Lara Croft (Tomb Raider) Discussion

Lara Croft is the main character of the video game series Tomb Raider. The Tomb Raider franchise has spawned 9 main titles in the series, two isometric side-games, a few handheld games, mobile games, and even a DVD game. The franchise has been rebooted twice, and the most recent title in the series is currently a reboot, with a second game in the series to be releasing the holidays of 2015.

Lara is an archaeologist and a treasure hunter, having found the fabled weapon Excalibur of King Arthur, and Thor's Hammer, among plenty of other fascination discoveries. The Tomb Raider games usually revolve around Lara trying to uncover a mythical object, hidden deep in the world. Lara has an arsenal of weapons with her, ranging from her array of guns, to secondaries like grenades. While she prefers to use her weapons, her kicks can be quiet devastating.

Lara is quick and agile, and even faster on the trigger. She's not a force to be reckoned with.


Reasons for Crusade
She's a fast an agile character, and I feel her move-set could fit in with the rest of the characters.
If characters likes Crash could get in on this, Lara has a fair chance too.


Note: I just wanted to leave a quick note before I get into the move-sets and all that good stuff. I vaguely remember her being talked about when I first stumbled across this game a year or so ago. I don't know what became of that discussion, but I think a lot of her move-set was either unfinished, or just not thought of to be good enough. I don't know if she was confirmed or not to be added at a later date, or as DLC, but I honestly can't find anything about it. I don't see her used in the list of unofficial characters either. I want to apologize ahead of time if this post isn't needed.

Anyway, hopefully this could help the character be considered otherwise. I'm open to critiques, slamming, shaming, and the occasional but rare nice comment.


Move-set:

(In-case this is too elaborate, or over-powered, I've taken to making some alternatives moves at the end to hopefully compensate.)

Gimmick: Interchangeable weapons and gear specials.
If the special button is held with their appropriate direction (Or lack-there-of in the case of a neutral special), Lara will cycle through her arsenal of weapons, grenades, and gear. If the special is used normally, the appropriate item will be used.


Neutral Special: Interchangeable Weapons

(Note: Would ammo limitations be possible, or maybe some form of overheat mechanic to ensure the
guns can’t just be sprayed? Maybe a slower rate of fire?)

Suggested Weapons:
Pistol (Akimbo) - Lara’s default weapon of choice. She shoots two pistols, alternating her shots.
Pump-Action Shotgun – Lara switches to her trusty shotgun. A powerful, short-range burst shot; however it’s slow due to her having to pump the gun every shot.
Assault Rifle – Lara pulls out a rifle. It could shoot in bursts of three, or be fully auto.

Side Special: Interchangeable Grenades
Frag Grenade – Lara tosses out a frag grenade in front of her, detonating either on impact, or with a timer. The grenade can roll on flat surfaces and slopes. (Roughly 2-3s?)
Sticky Grenade – Lara tosses out a grenade that can stick on the surface, or the enemy. Detonates after a few seconds. (Roughly 2-3?)

Down Special: Interchangeable Gear (Cannot be switched after use.)
First-Aid – Lara pulls out a medi-kit, and bandages her wounds. Restores a small amount of her life. One use. (Roughly 10%? One use per game? Per death?)
Crowbar – Lara pulls out a crowbar. The crowbar can be used like a normal item, replacing Laras’ jab combo, and possibly her smashes. Breaks after some usage. (Slim damage increase, 1-3% maybe?)

Up Special: Grappling Hook – Lara throws her grappling hook above her. Can be tossed up and to a diagonal for better recovery. Minimal to no damage when hit with. Effectively is a tether recovery.


General Attacks:
Jab: Lara assumes a combat stance and delivers two punches, followed by a swift knee to the stomach.
Stilt: Lara delivers a swift elbow swing to her enemy.
Dtilt: Lara plants her hands on the ground, and kicks out one leg in front of her.
Utilt: Lara punches straight up above her.


Smashes
Ssmash: Lara rears up her leg, charging up to deliver a devastating sideways kick.
Dsmash: Lara gets low to the ground, planting her hands down, and charges up for a quick spinning leg sweep.
Usmash: Lara slides her leg out in front of her slightly, and charges up to deliver a kick straight up into the air.


Aerials
Nair: Lara lays sideways and delivers a dropkick to her foe.
Fair: Lara swan dives into her opponent.
Bair: Lara turns her head and quickly tucks one leg under the other, jutting the other one in front of her. (See Dash below.)
Dair: Lara shoots down at a slight angle, putting the full force of both her feet into her opponents face.
Uair: Lara does a drill kick upwards.

Throws
Grab Attack: After grabbing her opponent, Lara bashes her opponent in the head with the base of her pistol.
Uthrow: Lara tosses her opponent into the air, and pulls out her shotgun, delivering one quick shot to her opponent.
Dthrow: Lara throws her opponent to the ground, pulls out her pistol, and quickly shoots them.
Sthrow: Lara throws her opponent forward, and quickly pulls out her rifle, delivering a quick burst of bullets into them.
Bthrow: Lara tosses her opponent behind her, pulls out her akimbo pistols, and delivers a few bullets to her enemy quickly.


Final Smashes
Final Smash: (Excalibur; Thor’s Hammer) Lara could either randomly pull out the Excalibur sword, or Thor’s Hammer. Both would function similarly, except the sword would be faster but weaker, and the hammer would be stronger but slower. Both would have increased damage, and replace her smashes and jabs with new attacks.


Excaliburs’ jabs would consist of two diagonal slashes, followed by a quick stab forward.
Thor’s Hammers’ jabs would be bulky side swings, and a powerful down swing to end it.
Excalibur and Thor’s Hammer have the ability to expel pulses of energy when swung. Instead of being able to smash, Lara would swing her weapon in the chosen direction to expel the blasts, as well as the weapon itself being capable of dealing damage. The sword and hammer could have energy meters, or expel after a short period of time. (Could just use one weapon.)


Alternative Final Smash: Staff of Osiris
Horus and Isis have lent a staff for Lara to use in her time of need. The staff is capable of emitting a light beam that deals high damage, but cannot be used any way else. The beam could be shot in all directions.


Other
Dash: Lara dashes forward at her enemy and quickly jumps forward, tucking one leg under the other to form a triangle, and using her other leg to unleash a powerful kick. (Basically a Sex Kick.)

Jumps: Her usual forward jump, followed by a quicker forward swan dive somersault.

Dodges: Laras’ backward dodge roll would be a backwards handspring.

Entrance: Lara comes in from off screen on her motorcycle, ditching it off the platform edge.
Taunt: Lara spins her pistols with her fingers, then holsters them.
Win: Lara pulls out her pistols, and blows the smoke from the barrels.
Lose: Lara glares at player.


Alternatives
I'm going to put these in a spoiler to save space.

Alternatives Moves:

Also, her swan dives won't end up in her being killed like in the game.

Nice work

imo, the new reboot should get some use for sure. It's pretty popular and a damn good game

*Only looks at the title name*
Oh boy, here we go...
*clicks on post and looks at moveset*
Holy crap, actual effort...

I prefer that the up-special to have a bit more tweeks. Besides that you have my support.

definitely has my full support

This is genuinely impressive, especially for your first post. Well done!

I really like that Up Special, but I agree it probably requires a little tweaking. The interchangeable weapons has been proposed for other characters, but this one actually almost seems like it'd work. I'm a little unclear on how the input for switching weapons is different from using them, though. The alternate scheme you suggested, where each Side Special switches to the corresponding weapon, is probably the best way to go, in my opinion.

Work in the axe if you think you need to, but, honestly, Lara here should definitely represent the main series (you know, the iconic, actually good games, as opposed to the Uncharted wannabe we got in 2013, with it's quick-time events, and distinct lack of tombs and puzzles, and regenerative health, and freakin' cover shooting, and failed attempts at having emotion, and likable characters, and someone who even vaguely resembles Lara Croft as the protagonist, etc., etc.)

But, yeah, anyways, you got my support!

Perfect Hell wrote:

Nice work

imo, the new reboot should get some use for sure.  It's pretty popular and a damn good game

If I were to implement something from the Tomb Raider Reboot, it would be the Bow, that thing is REALLY awesome, that and MAYBE an alternate TR Reboot costume?

Lara is a character worth considering with games worth playing, and she seems pretty fitting in Crusade's environment. This post does her some great justice; Eidos would be proud.

Full support.

I've been waiting for this suggestion for some time now. I must say that it has an excellent presentation.

I remembered that I made a move set for her. Gotta go find it. Though I do remember that I had Excalibur and Thor's Hammer used as her smash attacks with Atlantian Scion as final smash.

You got my full support!

Awesome work. Hopefully we see Lara in this game in the future.

Smash King wrote:

I've been waiting for this suggestion for some time now. I must say that it has an excellent presentation.

I remembered that I made a move set for her. Gotta go find it. Though I do remember that I had Excalibur and Thor's Hammer used as her smash attacks with Atlantian Scion as final smash.

I remember your moveset including the artifacts from the games, whereas this one seems more like Lara using herself and weapons as opposed to artifacts. iirc your jab or one of the tilts used the dragon knife

I'm glad to hear everyone likes the ideas so far.

As for the USpecial, does anyone have any ideas? I've been trying to come up with another idea, but I'm kind of stumped.

Just for reference, I do love the new Tomb Raider reboot. I also thought about the compound bow, but I felt it would be too similar to Links bow.

Keeping with the gimmick of her interchangeable gear, maybe she could use the rope and "fire" arrows as well as the basic ones?

Personally, I think the bow would best be implemented in a Reboot Lara alt. I'm probably the only one here who thinks this, but I never really liked the bow all that much(or reboot Lara, for that matter). I'd be much more in favor of working various artifacts into the moveset(i.e., Dagger of Xian Smash, Scion of Atlantis Final Smash). That said, I won't argue against it if it's incorporated well.

Naughty Ottsel wrote:

Work in the axe if you think you need to, but, honestly, Lara here should definitely represent the main series (you know, the iconic, actually good games, as opposed to the Uncharted wannabe we got in 2013, with it's quick-time events, and distinct lack of tombs and puzzles, and regenerative health, and freakin' cover shooting, and failed attempts at having emotion, and likable characters, and someone who even vaguely resembles Lara Croft as the protagonist, etc., etc.)

Hoping your aware that that is an extremely unpopular opinion in general. Tomb raider reboot was incredible, received very high accolades and critical acclaim, and even was up for game of the year in multiple outlets. To each their own, but be aware that the general consensus is as i've described and as such is more than deserving of representation.

Perfect Hell wrote:

Hoping your aware that that is an extremely unpopular opinion in general.  Tomb raider reboot was incredible, received very high accolades and critical acclaim, and even was up for game of the year in multiple outlets.  To each their own, but be aware that the general consensus is as i've described and as such is more than deserving of representation.

I know I'm in the minority here, and I agree that if most people here want the reboot represented, then it should be represented. I understand that a lot of people liked the reboot, even if I can't comprehend why, since it I think it resembles Tomb Raider about as much as Devil May Cry resembles a stale croissant. Even if the reboot is arguably a decent game (not something I believe), it just wasn't Tomb Raider, it didn't have the great tried-and-true gameplay of the old series, and the extent of Lara's development (something that was really never wanted by anyone) was to get physically abused, cry for a bit, then shoot people in the head unflinchingly. After sobbing over shooting a guy that was going to rape and murder her. Rinse, wash, cauterize several days after receiving wound, repeat.

But I digress. My opinion of the reboot aside, I'm mostly concerned about how it's implemented and whether or not it works well for Lara in Crusade. If it looks good, I'll support it, whether it's from the reboot or the original.

Naughty Ottsel wrote:

I know I'm in the minority here, and I agree that if most people here want the reboot represented, then it should be represented. I understand that a lot of people liked the reboot, even if I can't comprehend why, since it I think it resembles Tomb Raider about as much as Devil May Cry resembles a stale croissant. Even if the reboot is arguably a decent game (not something I believe), it just wasn't Tomb Raider, it didn't have the great tried-and-true gameplay of the old series, and the extent of Lara's development (something that was really never wanted by anyone) was to get physically abused, cry for a bit, then shoot people in the head unflinchingly. After sobbing over shooting a guy that was going to rape and murder her. Rinse, wash, cauterize several days after receiving wound, repeat.

But I digress. My opinion of the reboot aside, I'm mostly concerned about how it's implemented and whether or not it works well for Lara in Crusade. If it looks good, I'll support it, whether it's from the reboot or the original.

Don't you ever compare those two games again. Tomb Raider 2013 was a re-imagining of a series with a modern yet familiar audience in mind, and DMC: Devil May Cry was made literally in disrespect to the older games. Multiple jokes are made about Dante's old design, and one of the devs went out of their way to make a laughing stock about Dante's old design because it was brought up so often by making a presentation of old Dante and comparing it to girlier, hated celebrities of today.

Tomb Raider changed because it's gameplay and control style is something that has aged poorly for a great sum of people, unlike Devil May Cry, as I see people still making combo videos for DMC 3 and 4. Tomb Raider '13 was trying to aim it's sights for a new spectrum, but DMC: Devil May Cry tried to fix a whole load of crap that was never broken.

Putting this in a spoiler 'cause it's a tad lengthy and I don't want to take up the rest of the page

Spoiler:

Reboot is good.spoiler

Spoiler:

Spoiler mostly for the sake of consistency

Spoiler:

I left out Anniversary on purpose, it's a direct remake of the first game and therefore that game would be double counted. Yes i know it has differences, but it's basically the same game and therefore shouldnt be shown as a representation of the recent quality of traditional style TR games.

The whole point of this in the first place was actually about repping TR reboot in the moveset. So, while going into details on opinions of the reboot is a bit off topic, the underlying point is not. Imo (and now backed with valid info), the reboot should have references in the moveset. The go-to things are definitely the Bow and the Axe.

Okay, like I said, if the moveset looks good, I'll support it, whether it represents Tomb Raider or TR. Do I think old Lara should be represented more? Yes, not only because I think those games are better and more true to what the franchise as a whole is, but also because there's nine times as many of them as there are games that new Lara has been in. Again, though, I'll throw support at a well-designed, thought-out moveset regardless of if it draws aspects from TR or not.

And for the record, just because Anniversary was a remake, doesn't mean it doesn't count. It was still a great, well-received recent Tomb Raider game.

Alright, I concede. The story in DMC wasn't exactly the best. Was it better than any of the older Devil May Cry games? With the possible exception of 2, not at all.

And you're right, I have unintentionally made this into the very thing I said I didn't want to get into. And at this point, we really are just arguing about things that some of us couldn't stand and others of us didn't mind. Needless to say, that's not going to get anywhere. I won't say you're right, and you shouldn't say that I'm right. How 'bout we just move on and let it rest?

Naughty Ottsel wrote:

Alright, I concede. The story in DMC wasn't exactly the best. Was it better than any of the older Devil May Cry games? With the possible exception of 2, not at all.

And you're right, I have unintentionally made this into the very thing I said I didn't want to get into. And at this point, we really are just arguing about things that some of us couldn't stand and others of us didn't mind. Needless to say, that's not going to get anywhere. I won't say you're right, and you shouldn't say that I'm right. How 'bout we just move on and let it rest?

Yes, definitely. Sorry for adding to the fire, and I think we can walk away from this one in a new understanding.

For now, let's just stick to Lara discussion.

Naughty Ottsel wrote:

Okay, like I said, if the moveset looks good, I'll support it, whether it represents Tomb Raider or TR. Do I think old Lara should be represented more? Yes, not only because I think those games are better and more true to what the franchise as a whole is, but also because there's nine times as many of them as there are games that new Lara has been in.

this is exactly what has been said from the start. No one said anything about basing the entire moveset, we simply suggested one or two references.

I suppose now would be a good time to talk about implementing the bow and the Axe. Bow is pretty straitforward, it could be differentiated from Link by adding up/down aiming.

But then it would be like Pit's bow but without the projectile controlling, and from what I remember, Pit is planned for Crusade as well.

TrinitroMan wrote:

But then it would be like Pit's bow but without the projectile controlling, and from what I remember, Pit is planned for Crusade as well.

I think the bow controlling for Lara would probably be closer to something like Crash's bazooka, which has actual aiming, not just a sideways and upwards variant.

HypeConduit wrote:

TrinitroMan wrote:

But then it would be like Pit's bow but without the projectile controlling, and from what I remember, Pit is planned for Crusade as well.

I think the bow controlling for Lara would probably be closer to something like Crash's bazooka, which has actual aiming, not just a sideways and upwards variant.

I like this idea, but if it's gonna be like that, It should have plenty of startup time, since I'm pretty sure that firing a Bow requires A LOT of concentration, which could be presented in the Startup Time AND the Damage of the Bow, maybe even it's knockback, to give the Bow credibility.

Idk, I thought people found Crash's Bazooka useless. So how will this benefit Lara Croft

Smash King wrote:

Idk, I thought people found Crash's Bazooka useless. So how will this benefit Lara Croft

Crash's Bazooka is mostly because of the game, it's not that useful. Lara's Bow, however, would be more benefitial, it should do pently of damage and Knock Back, to the point where it's a good, reliable kill move