I then asked Inna to draw me a few sketches and she gladly did so (see above).

Jonathon, who wrote the music for my E3 video, agreed to compose the music for this project. He perfectly captured the Slavic motifs.

And so after a few sleepless nights and many pages of handwritten text I’ve put together this animation in After Effects. 

A few Tomb Raider fansite admins and fans offered their help with translating this video:

• Bulgarian Subtitles by Tomb Raider Passion
• Croatian Subtitles by Ana Schindler 
• German Subtitles by Lara’s Generation
• Russian Subtitles by Laracroft.ru
• French Subtitles by Brice Jeunieaux

Lastly, the video featured on the official Tomb Raider Blog, Twitter and Facebook.

I’m very grateful to everyone who was involved in this! Here’s the result of our work:

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New cover photo for our FACEBOOK PAGE! 

Signed by

Noah Hughes – Creative Director at Crystal Dynamics

 Jill de Jong – official Lara Croft lookalike model (Tomb Raider 6)

John Stafford – lead narrative designer (Rise of the Tomb Raider)

Earl Baylon – the voice of Jonah in Tomb Raider (2013) and Rise of the Tomb Raider

Rhianna Pratchett – writer (Tomb Raider 2013 and Rise of the Tomb Raider)

Peter Connelly – composer (Tomb Raider 4-6)

Shelley Blond – Lara’s voice in Tomb Raider (1996)

Andy Sandham – level designer and writer (Tomb Raider 3-5)

Brian Horton – Game Director at Crystal Dynamics

Darrell Gallagher – head of Square Enix studios in North America, and Europe

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Official concept art for Lara Croft Relic Run

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LONDON,15^th October 2015 – Square Enix is
very proud to announce that over 10 million Lara Croft: Relic Run fans have
downloaded the mobile game to date since its launch on May 28^th 2015.
To celebrate the occasion, Square Enix has released a new update that will further
enhance player’s gameplay experiences with some great new additions.

What’s new? Well, Lara
Croft can now explore a new Mountain Pass location as well as jump on a Snowmobile
to beat Yetis and Ice Spiders. Not only this, but her new powerful mini-gun
will help to protect players against the “New Demon”, a new boss that shoots
ice into Lara’s path, creating difficult obstacles that need to be avoided…so
make sure you take him down!

Lara Croft: Relic Run
offers fans a fresh experience every time they play, ensuring no two runs are
ever the same. An improved tutorial, new campaign map and campaign mode whereby
players work through levels to complete objectives and collect relics to unlock
a new location, have also been added. Localised into English, French, Italian,
German and Spanish, as well as Brazilian and Portuguese, Lara Croft: Relic Run
is a must-play for Lara Croft and mobile gaming fans alike. There’s no time to
waste, download the game now and see how long you can survive.

·        
AppStore – https://itunes.apple.com/app/lara-croft-relic-run/id960251959?ls=1&mt=8

·        
GooglePlay –http://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.squareenix.relicrun

·        
Windows – http://www.windowsphone.com/s?appid=4bfa010c-2e5f-4da8-86fa-03de83fb1ba3

For more information:

• Visit us on Facebook at Facebook.com/LaraCroft
• Follow @LaraCroft on Twitter

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Thinking of getting involved in the video games industry? Here are some interesting tips from Ian Livingstone! #createuk

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From top to bottom:

1 Lara by All Hallows Church. Inspired by the All Hallows level 

2-4 Lara by St Pauls Cathedral inspired by Thames Wharf level in
Tomb Raider 3

5 Lara with a Tower Bridge and the Shard building in the
background

6 Lara with the London Bridge and the new Square Enix Europe
building in the background.

7 an improvised Lara Croft manor scene J (you can see me on the
right lol)

 inspiration pics:

Special thanks to Survivor Reborn for all the help!

See more LED art here

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As part of my degree I had to produce a detailed report for the Independent Study module. I wrote mine on Square Enix Europe. I’ve got 85% for it and decided to publish one chapter

Eidos was founded in 1990 by Stephen Streater. The
company initially focused on video-compression and non-linear editing software
for the Risk OS, in the process revolutionising the video editing industry.
This was helped in no small part by Streater’s use of his PhD research on image
processing to create a new video compression technology, a technology they sold
to Oracle for £36m.  “I thought we’d sell our technology to Larry
Ellison (Oracle)," says Streater. “Eidos had the only
technology that could do full-screen, full-motion video in software. And in a
$200 computer you can’t put in a $400 accelerator card.” 

After they got the £36m in 1996, Eidos bought
Domark and Centregold Group, with its subsidiaries Core Design and
US Gold. From this point on Eidos focused on video-games, completely abandoning
video-editing; the distribution element of Centregold was sold to focus solely
on developing and publishing.

In 1996 Eidos published Tomb Raider (developed
by Core Design) – the most influential video game in its history.

In 1998 Paramount Pictures acquired the rights to
Tomb Raider and its protagonist, Lara Croft.

By 1999 Eidos acquired developers Crystal Dynamics
and Pyro Studios.

Stephen Streater leaves, multiplying his original
investment – , £4 – by a million.

Streater set up Forbidden Technologies,
licensing video editing technologies from Eidos, which by now was almost
completely concentrating on games. 

By 2000 Eidos published a number of successful
games including Legacy of Kain(developed by Crystal
Dynamics), Hitman (developed by IO Interactive), Deus
Ex and five instalments of the Tomb Raider game
series. In 2000 Eidos also won two BAFTA awards for Deus Ex and Sydney
2000. In 2001 Eidos won another BAFTA forChampionship Manager.

Despite their other successes, Tomb Raider remains
the most important entity in the Eidos empire. Eidos shares regularly close
high on the NASDAQ and London Exchange before the release of a new installment
of the successful series.

Part of SCi

In late 2004 Eidos announced that it was in early
discussions with a small number of companies in relation to a possible
takeover.

In early March 2005 it was revealed that the
company’s pre-tax losses had grown to £29m.

A couple of weeks later Eidos announced that it took
the second takeover bid from SCi – another well-known British video games
publisher and developer. SCi offered £74m and a clear plan to restructure the
company in an attempt to cut annual costs. By May Eidos became a part of SCi.

In 2008 SCi’s annual report revealed that the
company had suffered a £100m in loss. CEO Phil Rogers linked this to the
organisation’s restructuring. SCi then changed their own name to Eidos Plc.
including changing their stock exchange index from SEG to EID.

Part of Square Enix and rebranding to Square Enix
Europe

In 2009 Square Enix acquired Eidos Plc for £84.3
million. It was announced that Eidos would remain independent. Contrary to this
it was then announced that the European Division of Square Enix would merge
with Eidos to form Square Enix Europe. All the studios owned by
Eidos retained their names including Eidos Montreal and Eidos Shanghai.

This merger was accompanied by some cuts in
jobs.

Despite this little changed in the routine of the
company. Phil Rogers remained CEO and Square Enix kept its promise not to
interfere with inner affairs of the former Eidos.

See this timeline for a brief history
of Core Design and Eidos

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55 Ashbourne rd. Derby. This is where Lara was created

 And right next to it is the Croft House!

2 Roundhouse rd, Derby. Core moved here later on and remained here right until they were sold to Rebellion Interactive. The studio was then shut. 

Founders of Core Design Jeremy Heath-Smith and Adrian Smith found Circle studios in Derby. It is now defunct. Pic was taken in 2009.

And Lara Croft Way of course. I made many friends Online because of Tomb Raider. And when they visit I always take them to all these (plus a few other) places. It is like a Tomb Raider pilgrimage! 

So during one of these times we actually occupied Lara Croft way (Anonymous was very active at that time :P)

Wimbledon Bridge House. Eidos/Square Enix Europe moved to central London last year.

Rhona Mitra’s costume in the former Eidos office

Lucy Clarkson’s costume

Jill de Jong’s costume.

Me with Lara

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