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Date: 29/07/2003 (source: Reuters UK )
Video Game blamed for weak sequel...
The romance between Hollywood and the video game industry is suddenly a lot chillier after Paramount's "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life" cited problems with Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness video game for the sequel's weaker-than-expected debut.

The movie and video game industries have grown closer in recent years as films increasingly are tied in to games and games, in turn, are licensed as movies.

But the comments by Paramount Pictures underscore the tensions between the two sides when sales disappoint.

"The Cradle of Life," the second film based on games heroine Lara Croft, opened in fourth place at the U.S. box office last weekend with sales of $21.8 million, well below the opening weekend of 2001's "Tomb Raider."

Paramount executives blamed an over-abundance of sequels this summer, but also pointed to "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness," the latest game in the franchise from Britain's Eidos

"The only thing we can attribute that to is that the gamers were not happy with the latest version of the 'Tomb Raider' video game, which is our core audience," Paramount distribution president Wayne Lewellen said.

A spokesman for Eidos said the company had no comment on Paramount's claims.

Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness was released in the United States on June 20 and in early July in Europe after repeated delays put it months behind schedule.

It is currently the No. 2 game across all formats in the U.K., according to the European Leisure Software Publishers Association and was the No. 2 game in June in the United States across platforms, according to NPDFunworld.

But critics, at least in the United States, have bashed the game for what they said are numerous bugs that make it almost unplayable. A senior Eidos development executive, Jeremy Heath-Smith, resigned days after the game was released.

GameRankings.com, a site that tracks game reviews and averages scores into an overall ranking, showed a score of 58 percent for "Angel of Darkness" as of Monday morning, which puts it well out of the "Most Popular" list. Most top games score better than 80 percent.

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-31-2003, 03:59 AM:
 
Brad that appears to be a teaser title. Please change it before I have to moderate your ass!

Tomb Raider sucks in both movie land and videogame land. Tomb Raider hasn't had a good game out for about 8 years, and the first movie did OK I think.
 

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Posted by Phil Hill (Member # 371) on 07-31-2003, 04:10 AM:
 
Joe, I don't think that is a "teaser" title.

But, "moderate" his ass anyway.

>>> Phil
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-31-2003, 09:25 AM:
 
Would that be the same as "getting medieval on yo' ass"?
 

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Posted by William Leland III (Member # 1400) on 07-31-2003, 09:40 AM:
 
When I first played "Tomb Raider" the game for PS1, I was blown away. It looked like a movie, the sad thing is it was better than most movies I have seen.

When the movie came out, those bastards in Hollywood are the ones who ruined the franchise, not the game makers. Yeah the new games have sucked but I think that is because they have lost what makes a good game. The simple concept to make it interesting and fresh. It's hard to do when everyone compares your product to everyone else's. I bought "Tomb Raider 3" for PS1 and man did it suck. I think I played it 6 times that is all.

What I saying (if you read this far) that Hollywood farked up the franchise. The fact they put blame on Eidos is ludicrous. I bet they blame Capcom for "Resident Evil the movie" sucking also.
 

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Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 07-31-2003, 02:39 PM:
 
Gee, is it the video game's fault that critical concensus on Rottentomatoes.com is 26% positive, 74% negative? I doubt many of those critics have ever seen let alone played the game. Although I didn't note it in my 1-word review, I walked out of the movie after about 30 mins.
 

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Posted by Paul Linfesty (Member # 214) on 07-31-2003, 08:19 PM:
 
Well, here's the modern movie executive's "don't blame me" mentality. You base a movie on a game, the current game outsells the movie, and you WHINE about it? Try something original for once. OH, thats RIGHT! If you try an original idea that doesn't work, you have no one to blame but yourself! LOL!
 

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Posted by Elena N. Solovyova (Member # 1636) on 08-01-2003, 02:03 AM:
 
This second flick is definetely better then the first one. It means that Paramount probably "did their best" (though I'm too old to appreciate it).
 

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Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 08-01-2003, 03:07 AM:
 
I for one am not a gammer. But I did try and play those Tomb Raider games. They were a waste of time and I never even bothered to see the first Tomb Raider and probably won't see this one.
 

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Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 08-04-2003, 07:12 PM:
 

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I bet they blame Capcom for "Resident Evil the movie" sucking also.

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