Tomb Raider RPG Cancelled For Creative Differences

Evil Hat Publishing has just announced that the official Tomb Raider TTRPG has been cancelled.

Sad news: We are canceling the Tomb Raider RPG project. Due to creative differences we couldn’t get our vision to gel with the licensor’s, so we've chosen to part ways.

The stellar team designing this game put their hearts into making this an exciting, dynamic RPG of adventure and exploration.

We're proud of the work they've done and we plan to retool the project as a standalone game with a fresh, original setting.

You haven’t seen the last of it.

An official Tomb Raider RPG was originally announced by Square Enix in 2021 for the 25th anniversary of the property. 2023's Lara Croft's Mark of the Phoenix released as free PDF on the Crystal Dynamics website.

The Evil Hat version was announced in February 2024 as a full-color hardback book. The plan was to allow you to play Truth Seekers, allies and contemporaries of Lara Croft who Indiana Jones out hidden artifacts for the benefit of good.

Explore hidden tombs and uncover powerful secrets! Defy danger as you race to discover forgotten artifacts and prevent nefarious forces from exploiting them! Race to unearth secret artifacts and forgotten truths in order to save them from the nefarious forces that would exploit them!

Mystery awaits, and sometimes, the answers we seek can only be found in shadow…

In this officially licensed tabletop RPG you play members of the Truth Seekers: contemporaries of Lara Croft who strive to reveal long-hidden knowledge and thwart those who would steal and exploit artifacts for their own gains. It is a game of action, exploration, and self-discovery. Face perilous challenges and tough choices as you learn what it takes to be a hero.

Tomb Raider: Shadows of Truth requires 3-6 players, pencils, paper, the rulebook, and at least six 6-sided dice in order to play.

Your group will collectively create their Team using one of the Team Playbooks and then build individual Team members choosing from the Crafter, Scholar, Hunter, Companion, Legacy, Changed, and Reclaimer. One player, the Keeper of Truths, describes the dynamic and compelling world around the Team as they all make the connections which bring the adventure to life.

Collect Truths and draw upon your Maps, Aid, and Lore to boost your rolls as you race to enter the Final Tomb!

The Truth is hidden. The Truth is dangerous. And in the end, the power of Truth is what we make it.

 

[schneeland]

Matt Gaston, a senior employee of Crystal Dynamics, made his own Tomb Raider RPG as a passion project, which was released on Crystal Dynamics' own website, but they've since purged it, ostensibly due to the one being developed by Evil Hat.

Seems to still live on here: croftgeneration.com.

 

[JConstantine]

Seems to still live on here: croftgeneration.com.

Indeed, that's what I linked to earlier.

 

[schneeland]

Indeed, that's what I linked to earlier.

Ah! Sorry, then! I somehow thought you were referring to the CD page, from which it was removed.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Evil Hat excited to salvage treasure from cancelled Tomb Raider RPG

No tombs, no Croft, no problem.

www.rascal.news

More details on the game that was and what's being taken forward to the new iteration.

I had not been aware of how strongly anti-colonialist the game was intended to be, which definitely sets it apart from others in the genre, to be sure.

 

[Nikosandros]

Evil Hat excited to salvage treasure from cancelled Tomb Raider RPG

No tombs, no Croft, no problem.

www.rascal.news

More details on the game that was and what's being taken forward to the new iteration.

I had not been aware of how strongly anti-colonialist the game was intended to be, which definitely sets it apart from others in the genre, to be sure.

The article is beyond a paywall, but I wonder if the licensor was looking for something less political?

 

[SteveC]

More details on the game that was and what's being taken forward to the new iteration.

I had not been aware of how strongly anti-colonialist the game was intended to be, which definitely sets it apart from others in the genre, to be sure.

It wouldn't surprise me if this was the case. I would say a Tomb Raider game is squarely in my wheelhouse for interests, and I loved Outgunned when I had the chance to play it. This game, was not the sort of thing I'd be looking for, to say the least. Now will it find an audience? I'm sure it will. But not with people who are interested in action-adventure games about rescuing/raiding treasure out of tombs. Very much a "to each their own" situation.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The article is beyond a paywall

Huh. It wasn't earlier.

The big takeaways is that this was a PbtA game that subverted the whole genre by directly addressing the colonialist nature of Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider, etc. Now they have to figure out why PCs are running around in tombs and ruins if their primary goal is to undo the harms folks like Indiana Jones and Nathan Drake have done. ("World Court Raider" doesn't have quite the same ring.)

 

[Nikosandros]

Huh. It wasn't earlier.

The big takeaways is that this was a PbtA game that subverted the whole genre by directly addressing the colonialist nature of Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider, etc. Now they have to figure out why PCs are running around in tombs and ruins if their primary goal is to undo the harms folks like Indiana Jones and Nathan Drake have done. ("World Court Raider" doesn't have quite the same ring.)

Thanks for the clarification. I don't know it this is touched upon in the article, but it does seem possible that the licensor wanted something more standard and in-genre. But then again, looking at Evil Hat past products, it is not a surprising take from them, IMO.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Thanks for the clarification. I don't know it this is touched upon in the article, but it does seem possible that the licensor wanted something more standard and in-genre. But then again, looking at Evil Hat past products, it is not a surprising take from them, IMO.

Yeah, if the licensor didn't know what they were getting, that's on them. That said, it could be a matter that either Evil Hat went harder than expected, or the people in charge at the licensor changed over the course of the project. Or maybe the vision for the Tomb Raider franchise (which has been aware of the harms to indigenous people in more recent games, per the article) has changed.

It does sound like there's zero bad blood on either side.

 

[JConstantine]

Now they have to figure out why PCs are running around in tombs and ruins if their primary goal is to undo the harms folks like Indiana Jones and Nathan Drake have done. ("World Court Raider" doesn't have quite the same ring.)

That's easy:
Tomb Savers
The PCs are part of a specialist team under a UNESCO-style organisation, who are tasked with finding and securing sites of cultural and historical significance to protect them from the likes of Jones, Croft, Drake and co.