Interesting article about the 90s versions of Sony and Tomb Raider

This is ripped straight from Polygon:

https://www.polygon.com/features/2017/7/19/15924004/why-the-man-who-oversaw-tomb-raider-turned-his-back-on-games

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"Financial security for Heath-Smith and the team didn’t negate the long hours and intense work, and Sony was eager for more, no matter what it took.

“There was a finite amount of time in how long the PlayStation was going to be around before they launched the second one, because hardware was on fire. We didn’t have two years to write a PlayStation 2 game, so we needed to make games while [the first] was on the rise,” he says.

“Tomb Raider 2 had to be written within a year, which means the development time was probably about eight months. We worked long, long hours.

“But we also earned an awful lot of money.”

The constant turnover demanded sacrifice, and the sequels “rolled off like a machine”. The quality suffered, and so did the sales. By the time Angel of Darkness, the sixth game in the franchise, was released, Eidos had had enough — the game was riddled with bugs and critically panned.

Heath-Smith was fired."

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This isn't the first I've read about Sony demanding games annually and wanting to work developers to death. We've heard similar stories about the teams behind Crash Bandicoot, Spyro the Dragon, Jet Moto and Twisted Metal. The PS1 had a lot of franchises with annual sequels in the 90s.

It's interesting how much Sony gets knocked today for almost giving their developers TOO much freedom and leeway- many of their games have seen long delays in recent years, some games like TLG and Nioh taking a decade to complete. Perhaps Sony learned two things after coming off the initial success of the PS1: owning/controlling your own IP is essential to the industry (after losing Crash and Spyro) and rushing developers does not make a good working environment or finished product.

Also, weird how Sony and Tomb Raider always get paired up together even though the original TR launched on the Sega Saturn then later the PS and PC. But I suppose the TR franchise has always been branded with Sony and Playstation.

Thoughts? Interesting? Bored to tears? Blog it?

You're not allowed to talk ill of Sony here. Especially if you don't bring up how shitty MS is with them. As for the topic. It's interesting, but kind of irrelevant. I think Sony went from one extreme to the other like you said. And extremes aren't good.

It's not really talking "ill" about Sony. More about their growth as a video game company from their initial beginnings to modern times. Some companies don't change their business practices but it seems they have for the better.

If only MS was as dedicated and close to the development of Scalebound. . .

@jcrame10: Yeah for the most part I agree. There's a lot of things Sony does though, that I find very shady.

Oh yeah I meant to say following the talking ill of Sony comment to expect a bunch of cows to come in here and bring up MS, and bash them even though the topic has nothing to do with them. Our cow friend moogenga just reminded me lol

That's very interesting. Thank for sharing, jcrame!

I think in light of this, hats off to modern Sony for giving developers the time and freedom they need to create their work at a reasonable pace.

like what?

@jcrame10: Their marketing of the PS Pro. Passing off games like No Man's Sky, and Crash as exclusives. Not doing cross play with MS and Nintendo. Raising their price of PS plus, especially when it's inferior to XBL. I really hope you're not trying to argue that Sony doesn't do shady things. God I hope you're not another cow, I'm so tired of them lol.

I havent followed much of the PS4 Pro campaign as I dont plan on buying one. I dont think exclusivity marketing is as big of a deal with something like No Mans Sky as much as the bait and switch of what the game actually was. Nowhere on NMS or Crash Bandicoots PS4 boxes does it mention exclusivity. Yeah they raised the price of PS Plus which sucks but its now the exact same as Xbox GWG so it cant really be said that one deal is better than another.

I think the worst thing Sony does is allow too much creative freedom within their studios and when things get whacky they decide to close them. For example, Zipper and Evolution.

Thanks. You're welcome.

Yeah, very interesting read if you're into the behind the scenes stuff of the industry.

The Topic is about Sony, Tomb Raider, Core Design, Eidos...

Don't see why its relevant to bring up Microsoft. Microsoft wasn't even relevant to the gaming industry when all of these things were happening lol

@jcrame10: Yeah at first they put only on Playstation for Crash then removed it. And what about not doing cross play. I don't get that. There excuse was lame af lol

Just doing the System Wars thing. Wanted to see if I could start a tussle lol

TBH I think Nintendo and Microsoft are only doing it because they are losing to Sony. And since Sony is winning, why would they want to do it?

I dunno what will happen to Crash I'm sure Sony is fighting for exclusivity but Activision will be greedy and want it to go everywhere. Sony would have had to pay a LOT of money to keep it only on PS4.

@jcrame10: Ok and you don't think that not wanting to do cross play is shitty? I mean MS even invited Sony to do it.

It definitely is.

@primorandomguy: people will inevitably respond to you with anti ms comments because the reality is that ms has a really long list of being shady and anti consumer. It's only in the position of weakness that they put on a pro-consumer face. Sony may have been impossible to work for back in the day, but look at how they've turned things around for devs. I'd say they've evolved for the better, and their AAAE, AAAAE games being produced speak for themselves.

Can't really say the same for MS. It seems like they're always floundering, or playing catch up. The end result is no real quality exclusives, likely due to poor management. But from your post history, it seems that you're satisfied with low quality products from ms, so this message will likely miss you.

@jcrame10: That really sucks. In my Playstation days I couldn't find too many people that didn't play Tomb Raider then it did go downhill really quick. Now seeing the state that it's in and how little influence it has kind of sucks. I remember when Laura Croft was damn near the Sony Playstation mascot now they quietly shifted to Kratos, Nathan Drake, and Crash. I think if they would've been looking at things from a longevity point of view as opposed to an annual cash grab point of view Tomb Raider would still be a Sony exclusive powerhouse. Now it's being compared to new IP's like Horizon Zero Dawn and the majority of people that played both games prefer the latter smh

Although the AI is dumb as a rock Tomb Raider 2 is one my fav games, love the huge intricate levels.

One of the appealing things (espcailly in 2) was knowing a trap could lob your head off or a T-Rex could come directly charging at you out of the darkness. It created slow but tense gameplay. The later games start adding checkpoints every 5 feet, so anything remotely approaching a threat dissipates into inconsequential.

Having to navigate the levels for what is basically, key hunting. Is replaced by Lara specifically telling you what to do, having items highlighted rendering the entire thing pointless 10 feet away in the same room.

They seem to have it drilled into their heads as well that people absolutely love QTE's. Since about Angel Of Darkness they haven't removed them but in fact increased.

Tomb Raider 2 > Reboots

@uninspiredcup: yeah it's insane how much different the later tomb raider games are from the original ones. Most people wouldn't have the patience for the older ones nowadays

To be fair, that was still better than how Nintendo treated third-parties back then.

Quick turn over for sequels was quite common in the 90s and even early 00s, its what the game libraries for the PS1 and PS2 so spectacular. We has more AAA titles releases over a 2 years period than the entire length of this gen.

Sony was the Apple of the 90s. Sony wasn't the only group making money off these releases. These other companies wanted to shovel out as much product as possible.

Similar to stories about GTA..I think its hard to get away with it these days as games will be exposed and so will poor working conditions.

Fair points, and a good reflection. I think Sony's need/desire to come out the gate strong lead to a need for aggressive handling of the IPs then. Now they seem much more balanced, since the brand is well established.

@shellcase86: that's pretty much the message I took away from the article as well

Hell, even before the PlayStation was conceived as a standalone console, they were still shady as hell with their end of the deal with Nintendo.

@nintendoboy16: actually Nintendo was the shady one. Ask the previous partner they tried to rip off before Sony: Phillips

You guys are probably both right. Both Nintendo and Sony did or tried to do something shady, but Nintendo did the double crossing. If Nintendo didn't cancel the contract for the SNES-CD Sony would've had a lot of control over software licenses for the SNES-CD format.

How did Nintendo rip-off Philips?

So, having a loophole that has Sony manufacture discs with Nintendo's licenses without their permission isn't shady? Just because they never did it because of Yamauchi and Lincoln's actions, doesn't make it less shady.

Philips would've been better off with Nintendo. The CD-I failed.

1. Sony should never be knocked for giving devs too much time, at the least not if you're a fucking consumer - I understand if you are invested in them, and would like them to manage their money better, I guess. but Sony has a healthy offerings of games made quickly that make good money, and other productions that take awhile. Delays are a good thing, most games actually benefit from a long delay. All a long dev cycle means is that the game had some trouble in development, so no, the game wouldn't have been better if it was done in 3 years as opposed to 7. If anything it would probably be messier.

Sony gives their teams a chance to salvage the project n turn it around. Yeah the Last Guardian didn't exactly light the world on fire, but the medium, the art, is better for a game like that existing, than it is with Sony cancelling that shit. Rushing out a bunch of games before they have proper time to be finished creates an initial sour taste in peoples mouths that the game has to over come for the long haul: See Street Fighter V which is a damn good game now, but stupid people still say dumb shit about it. Like for starters, you actually have no excuse but your own if you honestly feel you don't get enough fight money to buy characters through the in game currency and not spend your own actual money.

2. Not surprising, gaming has a long history of shitty practices with crunch. I remember stupidly some people on this forum have looked at that as being more "passionate" or "loving their work", but it's actually fucking unhealthy, counter-productive, and the medium would benefit if it's working class actually got to work more manageable schedules so they don't burn out and leave the industry permanently.

@jcrame10:

Funny, Tomb Raider 2 was rushed in 8 months yet it turned out to be the best in the series.

Good point!

How is that Nintendo's fault? Nintendo gave them their licenses, and Phillips used those licenses to produce the worst Mario & Zelda games ever made. The CD-i deserved to fail.

I prefer the original TR. But TR2 is my second-fave in the series.

@primorandomguy: How is NMS not exclusive? Can I play it on a switch, WiiU, Xone, XoneX, Atari 2600?

@vfighter: It's on PC. It's a console exclusive.

@nintendoboy16: How was Sony's actions at that point shady? It was right in the contract with Nintendo, if Nintendo did t like it they could have said no or negotiated a new deal, not drop Sony at the consumer electionics show after Sony already presented and then go with Sony's rivals. That was shady of Nintendo, not Sony.

I'm sure that Nintendo probably didn't know that the CD-i would fail.

Being in the contract doesn't make it less shady. Again, I'm not denying Nintendo wasn't shady. But I'm utterly sick of Sony being seen as the good guys in that situation, when they clearly weren't. Both sides were evil, but only one got away pretty much scott free just because the other acted horribly on it. In fact, being on the contract and showing that Sony has an edge makes it worse.

@killered3: crash and spyro were also rushed out in 8-10 months each time and each game was stellar