Christoph Hartmann, studio head at Amazon Games, says Tomb Raider studio Crystal Dynamics is “fairly protected” from the volatility of its parent company Embracer Group and that the next Lara Craft game is making progress.
In an interview with IGN, Hartmann largely brushes aside concerns about the as-yet-untitled Tomb Raider game, even though the company with the rights to the IP, along with other big-name publishers, is at the epicenter of the industry’s ongoing layoff crisis. According to Hartmann, Crystal Dynamics is relatively safe from Embracer’s wrath, despite parting ways with a comparatively small 10 employees in September.
“People obviously look at what the parent company is doing, but it’s never impacted resources and never led to any changes in management, so it’s all fine,” Hartmann tells IGN. “I mean, the bar is set very high when developing a new Tomb Raider. The longer you’re at it, the higher the expectations get, so it’s a huge, huge task, but it’s moving forward. I mean, there are some really great ideas here.”
Hartmann says there is no news on the new Tomb Raider title – as Gamescom 2024 viewers know only too well – but assures that “things are going well, things are evolving,” adding: “As far as I can tell, Crystal has been pretty sheltered, because even if you look back before … they’ve already gone through a few changes of ownership anyway, it’s nothing completely new for them.”
The long-overdue Tomb Raider game was first announced by Crystal Dynamics more than two years ago, and a few months later, Amazon Games announced that it would take over publishing duties from Embracer. We haven’t even seen a teaser trailer for the game yet, nor anything from Amazon or Crystal Dynamics.
In the meantime, Netflix’s Tomb Raider anime gets a new teaser trailer and our best look yet at Hayley Atwell’s Lara Croft.
