Perception
Cunning (could also be charisma)
Willpower (could also be wits)
D…

hum, i don’t know what the D could stand for.

If W is Wits, then D might be Determination.