Character Analysis: Lara Croft from 2013's Tomb Raider

In March of 2013 a new Tomb Raider game was released on Playstation 3, Xbox 360, and Microsoft Windows systems. Later the same game became available for Playstation 4, Xbox One, and OS X systems. This game got high reviews by sources such as Metacritic, Game Informer, and IGN and even got the "GamesMaster Gold award". One of the most interesting aspects of this game is that it covers Lara's first expedition and shows her development into the Lara Croft of earlier installments of the series. This game also solidified Lara's backstory that has been changed a number of times throughout her series. Throughout the game itself, Lara goes from being a young and fairly innocent girl, to the hardened "survivor" that seeks adventure in other games.

My Steam library on my Windows Computer.
Surprisingly, these aren't the only games I own from the franchise.
I swear I don't have a problem.

Before I begin deeply analyzing Lara Croft's character development in the game, I just want to say I've owned and played a lot of the Tomb Raider games in the series. I've played and owned games on console and on my Windows computer. Thanks to Steam I was able to purchase almost all of the games in the main series for myself. I plan to save up for the new Rise of the Tomb Raider game but am actually borrowing a friend's copy in the meantime. Even though I've played majority of the games, I have not seen any of the film adaptions. I've loved every Tomb Raider game I've played and in turn I absolutely love Lara Croft.

"I hate tombs!" -Lara while falling into a tomb in Tomb Raider (2013)

Quick Overview

Name: Lara Croft

Timeline: Survival Timeline

Birth Date: February 14, 1992

Nationality: English

Marital Status: Single

Games: Tomb Raider (2013), Rise of the Tomb Raider

Voice Actress: Camillla Luddington

Tomb Raider (2013) immediately begins with the ship Lara is on, The Endurance, crashes onto the lost island of Yamatai. Alone, cold, and injured, young Lara desperately searches for her friends with only a torch and a radio at her side. Fueled by fear and the will to survive, Lara further explores the island in search of her friends and a means of escape. The island itself shows signs of inhabitants in the forms of dead bodies, sacrificial rituals, and abandoned campsites. Building up her skills and acquiring new equipment, such as a pry axe and a bow which remain with Lara through the game as weapons that can be improved with salvage, Lara once again makes contact with the other survivors of The Endurance and in turn learns more about the history of the island.

For the majority of the game, Lara is disgusted by all the death surrounding her and becomes very emotional when she causes someone to die. The gameplay itself can take a stealthy route without killing many people but players are forced to kill at least some people to continue in the game. Critics argue that this distracts from the story and Lara's character development but I personally don't feel it did. I also however chose to be stealthy rather than aggressive so I guess I stuck true to Lara's in-game character. Whatever the case, Lara soon learns the inhabitants of the island are not only aggressive killers but also insane. Fear turns to hatred as Lara learns that not only have most of her friends get captured but the leader of these inhabitants, Mathias, plans to use her best friend Sam in a deadly fire ritual to the late Queen Himiko, whom Sam is the direct descendant of. She almost becomes numb to the numerous deaths of the Solarii Brotherhood, the men who follow Mathais, that she causes. This however doesn't mean she becomes numbed to death itself as she feels bad for innocent people who weren't as lucky as her on the island and lost their lives from either the Solarii or from other hazards of the island. When she witnesses the death of her friend Grim, whom sacrificed himself to allow Lara to continue, she is left emotionally scarred from the experience. Although she continues on to ensure his death wasn't in vain, Lara still mourns her friend on multiple occasions and she blames herself for his death.

The death of Grim wasn't the only emotional death of a friend for Lara. After she reunites with the other survivors from The Endurance crash, she painfully witnesses the deaths of two other friends she held close in her heart. The death of her mentor and caretaker Roth was one of the most emotional parts of the game for not only Lara, but the player as well. Soon after Lara also loses one of her best friends Alex in an explosion. All of these deaths were sacrifices made so that Lara can continue on her adventure. These deaths also deal a massive blow on Lara's mental health, making her seem more crazy and taking more risks in the final parts of the game. At one point Reyes, a survivor of The Endurance crew,  even mentions "Seems anyone caught with you has a pretty low survival rate" in which Lara replies "Better keep your distance then."

Lara after killing Mathias

In the final stages of the game, Lara has pretty much lost any girlish innocence she had at the beginning. She no longer lets any fear control her or even allows herself to fear anything in the first place. She has her goals in mind and she does whatever it takes to accomplish them, no matter how many enemies she has to kill to get there. By the end of the game, she's the hardened survivor and adventurer that she is depicted as in other games.

In the following game that was recently released, Rise of the Tomb Raider, her character development continues. In the sequel, which takes place soon after Tomb Raider (2013), her character is supposedly expanded upon. I personally am excited to see if this is true. The Rise of the Tomb Raider wikia summarizes the story "After she encountered an immortal being [supposedly Himiko from the previous game], Lara spent a year researching eternal life to both understand and prove what she saw. This research leads her on a quest to find Kitezh, a mythical city both founded and lost in what is now Russia's Siberian tundra." I haven't gotten the chance to experience the game for myself yet.

Lara Croft from different games.
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Lara Croft has become an icon in the gaming industry as one of the first strong female protagonists. Throughout her many games, she has been rein-visioned multiple times. Because of this, she has been given three different backstories which in turn have created three different "timelines". These timelines include the "Original Timeline", the "Legend Timeline", and the "Survival Timeline". I'm not including the comic or film timelines. The games of the "Original Timeline" include Tomb Raider (1996), Tomb Raider II, Tomb Raider III: Adventures of Lara Croft, Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, Tomb Raider: Chronicles, and Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness. In 2006 the series was rebooted and Lara was given a different backstory and personality. These next games were dubbed the "Legend Timeline". These games include Tomb Raider: Legend, Tomb Raider: Anniversary, and Tomb Raider: Underground. Finally in 2013, the series got another reboot. In this reboot they made massive changes to Lara's character and backstory. There are only two games in this "Survivor Timeline" so far and they are Tomb Raider (2013) and Rise of the Tomb Raider.

These three different timelines can be interesting to research and compare their differences and perhaps I'll do another post about them eventually.

So far, the Lara of the "Survivor Timeline" is very interesting and I like who each game is being released in chronological order so us players can follow her story easily and without any timeline confusion like many other video game series. Although I can see the newer Lara slowly turning into the woman we know from the original Tomb Raider games, its very obvious that they are still very different Laras. It makes me so happy that developers love Lara Croft so much that they continue to evolve her character, as well as her polygon count. She's not just a reoccurring protagonist, she's also an evolving one.

It's amazing to see how far she has come.
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