Exciting details and new key art revealed for Tomb Raider I-III Remastered

We can't believe that nearly 30 years ago, Lara Croft graced the Playstation and became a gaming icon! And soon enough, players both young and old will be able to revisit the classic trilogy in a stunning remastered version, which comes out on February 14th (Lara Croft's actual birthday!). Tomb Raider I-III Remastered will be playable on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.

We found out some interesting details from Aspyr regarding the Tomb Raider remaster, and it looks like they and Lara go way back! It appears Aspyr launched Tomb Raider II on Macintosh computers back in the late and greatest decade of gaming, the 90s. 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.

"We’ve 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."

"As Crystal Dynamics continued 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."

"What would the balance of preservation and modernization look like? We call it Tomb Raider I-III Remastered Starring Lara Croft."

It seems like Aspyr has a passion and tremendous respect for the old games, and by bringing them back to modern hardware, with an immense amount of talent to make them playable, be graphically upgraded, and place in a whole heap of extras that allow you to customise the experience to modern or retro standards. In many ways, it is a definitive remaster of a classic trilogy.

"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."

Aspyr had envisioned a grand return of the classic Lara Croft adventures through several key points, to make the perfect and respectable remaster. As Apsyr outlined below:

Engineering goal – performance with pixel-perfect preservation

At the outset, we knew we would use the source code and engine. Magic can’t 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.

It’s a love letter to all of our memories of these games, but it’s also truly fascinating to see how far hardware pushed in the ‘90s 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.

Gameplay goal – surprise and delight lifelong hardcore fans

We firmly believe 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.

So the conversation evolved: how do we surprise and delight these fans? And that’s when we started brainstorming additions instead of revisions.

Classic and modern control options

We take inspiration from the Legend, Anniversary, and Underworld era of Tomb Raider for our modern controller settings. 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.

Just like our approach to the graphical presentation, the original tank-style controls are still available to players via a menu toggle.

There are a whole heap of other features and dynamics which make Tomb Raider Remastered a definitive return, both for new and old fans.

Boss health bars - Health bars have been added to bosses to allow you to know how much damage you doing. Particularly good for bosses such as the final bosses in Tomb Raider I.





3D item sprites replacements - All those 2D sprites for items have been replaced with full 3D models.





Over 200 trophies - There are 200 trophies across all 3 games! Trophy hunters rejoice. And yes ... there is an achievement for putting the butler in the freezer.





Photo mode - Maybe the best new feature, allowing us to take photos as Lara explores multiple beautiful regions and locations.

"Exploring environments in Tomb Raider is magical. We want you to be able to share these environments and iconic moments, so we’ve added a robust photo mode to pose Lara, freeze gameplay, toggle between classic and modern graphics, and showcase these environments."





And a few more surprises - Some surprises for fans which Aspyr don't want to ruin.

There are also other new features, ranging from graphical advancements and control schemes, allowing players to switch between modern or tank controls. Features such as "Baked and real-time lighting effects", and a Graphics toggle, allow players to switch between the new and old graphics of all 3 games. .

There are new models, environments, and enemies – As shown in our initial reveal, updated models for a consistent modern look and feel. Including new models for Lara Croft.





Additional updates to the animations, textures, and VFX. Adjustments have been made in the modern scheme to look consistent with the updated models for a polished final look.

Very exciting! We can't wait to play the remaster of all three classic Tomb Raider games on February 14th on Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5 and PC.