Tomb Raider (2013 video game)
"Tomb Raider" was released as scheduled on 5 March 2013 for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows. However, it was released early in Australia, being available on 1 March 2013. On 25 April 2013, "Tomb Raider" was released in Japan. A ported version of the 2013 game to the Mac OS X was released by Feral Interactive on 23 January 2014. "Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition", an updated version, was released in North America on 28 January 2014, in Australia on 30 January 2014, and in Europe on 31 January 2014 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One containing all features and DLC. Unlike the previous installments that received a T rating, "Tomb Raider" is the first game in the series to receive an M rating by the ESRB, due to blood and gore, intense violence and strong language.
Lara Croft
Core Design, a subsidiary of Eidos, created Lara Croft as the lead protagonist of its video game "Tomb Raider", which began development in 1993. Lead graphic artist Toby Gard went through about five designs before arriving at the character's final appearance. He initially envisioned a male lead character with a whip and a hat. Core Design co-founder Jeremy Smith characterised the design as derivative of Indiana Jones, and asked for more originality. Gard decided that a female character would work better from a design standpoint. He also expressed a desire to counter stereotypical female characters, which he has characterised as "bimbos" or "dominatrix" types. Smith was sceptical of a female lead at first because few contemporary games featured them. He came to regard a female lead as a great hook and put faith in Gard's idea. Inspired by pop artist Neneh Cherry and comic book character Tank Girl, Gard experimented with different designs, including a muscular woman and a Nazi-like militant. He settled on a tough South American woman with a braid named Laura Cruz. Eidos management preferred a more "UK friendly" name, and it is claimed that "Lara Croft" was selected from similar-sounding British names found in an English telephone directory in Derby, where the Core Design developers were based. (A road in Derby was later named after Lara Croft.) An alternate explanation is a homage to an accountant named Laura Croft. Along with the name change, the character's backstory was altered to incorporate a British origin. Gard also cited "Virtua Fighter" as an influence on the creation of Lara Croft, stating: "It became clear to me watching people play "Virtua Fighter", which was kind of the first big 3D-character console game, that even though there were only two female characters in the lineup, in almost every game I saw being played, someone was picking one of the two females."