Tomb Raider (2013 Game)

Tomb Raider 9 is the codename for Lara Croft's latest adventure, This has been a hot topic in the fan community in quite a long time, with Tomb Raider Forums filling up with suggestions as well as rumours the fans themselves found investigating in the subject of Tomb Raider 9.

First Announcement
In an interview with GamingIndians.com, Ian Livingstone, Life President of Eidos Interactive, announced that the next Tomb Raider was currently in the works. Livingstone stated "I think it will surprise a lot of people and reinvigorate the franchise." Tomb Raider 9 is currently being developed by U.S. studio Crystal Dynamics.

Leaked Material
When Underworld was ended, the fans started discuss on what will be the upcoming next epic adventure with Lara Croft.

Fans quickly started suggestion threads on the Tomb Raider forums, the numbers of posts grew larger for every day, then suddenly some unkown pictures with a description surfaced upon the web on the website 4Player Coop.

The artwork
These were stated that they were the first artwork for Tomb Raider 9,

- The first picture shows off a female character that looks like Lara Croft holding a torch.'''  - The second picture shows off 3 creatures that do not look very human. ''' - The third picture shows off the "Lara Croft Lookalike" sitting on the riding horse holding a bow and an arrow trying to shoot the 3 creatures from the second picture.



The images had also a description included.

The description
The description said the following:

"When a sudden storm destroys her research vessel, a young and inexperienced Lara Croft finds herself stranded on a mysterious and remote island hidden off the shores of Japan. Despite several signs of various inhabitants the island is oddly deserted, and an uneasy feeling settles in as strange sounds emerge from the shadows. 

"With only her determination, inner strength, and resourcefulness to help her, Lara must overcome the challenges of a harsh and unforgiving journey that will take her across a vast island wilderness and deep into the claustrophobic and menacing underground tombs from the island's past. 

'"As she struggles to prevail through brutal combat encounters and treacherous exploration, Lara will be pushed to her limits and forced to adapt to her situation in order to survive and escape from the lethal predators that stalk her every move." '

Features include:

'* Hunt or Be Hunted: Evade, outsmart, trick and kill the mysterious enemies that hunt you as prey.
 * Survival Action: Brutally attack and defend yourself as you fight to survive through visceral one-on-one melee combat.
 * Strategic Weapons: Gain an advantage in combat by finding an array of different melee and ranged weapons including a variety of guns, and the hunter's ultimate weapon, the bow.
 * Creative Survival: React and adapt to the island by using only that which you can salvage from the environment like climbing axes, rope, and machetes that can be used to unlock new traversal and combat game play options.
 * Free Movement: Scramble up a vertical cliff wall, sprint and leap across a huge chasm, steer mid-air to land a misdirected jump: There is no one right way to traverse, survive, and explore the harsh environment of the island.
 * One Cohesive World: The diverse multi-region island is an open playground alive with creatures, weather, and natural events.
 * Origin Story: The new Tomb Raider concept reboots the franchise by exploring Lara Croft's transformation into a hardened adventurer as you unravel the story behind the island's mysterious past.'

Fueling the fact that these, may be for real the authentic pictures of the upcoming Lara Croft adventure.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light
With fans thinking about the newly leaked information about Tomb Raider 9, the official first pictures of the upcoming Lara Croft adventure Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light (Lara Croft TGOL) was announced, the fans got a major shock and started to talk and discuss on the forum begging that this was not the future for Lara Croft, and begged that this was not Tomb Raider 9.

The official Lara Croft forum moderator, Keir, said that "Tomb Raider 9" is in works, and that TGOL was just a new Spin-Off project from the Tomb Raider games entitled Lara Croft, making the Tomb Raider fans both excited and calm.

6th December 2010
The only thing that the fans had to discuss were the over and over recycled news about the old pictures of Lara Croft leaked by 4Player Coop.

But on 12th Novemeber 2010, new rumours started to grow when the Game Informer magazine released a 2 page large teaser commercial with a shipwreck stranded on a shore with the exact same color scheme as the previous leaked pictures.

The teaser have the title "A SURVIVOR IS BORN" together with a small text saying in the corner: "Next Issue, Cover Reveal: December 6th, www.gameinformer.com



A SURVIVOR IS BORN
Quickly fans of the franchise began connecting the dots, and one of them were Gian Carlo from the Tomb Raider Forums who posted the original article from EuroGamer.net who connected the dots first.

Every Tomb Raider fan on the forum got a major shock, but this time positive with alot of excitment.

In a matter of days, the post got more than 500 posts, and some of them were focused mostly on to track down this mystery and prove if this have a connection to Tomb Raider after all.

Copyright
After some some days, fans began to reveal that the title "A SURVIVOR IS BORN" is Copyrighted by Square Enix, more or less proving that this may be the newest Tomb Raider Adventure.

Website Registration
Without any fans knowing about this, in 2010 on May 10th, a website named www.asurvivorisborn.com was created, and after the rumours started on the 12th November 2010, the website got huge viewing ratings because of the amount of excited Tomb Raider fans around there.

But to be extra sure and continue the investigation if this really is Tomb Raider 9, the fans of Tomb Raider decided to track down the website provider.

Website Registrations are a well known source to track down if it's really an upcoming title to a game franchise or not, with the help of WHO IS Tomb Raider fans tracked down information that once again shows that the teaser may belong to the Tomb Raider franchise afterall.

The check up showed that the website www.asurvivorisborn.com is registered to CSC CORPORATE DOMAINS, INC, the same company that the official Tomb Raider website (www.tombraider.com) is registered to, giving even more fuel to the rumours.

Official Forum Moderators Reactions
The official moderators for the official Tomb Raider forum, Keir and jaywalker began a discussion on the screenshot of the "A SURVIVOR IS BORN" teaser that a forum member released on the official forum, and Keir together with jaywalker began to act that "they do not know what this is because they've never seen this before... but that it looks intressting." and made a quite of a good roleplay acting like they do not know what's going on, and when a member asked "So it isn't TR9?" Keir answered: "I guess we'll have to wait and see."giving even more fuel that this may be the official Tomb Raider 9 teaser.

Tomb Raider title revealed?
After the A SURVIVOR IS BORN investigation began, the fans tracked down it as far as to one motion editors Kevin Wang's profile on LinkedIn.

The profile shows off a title underneath the category "Game Credit:" called "Tomb Raider Ascention" together with "(2011)" right beside it, even though it was wrong spelled, Ascention means Ascension.

A screenshot got captured by one of the fans, and suddenly after the picture got released, Kevin Wang's profile got deleted, proving that the next Tomb Raider name might be Tomb Raider: Ascension.

Additional & Important info: There is a fan made movie called Tomb Raider: Ascension already, and it should not be thought of that Kevin Wang maybe ment he did the effects for that movie, because the movie was released in 2007, and Kevin Wang's profile clearly state that the "Tomb Raider: Ascension" he's talking bout, is going to be released in 2011, and is under the category Game Credit.

Other Magazines announce the new Lara Croft
After the Game Informer's teaser, other magazines such as GameMasters Magazine published a commercial that they were going to publish a new article on 4th January 2010 featuring Lara Croft.

The commercial features the cover picture Lara from Legend with a text saying "Hello Stranger" and then with a smaller text: "She's back! - Get the full story in GM...

The Confirmation
On December 6th, the Game Informer cover was revealed. As expected, Lara was in that cover with a render that proved the previous leaks were real. We were about to see a completely different Lara, younger, as this game is a reboot to the whole franchise.