Lara Croft is getting a progression system. That’s the sticking point for a lot of people.
The sixth behind-the-scenes video for Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis has arrived from Amazon Game Studios, and this one devotes its whole runtime to gameplay instead of visuals. Due next year, the remake of Lara’s 1996 debut brings a set of modernized systems with it — and a few of them have landed about as gracefully as a spike pit.
The Focus meter is the easy sell
Uploaded to the official Tomb Raider YouTube channel under the title “Combat & Progression Reimagined,” the video runs through several new mechanics. Game director Raul Siquera leads with the headline addition: Focus.
“When you’re taking damage, dealing damage, dodging attacks, you’re building your Focus meter,” Siquera explained, “Focus allows you to slow down time around you and showcase some of the things that Lara used to do in 1996.” Top up the meter and more of her acrobatic moveset opens up.
Focus has drawn little in the way of pushback, and in fan-discourse terms silence reads as a thumbs up. The footage also sells it well whenever a player chains it together cleanly.
The skill tree is where it falls apart
The remaining two additions — a skill tree and herb collecting — were covered by design director Jason Epps. Neither hides its debt to the Survivor Trilogy from Crystal Dynamics, where scavenging materials fed into ability upgrades.
“When I played the Survivor series and I could suddenly affect and increase Lara’s power in the game, I felt much more engaged,” said Epps. The crafting side runs on a Resident Evil-style system that turns out healing items and buffs for Lara.
Those two took a beating. On ResetEra, a thread discussing the video piled up responses along the lines of “No sir, I don’t like it,” and “I hate it.” One poster asked, “Isn’t she supposed to be a veteran treasure hunter in this game? Why would she be learning new skills at her age?”
There’s a fair argument in there somewhere. Stripped down and free of the RPG scaffolding bolted onto modern releases, the 1996 original was exactly what a sizable chunk of players hoped Legacy of Atlantis would remain.
What the developers are actually building
Taken as a whole, the changes point somewhere obvious: a blend of the original games and the Survivor Trilogy. Hardly surprising, with the series moving toward a more unified timeline across its newer entries.
The skill tree has its own twist, too. Rather than grinding experience points, Lara banks skill points by tracking down in-game artifacts.
As for anyone worried the remake is straying too far from 1996, the developers insist the entire game is beatable with nothing more than Lara’s dual pistols. “If you decide that you want to play with the dual pistols the entire way and be iconic. Absolutely,” Epps said.
Feb. 12, 2027 is the release date for Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis on Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5, Windows PC and Xbox Series X.