Tomb Raider was 'losing relevance' before reboot

The upcoming gritty Tomb Raider reboot was borne out of necessity, as the character had become less relevant to modern gamers, according to global brand manager Karl Stewart. In an interview with Rock Paper Shotgun, Stewart explained some of the thinking behind this more realistic (and injury-prone) take on Lara.

"We felt [Lara] was losing some relevance in the gaming world, that she was a little too hard and removed," said Stewart. "We wanted to make her more approachable and relatable. I think this was a perfect time for us to reimagine the franchise, taking Lara back to her roots. I think it's growing to be a great way for players to learn to reknow who Lara is, retell her story."

He said part of this was removing her usual skill set, so she wasn't "perfect." The modern gamer can relate more to a "complex hero." Part of the reboot, though, came from a storytelling standstill. "We'd taken her to a great place, to somewhere she had some closure," Stewart said. "There weren't really many more stories we could have told. So we feel like with this new place we have fertile ground and there's a lot of places we can go to."

On the gameplay front, Stewart also addressed the quicktime scenes -- which looked heavy during the game's E3 presentation. "What we're trying to do with quicktime events is make some parity between what you see, so we're trying to use the analog stick as much as possible," he said. "We're in tutorial-heavy areas, so across the whole game it'll feel a lot less."