Prime Video's New Tomb Raider Reboot Gets Exciting Filming Update With Tease Of Game-Adapting Tone

From Croft Manor to the Dragon’s Triangle · Eight Questions How Well Do You Know Tomb Raider? “A famous explorer once said the extraordinary is in what we do, not who we are.” 🌏Core EraPolygon pioneers 🏫Croft ManorCountry-house wealth 🎢Lost TombsAncient relics 🏹Survivor EraReborn on Yamatai 🔫Twin PistolsAkimbo signature RAID THE TOMBS → 01 The original Tomb Raider launched in October 1996 on Saturn, PlayStation and PC, becoming one of the defining 3D action games of the early polygonal era. The studio that built it was a small Derby-based team that would develop the franchise through six numbered entries before the rights moved to Crystal Dynamics. Name the original developer. ARare BCore Design CBullfrog Productions DCrystal Dynamics ✓ Correct! Core Design — the Derby studio founded in 1988 by Jeremy Heath-Smith. Core developed the first six Tomb Raider games (1996–2003), with the first installment selling over 7 million copies and turning Lara Croft into the first superstar of 3D gaming. After 2003’s critically panned The Angel of Darkness, publisher Eidos handed development to Crystal Dynamics — ending Core’s run with the franchise. ✗ Wrong. The answer is Core Design. Rare made GoldenEye and Banjo-Kazooie. Bullfrog (Peter Molyneux’s studio) made Theme Park, Dungeon Keeper and Populous. Crystal Dynamics is correct only for the post-2006 reboot era. Core Design is the original Derby studio that built the first six Tomb Raider games. NEXT → 02 Lara Croft was designed by a 23-year-old Core Design artist who would later quit the studio over creative disagreements before returning years later as a consultant on the Crystal Dynamics reboot Legend (2006). He’s widely credited as Lara’s creator. Name him. AToby Gard BHideo Kojima CTim Schafer DShinji Mikami ✓ Correct! Toby Gard. He pitched a male, Indiana-Jones-style hero that was rejected, then redesigned the character as British archaeologist Lara Croft — reportedly with stylistic nods to Tank Girl and to Cuban-Spanish action heroine Néra. Gard left Core after the first game over disputes about Lara’s commercialisation, returned in 2006 to consult on Legend, Anniversary and Underworld for Crystal Dynamics. ✗ Wrong. The answer is Toby Gard. Hideo Kojima created Metal Gear at Konami. Tim Schafer is the Day of the Tentacle / Psychonauts designer at LucasArts and Double Fine. Shinji Mikami created Resident Evil at Capcom. Lara is the singular work of Toby Gard at Core Design. NEXT → 03 Across every iteration of the franchise — original PSX games, Crystal Dynamics reboot trilogy, the Jolie and Vikander films — Lara is consistently portrayed as a wealthy aristocrat from a country-estate background, complete with manor, stately library and disapproving family. Of which country is she a citizen? AIreland BUnited Kingdom CUnited States DCanada ✓ Correct! The United Kingdom. Lara is canonically English — the daughter of Lord Henshingly Croft (in the Core continuity) or Lord Richard Croft (in the Crystal Dynamics reboot timeline), with Croft Manor sitting in the home counties. The plummy received-pronunciation accent has been a fixture across every voice actress (Shelley Blond, Jonell Elliott, Keeley Hawes, Camilla Luddington, Hayley Atwell). ✗ Wrong. The answer is United Kingdom — specifically English. The Croft estate, the family title and Lara’s clipped RP accent all anchor her firmly in British country-house aristocracy. Ireland, the US and Canada have never featured in her backstory in any continuity. NEXT → 04 The first big-budget live-action Tomb Raider film hit theatres in June 2001, opening to over $47 million domestically and at the time setting the record for the highest-grossing opening of a film with a female lead. The film’s star was a then-25-year-old Oscar winner whose father played Lord Croft. Name the actress. AFamke Janssen BJennifer Garner CAngelina Jolie DCharlize Theron ✓ Correct! Angelina Jolie, fresh off her Best Supporting Actress Oscar for Girl, Interrupted (1999). The casting included a memorable detail: Jolie’s real-life father Jon Voight played Lord Richard Croft in the film, briefly reuniting the famously estranged pair on screen. A 2003 sequel — The Cradle of Life — followed but underperformed, and the Jolie continuity ended there. ✗ Wrong. The answer is Angelina Jolie. Famke Janssen was Jean Grey/Phoenix in the X-Men films. Jennifer Garner had the Alias / Elektra action-heroine credits. Charlize Theron took on similar roles in Aeon Flux and later Atomic Blonde. Jolie was Lara in 2001’s Tomb Raider and 2003’s The Cradle of Life. NEXT → 05 The 2013 Crystal Dynamics reboot kicked off the “Survivor trilogy,” recasting Lara as a younger, grittier explorer. The opening hours have her shipwrecked on a fictional island in the Dragon’s Triangle, ruled by a violent cult led by a man named Mathias and haunted by the spirit of an ancient sun queen named Himiko. Name the island. AYamatai BVilcabamba CAvalon DSkull Island ✓ Correct! Yamatai — named for the legendary 3rd-century Japanese kingdom believed (in Chinese sources) to have been ruled by Queen Himiko, whom the game uses as its supernatural antagonist. The 2013 reboot sold over 14 million copies, kicked off the Survivor trilogy (Tomb Raider 2013 → Rise of the Tomb Raider 2015 → Shadow of the Tomb Raider 2018) and re-established the franchise as a tentpole. ✗ Wrong. The answer is Yamatai. Vilcabamba is the lost Inca city Lara visits in the original 1996 game. Avalon is the Arthurian setting of Tomb Raider: Underworld (2008). Skull Island is from King Kong, not Tomb Raider. Yamatai is the storm-cursed Dragon’s Triangle island of the 2013 reboot. NEXT → 06 In March 2018, Warner Bros. and MGM rebooted the film series with a new origin story directly adapting the 2013 Crystal Dynamics game. Lara’s younger, leaner reimagining was played by an Oscar-winning Swedish actress fresh off her Best Supporting Actress win for The Danish Girl. Name her. ANoomi Rapace BRebecca Ferguson CAlicia Vikander DSofia Boutella ✓ Correct! Alicia Vikander, who’d won her Oscar for The Danish Girl (2015) and built physical-action credibility with Ex Machina, The Light Between Oceans and Jason Bourne. The 2018 film hewed closely to the 2013 game’s shipwrecked-on-Yamatai plot. It made $274 million worldwide on a $94 million budget — profitable but soft — and a Vikander-led sequel was put on hold during MGM’s acquisition by Amazon. ✗ Wrong. The answer is Alicia Vikander. Noomi Rapace had her own action-heroine moment via the original Swedish Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy. Rebecca Ferguson is the Mission: Impossible series’ Ilsa Faust. Sofia Boutella starred in The Mummy (2017) and Atomic Blonde. The 2018 Lara is Vikander. NEXT → 07 In the original Core Design games (1996–2003), Lara Croft’s instantly recognisable weapons load-out — holstered on either thigh and pulled in akimbo-style during enemy encounters — was a pair of what? (The 2013 reboot famously replaced this with a more grounded survivalist tool.) ATwin pistols BTwin SMGs CTwin crossbows DTwin daggers ✓ Correct! Twin pistols — the dual-wielded handguns holstered on her thighs that you’d unholster mid-cartwheel against velociraptors and Bengal tigers. They were Lara’s signature for the entire Core Design era. The 2013 reboot deliberately ditched akimbo gunplay in favour of a recurve bow as her primary weapon — a more grounded survivalist tool that became the new visual signature. ✗ Wrong. The answer is twin pistols. SMGs (Uzis), shotguns and a magnum were upgrades you collected through the Core games, but the default-equipped infinite-ammo signature was always the twin pistols. Crossbows and daggers don’t feature in the original era. The bow only becomes Lara’s signature in the 2013 Crystal Dynamics reboot. NEXT → 08 Tomb Raider’s original publisher was Eidos Interactive. In 2009 Eidos was acquired by a Japanese gaming giant — bringing Tomb Raider, Hitman and Deus Ex into a single Western-development house. The same publisher would then divest the entire Western portfolio (including the Croft IP) in 2022 to a Swedish parent. Name the 2009–22 publisher. ASega BCapcom CSquare Enix DKonami ✓ Correct! Square Enix bought Eidos in April 2009 in a deal worth roughly £84 million, folding it into Square Enix Europe. Square’s controversial sales targets (the 2013 reboot’s 3.4 million copies in its first month was reportedly considered a disappointment) drove much of the franchise’s strategic identity for a decade. In 2022 Square sold the entire Crystal Dynamics / Eidos-Montréal / Square Enix Montréal group to Sweden’s Embracer Group for $300 million — a remarkable bargain that briefly made Embracer a major Western publisher. ✗ Wrong. The answer is Square Enix. Sega has its own Western studios but never owned Tomb Raider. Capcom’s Western portfolio is much smaller. Konami’s Metal Gear era was over by 2009. Square bought Eidos in 2009 and held the IP for 13 years before selling Crystal Dynamics, Eidos-Montréal and the Tomb Raider rights to Embracer Group in May 2022. REVEAL MY RATING → Field Notes · Final Tally Your Tomb Raider Standing 🎢 / 8 Master archaeologist — or stranded on Yamatai already? ⤴ RAID AGAIN