WITCHBLADE/TOMB RAIDER CROSSOVER ANNOUNCED

I'm a bit late with this addition, but hell, I have a lot of work to do, even on weekends (yes, I'm speaking about earning money).

TopCow announced a new and exciting sequel to the first successful Witchblade/Tomb Raider story - this time Sara goes to London to investigate certain sinister matters, and she meets Lara Croft who will lend some assistance again in her fight against the bad guys... and maybe also against the Witchblade itself..

For more information, visit the TopCow site and check out what they have to say about Sara's upcoming adventures with our Holy Ponytail.

- Romulus

October 23, 1998

CORE MISSED THE POINT

The heavy blade of the law was swung and threats of a legal action were sent to a benevolent, however somewhat incautious Tombraider fan who dared to do what CORE was unwilling to accomplish – he planned to release a level editor to CORE’s famed game, Tomb Raider.

Now you wonder if he wanted to sell his editor for big bucks, if he plotted to include an illegal copy of Tomb Raider with his program – any of these actions could have justified CORE’s move completely, but the truth is different: he simply wanted to create a tool with which to enhance the replay value of Tomb Raider and to prolong the life span of the game, something that CORE was never wanted to do. Why? Do they fear that with a level editor released, the demand for a new Tomb Raider game would decrease? Well, they would not have to go very far to see the true value of allowing the fans of a game to create their own levels. id did permit their customers to build their own worlds around Doom, Quake and Quake2, and the same applies to LucasArts – these wise giants recognized the potential marketing possibilities in user created levels and made a bold decision to go where other companies like CORE and Eidos are still unwilling to follow them.

Strictly from legal point of view, CORE was absolutely right to protect their interests. But if we examine their motives, we will be a little bit confused. The legal representative of CORE was speaking about “damages” that CORE may sustain as a result of copyright infringement. Now what kind of damages would a level editor do to CORE? I presume, that raising the number of people interested in buying and playing Tomb Raider would results in a negative damage, that is, profit, so CORE’s attitude is simply dumb (unless they want to release a level editor for Tomb Raider IV. But then my question is: why don’t day say so?). I heard comments from game developer companies on user made level editors and levels, and their greatest worry was that these programs and level would not match the quality of the original levels – I have to say that these worries cannot be justified at all. I have played user created levels for Dark Forces – most of them were made by using the unofficial DFuse editor – and I can report that many of these level did not only rank with the original game, but some of them even surpassed it. Not to mention that the author of DFuse ended up as a LucasArts employee – those who played Jedi Knight might remember his name, he is Yves Borckmans.

Do you remember when Lucasfilm launched a short lived campaign against ‘illegal use of copyrighted Lucasfilm material on fan websites’? The outcry against this attack on harmless fan sites was so intensive that they issued an explanatory statement. Of course, when I say ‘harmless’ I do exclude warez dudes who deliver pirated stuff – they really do harm unlike those who simply insert a scanned picture of Lara Croft or a Tie Interceptor into their home page.

I think the keyword and the primary factor that determines the tolerance level of companies for fan stuff is greed. Companies which want to squeeze the last cents from their properties will wreak havoc on unsuspecting fans who dare to post anything which may be considered copyrighted, and they reach their goal through the abuse of their economic power. How many of us have the necessary financial background to take on a legal battle against a software giant to prove that we were within the limits of ‘fair use’? (As far as I know there are definitions for 'fair use" but usually definitions can be bent and twisted to mean something different).

The biggest problem is that we, customers are no more humans in the eye of the companies. We are purses with a behavior pattern which should be studied, understood, exploited and manipulated. Can you sense the danger in this attitude? Our voice is not heard any more. Only our behavior counts. We may whine about the quality of a game, we may write anything to newsgroups about how a particular game degrades and still if we go to the shop and buy the next crappy sequel because we cannot resist the temptation just like a heroin addict cannot resist, we will play right into their hands.

You may ask why Core and Eidos do not realize the potential in user support, why they do not allow customers to build their own levels and create their own editors? The answer is simple: if you study TR1, 2 and 3 you will see that despite their claim about significant improvements in the game, no profound changes have been introduced (and will be introduced with the releas of TR3). The levels are still built of square blocks with a slanted or flat top (which constantly reminds me of the Rise of the Triad and Wolfenstein 3D), there are only minor tweaks to Lara’s body mesh, a few new moves are added to her repertoire, and a couple of environmental effects and new enemies to spice up the otherwise repetitive and all too familiar surroundings. I hope that Core follows in the footsteps of Doom – Doom II was a turbo Doom I, something to chew on until the coming of Quake. id allowed the fans to dig into the code and create their own Doom worlds – they knew that this will give them the time frame to develop Quake fully and keep the legend alive. Core does not allow fans to do the same. Does it mean that Core doesn’t plan to release anything new and revolutionary? In that case, their concern that a level editor would reduce the merchantability of their product may not be entirely

These are disturbing questions. I fear that Tomb Raider IV will turn to be another Alien IV – a total disaster.

A scooper reported that although the model and her agent work hard to further Annalise's acting career (read the previous article in the Archived News section), no interest is shown to consider her for the role of the upcoming Tomb Raider movie or any role in a U.S. movie right now.

EIDOS TV has launched a new game in which you can win exclusive Lara wallpaper. They have also revamped the Demo section and finally they updated the Calendar section. Demo is still scheduled for a November release - but if we consider that the TR2 demo was out well before the actual game's release date then we might fear that the game is pushed back. (I hope that they will remove that stupid 'save crystal" feature from the final version).

- Romulus