Only Days To Go!

It’s great to see so much excitement out there over the demo we released for Tomb Raider: Underworld. So many positive posts everywhere, and this is only a teaser! It’s also good to hear people saying that it’s taking them anywhere from twenty minutes to two hours to finish, to varying degrees of completeness. This is what I was trying to say before when asked how long the game would be. I sometimes get busted for dodging answers, but often it’s because there is no simple answer. With a stretch of demo gameplay that’s just a taste in the grand scheme of the game, with this much playtime variation, how can I give a number for how long the whole game will last? To answer that, I really wanted to wait for you all to play some and help me with the math.

Scribbling on the back of an envelope here…the demo covers less than a fifth of the Thailand area, and much less than a fifth of the playtime given that there are no ancient device puzzles to figure out in the demo. And given how small an area the demo is compared to the entire game, using the 20-to-120 minute metric, that means the whole game is easily many times longer than Legend, depending on how much you rush through it without exploring and how long you struggle with the puzzles (or use Field Assistance). Thorough people could easily spend 50-60 hours playing through and finding all the hidden rewards and such. But I really can't be more specific because there is so much variation of playtime for Tomb Raider: Underworld.

As excited as we are about the demo, we are even more excited about the game. With as much as we managed to show in this little stretch of Thailand, there were so many major aspects of the game that you haven’t played. Loads of puzzles, from small local challenges to huge ancient set pieces are in store. Exploring the environment, finding the elements you need to understand, manipulate, and master to get ahead, in dramatically different environments around the world. Encountering many more enemies protecting even deeper truths about the ancient past. (Some of you already got a head start on this, finding ways to get to the floor of Bhogavati even though the demo was supposed to end before you met the naga…congratulations! We knew you would figure out a way eventually – that’s why we put invisible walls in the hallways below…)

I know it’s hard to wait – it’s hard for us, too, because we want to see everyone play the whole game and get answers to long held questions – but the time will fly by, you’ll see. It's only a week away!

Cheers,
-Eric