In our interview with the Multiplayer Producer, he assures us that Tomb Raider benefits from having his ‘specially picked team’ handling online, leaving Crystal to focus purely on Lara’s solo trials.
”Your first question is going to be “Why?” Right?” began Joe Khouri, pre-empting our thirst for knowledge. He reveals his online devs have been at Eidos Montreal for two years.
Tomb Raider is advantaged in that Crystal Dynamics’ needn’t trouble themselves with trying their hand at multiplayer, which of course would risk attention to deal on Lara’s singleplayer story, as Joe Khouri’s team can handle it thanks to plenty of experience with online gameplay. Fans of Tomb Raider shouldn’t fear the online component.
”…it’s going to be all about Lara in the singleplayer,” affirmed Khouri in our interview.
”But if you look at the videos we’ve shown, Lara is not alone on that island. She meets other shipmates, she meets other scavengers who don’t want her to leave… so she does meet other people. The earlier Tomb Raiders were all about Lara on her adventure alone, but in this one she encounters other people on her side and against. So the story element for this gave us a bunch of characters that we could use who players would know, and could play around with in Multiplayer.”
We also ask the Multiplayer Producer if online games always have to include the likes of Team Deathmatch?
”I think for the sake of being familiar, they might,” he replied. ”We acknowledge that this isn’t necessarily the mode that’s going to set us apart, and that’s reflected in the other modes… but it’s easy. You can’t ship a game with just a Team Deathmatch though, that was not what we wanted to be our ‘defining’ factor of Tomb Raider multiplayer.”
It includes Team Deathmatch, FFA (free-for-all), and then the more flavoured Rescue and Cry for Help modes. The Eidos Montreal team also have introduced what will really help set Tomb Raider apart online; traps. Players can set up deadly traps for others to stumble into, which can really help gain XP.
Check out our full interview with Joe Khouri as we discuss Tomb Raider’s fresh online credentials.
Tomb Raider releases on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC March 5th.