Would Tomb raider be popular franchise if it had male protagonist?

[B-Cell_v1legacy]

Hello,

so my friend, I recently tried rise of tomb raider which is uncharted with crafting and female protagonist. except uncharted is lot better. when game start you are just walking in snowy mountain first then climb which is just pressing buttons. then game has magic vision which highlight objects (lol dev think once again we are stupid). anyways fast forward, many fans claim new tomb raider games are dumbed down and older version are better and offer more exploration etc.

but then i look into old TR games, and i have to say they are mediocre as well. terrible controls, terrible camera angle, terrible combat. doesnot age well. i played older TR long ago and then try to replay again and it doesnot age well.

Now thing comes to my mind that is this series only popular because lara croft is female? i mean TR was one of the first game to potray strong female protagonist and lara croft is most recognizable gaming female protagonist.

Now i ask, what if the protagonist is male? would it still be popular franchise? would it still be praised? because i personally thing it would be forgattable franchise and no one would care.

New TR games might improve controls and camera angle which i give them credit but then they replace them with on rail cinematic sequence and magic vision.

so what do you think?

lets discuss

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

It'd be popular with you I'm sure.

 

[CritialGaming]

Hello,

so my friend, I recently tried rise of tomb raider which is uncharted with crafting and female protagonist. except uncharted is lot better. when game start you are just walking in snowy mountain first then climb which is just pressing buttons. then game has magic vision which highlight objects (lol dev think once again we are stupid). anyways fast forward, many fans claim new tomb raider games are dumbed down and older version are better and offer more exploration etc.

but then i look into old TR games, and i have to say they are mediocre as well. terrible controls, terrible camera angle, terrible combat. doesnot age well. i played older TR long ago and then try to replay again and it doesnot age well.

Now thing comes to my mind that is this series only popular because lara croft is female? i mean TR was one of the first game to potray strong female protagonist and lara croft is most recognizable gaming female protagonist.

Now i ask, what if the protagonist is male? would it still be popular franchise? would it still be praised? because i personally thing it would be forgattable franchise and no one would care.

New TR games might improve controls and camera angle which i give them credit but then they replace them with on rail cinematic sequence and magic vision.

so what do you think?

lets discuss

There is nothing to discuss, this already exists. It's called the Uncharted series, and yes it is very successful.

 

[KissingSunlight]

Tomb Raider was the first female character in 3D. So, I think a lot of people, male and female, really gravitated towards that game because of that. Like the OP said, other than the gender of the playable character, there was nothing remarkable about Tomb Raider.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Why bother asking such a stupid question when you already said that TR and Uncharted are basically the same?

 

[Zenja]

I don't think so. The biggest difference between Uncharted and Tomb Raider is evolving reoccurring characters. Tomb Raider uses cookie cutter characters and often favors all new characters not ever mentioned in previous games. You see relationships waver and evolve throughout the Uncharted series helping their Roster not appear so hollow. Nate and Elena, Nate and Sully, Elena and Sully, etc. Naughty Dog knows that half of the adventure is the story. Crystal Dynamics/SquareEnix think the story is just a tool to shove you through the adventure.

 

[McMarbles]

Hello,

so my friend, I recently tried rise of tomb raider which is uncharted with crafting and female protagonist. except uncharted is lot better. when game start you are just walking in snowy mountain first then climb which is just pressing buttons. then game has magic vision which highlight objects (lol dev think once again we are stupid). anyways fast forward, many fans claim new tomb raider games are dumbed down and older version are better and offer more exploration etc.

but then i look into old TR games, and i have to say they are mediocre as well. terrible controls, terrible camera angle, terrible combat. doesnot age well. i played older TR long ago and then try to replay again and it doesnot age well.

Now thing comes to my mind that is this series only popular because lara croft is female? i mean TR was one of the first game to potray strong female protagonist and lara croft is most recognizable gaming female protagonist.

Now i ask, what if the protagonist is male? would it still be popular franchise? would it still be praised? because i personally thing it would be forgattable franchise and no one would care.

New TR games might improve controls and camera angle which i give them credit but then they replace them with on rail cinematic sequence and magic vision.

so what do you think?

lets discuss

Maybe if they changed the name to something different... like, "Unlocated" or "Unfound", or something like that...

 

[Hades]

I thought Lara's assets were always a big part of the charm.

 

[Zenja]

The more I think of it, B-Cell, you seem to forget that Tomb Raider was the first of its kind. Its easy to be unimpressed by it now that generations have copied and improved the formula. It hasnt aged well because we have became masters of what was once a prototype. When Playstation first came out, many games used fake 3d (XCOM, Diablo, Final Fantasy, etc.) And those that actually offered true 3d environments were very small and contained. Tomb Raider contained the player in corridors but the feeling of being able to explore a 3d environment back then was unparalleled. The N64 offered the best selection and on that console but it took years before we saw the likes of Goldeneye and OoT.

Tomb Raider ran along side Quest 64 Tekken and Quake. It was at the time the best exploration 3d game out there. It still held up well against OoT and Goldeneye, especially with the sequel offering new experiences. I used to thing the dirtbike section in 2 was the coolest thing ever in video games.

 

[EternallyBored]

Tomb Raider was the first female character in 3D. So, I think a lot of people, male and female, really gravitated towards that game because of that. Like the OP said, other than the gender of the playable character, there was nothing remarkable about Tomb Raider.

You could call her the first popular 3D female character, there are older 3D female characters out there.

As for remarkability, people who weren't around when the first game came out might not know, but a lot of its popularity came from its graphics and its spot as as one of the first 3D action games that was actually pretty good, for a lot of PC players it was also a good looking PC game that even cross platform you could see the improvements on PC, especially after they put in improvements for those with graphics accelerator cards.

There's nothing remarkable about the old games today because the mechanics didn't age well, but the game was considered good for its time, a look into what 3D games might be able to accomplish, it existed in that weird Time period where tank controls were acceptable and blocky 10 polygon models were more popular than detailed 16 bit sprites.

Tomb raider with a male protagonist would still have occupied the same spot as one of those early 3D games that kind of got us started in the idea of free form exploratory open levels, as well as the quasi realistic scaling and jumping puzzles that would bridge the gap between the zany physics of something like Mario 64, and the much more deliberate climbing and jumping of things like Uncharted.

Even the old reviews mention a lot more than just Lara being female, it's hard to say how much her gender effected sales or popularity, her later status after the first game when they did things like that Playboy article would certainly be different, and without her status as a popular female character from an era with few contemporaries outside of fighting games and JRPGs, you could make an argument that a male equivalent would have been less likely to be rebooted as there would be less to differentiate the series from later imitators.


All in all I would say a male Tomb Raider would have seen similar popularity if only for its mechanics, graphics, and history, but would have been less likely to see the reboot we currently have as her status as a female icon is probably at least part of what saved her after the series took a nose dive in the 2000's

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Doesn't the existence and success of the Uncharted franchise answer the question?

 

[Sniper Team 4]

You got it backward. Tomb Raider isn't Uncharted. Uncharted is Tomb Raider. Tomb Raider came first, and Uncharted copied its ideas and adapted them to the then-current generation of systems.

And frankly, no. Lara Craft sold Tomb Raider. Was a lot of it due to the fact that this was a woman with crazy breasts? Yes. But she was also sassy, smart, independent, wealthy, and could more than take care of herself in a fight. And she wasn't tripping over herself whenever a guy showed up. She was ahead of her time it seems, and there's a reason why people still know her name today, even if they've never touched a video game.
Odds are if you ask people who Nathan Drake is, you're going to get a lot of people who go, "Who?" But ask who Lara Croft is, and you're going to see a light flick on in their eyes.

 

[Chewster]

Dude, how old are you? Tomb Raider is and was very popular. I haven't played any of the more recent games but the impression that I get is that they were generally well received.

Why does Tomb Raider need to be more popular?? The series seems to be doing all right.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Dude, how old are you?

This is a fair question. At this point I think it's fair to assume that B-Cell is not even 18 yet. He doesn't seem to know a lot about older games, and "his" opinion of some of the older games that he likes to talk about is adopted directly from some YouTubers that he likes.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

Dude, how old are you?

This is a fair question. At this point I think it's fair to assume that B-Cell is not even 18 yet. He doesn't seem to know a lot about older games, and "his" opinion of some of the older games that he likes to talk about is adopted directly from some YouTubers that he likes.

I do remember him once mentioning getting married, so he might be older. Although his behaviour once again calls that into question. Then again, physical age is not a guarantee of maturity.

 

[B-Cell_v1legacy]

Dude, how old are you? Tomb Raider is and was very popular. I haven't played any of the more recent games but the impression that I get is that they were generally well received.

Why does Tomb Raider need to be more popular?? The series seems to be doing all right.

i guess you didnot understand the topic. TR is popular franchise but question is would it be if it has male protagonist? and i think it would be forgattable because TR has never been good.

 

[Chewster]

i guess you didnot understand the topic. TR is popular franchise but question is would it be if it has male protagonist? and i think it would be forgattable because TR has never been good.

It seems I did misunderstand you. My apologies. So your question is, would Tomb Raider still be a popular series if it had Larry Croft as the protagonist instead of Lara? Is that basically it?

Well, Uncharted is ridiculously popular as a similar-ish swashbucking adventure series, but it came out last gen, so who knows if Drake would have been better received than Lara way back in the day.

IIRC (forgive me if my recollections are off, it's been years) it wasn't until the later games where more of her backstory was revealed. And I've no doubt her "assets" spurned on some of the characters popularity (especially amongst teenagers like me at the time) but the games were also fun because they were challenging and different than other games. It was one of the first interesting 3D action adventure gemes. It was also like being a more acrobatic Indiana Jones. Sure it doesn't hold up now but at the time it was hella exciting.

So I don't know if the series would have endured as much without Lara Croft but she wasn't the only thing that was appealing about the original games.

 

[dscross]

Ah Lara Croft. The most pixelated legs that were ever labelled as sexy in video game history.