A Vicious Cycle

Playing Tomb Raider: Legend, Crystal Dynamicsâ deft reinvention of Lara Croft, was a pleasure rediscovered. While Legend is far from perfect, it captures a lot of what was great about the franchise in the first place: fluidity of movement, the steady exploration of exotic environments, and the satisfaction of a puzzle solved allowing a new area to be accessed. For long-term fans, it was a happy reunion that reminded us of why weâd liked Lara in the first place.

Thereâs a specific kick in being reunited with a gaming experience that you used to enjoy but havenât had contact with for a while. Itâs an enthusiasm that requires a period of absence, a break away from constant iterations and watered down versions of the original concept. While the Angel of Darkness misfire was an expensive, repeatedly delayed error for all concerned, in the long run it has allowed gamers to come back to Lara with renewed enthusiasm, with healthy sales figures to match. After recent lean years, Legend has proven far more welcome now than it would have been if it had come along only a year after The Last Revelation, arguably the last really enjoyable Tomb Raider game.

Of course, leaving hardware generational leaps aside, Legend wouldnât be the same game if it had come out as just another annual instalment. If the franchise hadnât lost its way, resulting in the keys to Croft Manor being torn from the hands of originating developer Core Design, then there wouldnât have been the time, space and necessity to re-examine the series and refocus it in a fresh way that capitalises on the seriesâ appeal.

Other titles have had a similar renaissance after a prolonged absence. Prince of Persia: Sands of Time was a critical success some years after the last failed attempt to move the series into 3D. The recent revival of Segaâs OutRun racing franchise was considered a risky move that threatened to damage a much-loved brand, but instead worked due to the care and attention to what made the series work in the first place.

Itâs a simple approach: step back, re-examine core values of the game and how they can be given new life, then come back once gamers have been given a bit of time to really, really miss you. Put like that, it seems easy, but can these lessons be applied wider?

Creatively rewarding as this approach may be, it can be costly. Aside from missing out on the potential revenues from putting out an annual iteration, abandoning everything from previous games and rebuilding from scratch is inevitably expensive. When the economics are spelt out like that, itâs almost churlish to suggest that some franchises could do with the time off for a rethink. After all, regular instalments of major gaming franchises wouldnât come out if there wasnât a demand for them, and if the demand is there, why shouldnât it be satisfied?

Thereâs a relentless commercial logic that dictates that, while a series continues to be successful, to not put out a new product in a major sales period would be throwing money away. In practice, this means getting another title out in the run up to Christmas each year. Such a schedule leaves limited room for rethinking a game, but also requires that each sequel provides something new to justify its relatively rapid appearance.

For some series, an annual makeover is easy enough, especially with sports titles that can be fed new stats and strips each year with minimal changes to the basic structure of the game itself. Similarly, driving titles require a few new routes and cars to race.

Other series find themselves going down odder routes with each iteration. Activisionâs Tony Hawk series has evolved in unexpected ways, the first four Pro Skater titles pretty much tapping out the possibilities of the original format until no suitable environment went un-skated. Subsequent uses of the licence have been varied, leaving behind a simple contest structure and arguably distracting from the actual pleasure of skating with story modes, Jackass-style pranks and other sidelines. Tellingly, it seems someone has taken the necessary step back and the forthcoming Tony Hawkâs Project 8 is being marketed as a ground-up re-engineering of the game, focussed on âbringing skateboarding to lifeâ.

Ubisoftâs attitude to its major franchises seems to vary. After a trilogy of Prince of Persia titles, that series is being rested once more for a next generation revamp, while the companyâs Tom Clancy titles, including the Splinter Cell and Ghost Recon series, show no sign of stopping. Popularity aside, the difference between Prince and the Clancy games is that in the Clancy ouvre, Ubisoft has the advantage of a clear but flexible techno-thriller world to work within, and which development teams can continue to pull different aspects from while maintaining the consistency of the franchise. Each series within the franchise has a straightforward concept - stealth, domestic counter-terrorism, et cetera - which is flexible enough to allow each instalment to add further variations.

Clearly not all gaming franchises are alike, and the extent to which a series can cope with endless sequels depends on how loose the original brief is. Some genres lend themselves to continuous subtle variations on the same theme, whether that central theme is team football or squad based incursions. Other titles have a more specialised appeal, one which can be worn away by repetition.

Which returns us to where we came in, and the rise, fall and rise again of Lara Croft. Eidos has already made noises about Crystal Dynamics squeezing out a sequel to Legend as soon as possible, keen to capitalise on the rebuilt popularity. Clearly, the model of regular instalments of a gaming franchise is a hard one to shake off, and any lesson that suggests a contrary approach is a hard one to learn.