{"id":720693,"date":"2025-11-17T21:51:47","date_gmt":"2025-11-17T21:51:47","guid":{"rendered":"urn:uuid:93bc94cc-d73b-41b6-a443-1c044ba66526"},"modified":"2025-11-17T21:51:47","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T21:51:47","slug":"tomb-raider-i-iii-remastered-ps4-ps5-features-detailed-new-key-art-revealed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/tomb-raider-i-iii-remastered-ps4-ps5-features-detailed-new-key-art-revealed\/","title":{"rendered":"Tomb Raider I-III Remastered PS4 & PS5 features detailed, new key art revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It\u2019s been almost 30 years since Lara Croft took her first snowy steps in the mountains of Peru. In about 30 days, PlayStation players will get to re-experience Lara\u2019s first three globe-trotting adventures, with a fresh look and feel in Tomb Raider I-III Remastered on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5. <\/p>\n

How did we get here? That story takes us to Austin, TX in 1998.<\/p>\n

Aspyr & Lara go way back<\/strong><\/h3>\n

A burgeoning video game company, Aspyr, launches Tomb Raider II on Macintosh computers. Aspyr continued with the Tomb Raider franchise until 2003, launching Tomb Raider, Tomb Raider III, Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, Tomb Raider: Chronicles, and Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve always wanted to revisit these titles, but we always debated the right approach. For years, we worked through the right balance of preservation and modernization. And once we felt we nailed it, we got in touch with our friends at Crystal Dynamics.<\/p>\n

Crystal Dynamics vision<\/strong><\/h3>\n

As Crystal Dynamics continues to expand the Tomb Raider Franchise, the timing seemed perfect to reintroduce audiences to the games that started it all. We wanted to both honor the foundations of the franchise and make accessible to modern audiences the original games in all their glory. <\/p>\n

What would the balance of preservation and modernization look like? We call it Tomb Raider I-III Remastered Starring Lara Croft.<\/p>\n

Remaster defined<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Within pre-production, we divided the conversation into three buckets: engineering, gameplay, and art. With these categories in mind, we led our conversations in the same order.<\/p>\n

Engineering goal – performance with pixel-perfect preservation<\/strong><\/h3>\n

At the outset, we knew we would use the original source code and engine. Magic can\u2019t simply be rebuilt. A critical feature for any updates we made was to allow the users to toggle back to the original look and feel for Tomb Raider I, II, and III.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a love letter to all of our memories of these games, but it\u2019s also truly fascinating to see how far hardware pushed in the \u201890s to make Tomb Raider work. Preserving that experience will continue to inspire engineers of today and tomorrow to push games to be more immersive and memorable.<\/p>\n

Gameplay goal – surprise and delight lifelong hardcore fans<\/strong><\/h3>\n

We had a firm belief that the gameplay of Tomb Raider I, II, and III is timeless, and with our use of the existing source code, we had every jump, secret, enemy, and puzzle exactly as the original development team designed and intended.<\/p>\n

So the conversation evolved into: how do we surprise and delight these fans? And that\u2019s where we started brainstorming additions instead of revisions.<\/p>\n

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Classic and modern control options<\/strong><\/h3>\n

For our modern controller settings, we take inspiration from the Legend, Anniversary, and Underworld era of Tomb Raider. These changes are felt mostly in the way Lara moves – the right stick has full camera control and Lara moves directionally based on camera position. <\/p>\n

Just like our approach to the graphical presentation, the original tank-style controls are still available to players via a menu toggle.<\/p>\n

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Boss health bars<\/strong><\/h3>\n

One of Tomb Raider\u2019s strengths was the minimal UI. However, this can be frustrating for tougher bosses with massive amounts of health. We added a health bar to let you know if you should swap to the grenade launcher or if you should keep soaking pistol damage.<\/p>\n

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3D item sprites replacements<\/strong><\/h3>\n

While the menus in Tomb Raider used 3D models for the health kit and ammo, the in-game assets were flat 2D sprites. This was a legacy compromise that we\u2019ve adjusted to give a little more umph <\/em>to item pick-ups.<\/p>\n

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Over 200 trophies<\/strong><\/h3>\n

This is a big moment for the Tomb Raider community, so we made sure to pack in as much content as possible. We\u2019re excited to say there are over 200 trophies to earn including (my personal favorite) locking the Butler in the freezer. Sorry, Winston! See below for a sneak peak of a few you can look forward to discovering!<\/p>\n

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Photo mode<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Exploring environments in Tomb Raider is magical. We want you to be able to share these environments and iconic moments, so we\u2019ve added a robust photo mode to pose Lara, freeze gameplay, toggle between classic and modern graphics, and showcase these environments. We\u2019re super excited to see what the community puts together with these modes.<\/p>\n

And a few more surprises<\/strong><\/h3>\n

So much of what we love about Tomb Raider is discovery, and we don\u2019t want to spoil that. <\/p>\n

Art goal – visuals as in your memory<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Once we finalized the engineering and gameplay intent, it was time to move on to our biggest challenge and changes for the project\u2014the art. <\/p>\n

Our philosophy here was rather straightforward; we want the games to look the way they did in your mind. We knew we were on the right track in our early playtests because some play testers didn\u2019t even know they were playing with the modern art toggled on.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve worked hand-in-hand with Crystal Dynamics on the following modern art updates:<\/p>\n

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