June 17, 2010

Guardian of Light Demo at E3

Crystal Dynamics' Karl Stewart and Daniel Neuburger gave an exclusive demo of Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light for IGN's live broadcast from the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles this week. (Watch the video below.) Along with more on both the co-operative and single-player mechanics, the guys highlighted the game's vertical level design. We see Lara and Totec working their way down to the lower levels of the Spider Tomb, climbing, grappling, and dispatching enemies in barrages of sweet pyrotechnics.


Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light screenshot
(click for full-size image)

The development team is striving for the perfect balance between exploration, puzzle solving and combat—crucial for any Lara Croft game. The area we see in the video is a bit combat heavy, but Karl promised more exploration in other levels. He also mentioned the inclusion of "critical and non-critical tombs," meaning that for the casual player there are faster routes through each area. Hardcore raiders can choose to take on more difficult puzzles in order to unlock side areas containing special rewards and power-ups. Daniel mentioned how they've included a variety of tools that will allow players to solve each puzzle in various ways. The game also includes leaderboards and achievements to sweeten the pot.

Daniel also revealed some new info on the single-player game. Instead of playing as Lara with an A.I. companion, he explained, the solo mode involves Lara alone, with different puzzles and extra abilities that enable her to navigate each level independently.

No release date has been announced yet, but the news out of E3 is that Guardian of Light will be part of Xbox Live's third annual Summer of Arcade promotion, meaning we should be seeing the game very soon.

The word of the day: "co-op-etition!" Wait a minute, guys, is that even a word? ;)

P.S. I've also added four new screenshots to the collection in the LCGOL intro post.

7 comments:

  1. Stella! Eidos and C.D. have answered your wish! I chuckled when I heard the developer say they designed the game so you have easy routes for players who simply want to beat the game and hard routes for us expert players (referring to your request during Book Bonanza month). And I quite enjoyed Jessica Chobot's "guns" comment at the end there. Guardian of Light is JUST AROUND THE CORNER!! (And now we know a pillar release is in production!!!!)

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  2. I know! Yay for multiple paths (and yay for single-player as well as co-op). I could do without the boob jokes myself, but I've sort of resigned myself to it.

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  3. Thank you for catching that interview. It was long enough to really get the feel of the game and actually see how much fun and replay it will deliver. I'm looking forward to it's release even more now.

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  4. Hi Stella,

    Can I check with you if you know any place that details the "Legend", "Anniversary" and "Underworld" story arc? I have played all 3 games and I roughly understand the story about Lara finding her mum. I just can't make out the details based on the gameplay...

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  5. Sure thing, anonymous. Wikipedia has pages for each TR game with plot summaries. Go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomb_raider#Games and click the game titles beneath the world map (or use the search function to find the individual game pages).

    WikiRaider.com also has plot summaries and a wealth of other TR info.

    Happy hunting!

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  6. Hey Stella, just wondering if this is the new tomb raider game? I like know it is, but my only problem is I heard some people talking about this just being a arcade game of some sort. I heard the new TOMB RAIDER 9 name has not been released yet. By the way, u are a legend!!! ;)

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  7. Hi, anonymous. Thanks so much. :) And, no, this isn't TR9. You'll hear the guys in the video mention the "pillar game" or "pillar release"; that's Tomb Raider. It's in development but probably quite a ways off. As you heard, this is just a little arcade game they're releasing between "big" games. If you click "guardian of light" under "Labels" below the blog post or in the right-hand column, you can see all the other news and info I've posted about this game.

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