Right on with the comments on SWTOR "f2p speculation".

As to the DayZ comments. I am "noobier" they you Pokket and so far I have no problem with the game starting with no weapon. However I would like it to be easier to find one quickly. You can if you cheat (so to speak) by using any of the interactive maps that are available.

Although I don't play any "Croft" games, I agree with your commentary regarding the "extremes" and sexual assault issues.

And that is why IMO girls should not play Dayz. J/K. If anybody is getting killed on the coastline from bandits you are playing Dayz wrong. Most noob players follow the coast and run straight into Cherno and then get popped before finding a weapon or a decent weapon.

The moment I spawn (and doesnt happen often because I have enough sense) I run straight into the woods and hit up the tiny little towns and use my sense of direction to navigate me around the map. I usually find a compass and then make my way to the northern areas for good gear and little to no players.

OR you could be a complete baby and play on a server with 0/25 players on...but that's zero fun IMO.

SWTOR: Don't really have anything to say about that, why are people still talking about SWTOR?

DayZ: I believe that made that change because it was becoming obvious that all new players would do is rush into the closest major city, hunt for some other random player for a kill to get his gear. Worst case: he failed and respawned simply to try again. 

The whole point of the game is not to get frags but to survive as long as possible so I guess they wanted to turn away from a respawn type game and make it so that people didn't just throw their life away to gank some other players but to focus more on survival and co-op. Beside, zombies are really easy to avoid.

Tomb Raider: It sure is a touchy situation but I do not mind the idea. Sexual assaults are a fact of life and to deny it's existance isn't going to make it so. 

Hey, i agree with Swtor not going F2P for now altho i do not agree with your DayZ and Tomb Raider point of view.

Im deeply in love with that they did with Tom Raider, arent you tired of being overpowered? Killing everything that moves with a pistol and jumping from clif to clif like spiderman?

She isnt pathetic, she is Human! She falls, she fails but she does get up and keeps trying and that is the beauty of it! The game finally makes sense to me and i am so looking forward for it.

Watching Tomb Raider fighting for her life and overcoming her problems makes her strong not weak. 

What makes DayZ so special is how hard it is, i mean if they lose the realistic part of it i might aswell just go play L4D.

well glad i never bought the Arma shit for DayZ, giving someone no defensive capabilities is just stupid i don't give a damn how realistic it is.

Pocket, firstly good video. But if you? honestly think this game still has 1.3m subs you are being very optimistic. Personally I see this game going FTP/Freemium my the end of this year. Also you kind of miss the point of FFA PvP, it is not meant to be easy or fair. Play WoW or SWTOR if you do not appreciate this.

SWTOR: No way is it going F2p but I can see it taking the freeuim route. Letting peeps try the starter worlds and then having to pay passage to new worlds!

DAYZ:  " pushes the you are a jerk button" hahahaha It's a survival game so I can understand the whole respawn with no weapons. 

TOMB RAIDER:  She is Lara Croft and not the "OP BadAzz Tomb Raider" yet! I like the fact of making her more human...actually care more about the character.  They should just keep the sexual stuff if it really is in game...just have Lara knee em in the gorin! I would look at it as Lara becoming stronger and never being a victim every again. Watching Lara survie situations that would kill a normal person, makes it entertaining. =D

As for realism in a game...o.O you would think Mario would have brain dmage smashing all those bricks with his nogin XD

it's pronounced daze, not daisey. 

SWTOR will go F2P or it will follow the road of SWG.  Yes it will be F2P. 

I remember the same kind of a discussion about Aion a while ago.  Now we have Aion as F2P game.

A segment of the gaming world wants to believe that swtor will fail and that F2P is the touchstone of that failure. But the truth is, swtor is making good amount of money and will continue to for some time.

DayZ is doing the same thing that TR (reboot) is doing. Trying to control / change the way gamers play. Clearly there were two type of players. Those that run into Cherno with their Makarov, and get killed. The others head to the woods and loot the small towns, then head north. No weapons, tries to put the idea in the players head to check their surroundings for upgrades immediately.

Tomb Raider (Reboot) also tried to change the thinking of players. The vast majority of gamers have no empathy for their gaming avatars. Those that do care about their avatars have a hard time wrapping their minds around the idea of being forced to care. Why kick her when she is down? Why reinforce the idea that she must be protected? Because that segment of gamers will stop caring if not constantly and repeatedly goaded to care once more.

Furthermore, Angelina Jolie's Tomb Raider movies are by-and-large considered to be absolute garbage.  She's not a "badass" in thos movies, she's a canned cliche incapable of failure or fault which translates into a boring and unremarkable movie.

In the new Tomb Raider game, we're presented with a character who does fail, who does make faults... who gets beat up to the degree of a Die Hard movie-John Mclane level of punishment....

This has never happened in tv/video games/movies for women before.

So where's the shouting for equality now?  I can handle a female John Mclane character.

Can you not?

[mod edit]

Swtor is going f2p b/c gabe and james ohlen are incompetent idiots lol. They have done more damage to swtor then wow or any other mmo could have ever done combined. If they spent 1/3 of the money they spend on botched PR on actual development we'd have an awesome game but james/gabe dont understand mmo's they think and act like thier selling kotor 3 a single player rpg.

From 1983 to 2000, the National Transportation Safety Board investigated 26 major commercial accidents involving 2,739 people. A total of 1,525 survived, or 56%. Get your statistics right...

People are mentioning Lara's part being her growth period. I ask though, why does she need to start out vulnerable; I would go as far as to say a victim.

They advertised the sexual violence. They felt it was a necessary component to mention in advertising and include ingame for Lara Croft to become a heroine.

In the trailer you can see her surviving the elements, fending off dogs and strugling with her injuries but those feats did nothing to propel her abilities to kick butt. Instead it was her attempted sexual assault that turned on the epic music, got the inspirational speech and turned her into a badass.

The implication that her sexual assault was the turning point is only further beating the dead horse; women need to be hurt so that men can protect them. It is insulting and likely to distance many gamers from the franchise.

Surprise, surprise. I completely disagree with everything Pokket has to say. This is becoming more and more common. 

SWTOR is def going F2P. An hour into the first beta, and i knew SWTOR would be free in the first year. Honestly its a miracle they have lasted 6 months. There are more and more AAA free offerings, and whether you like it or not, thats just how it is. TSW will be lucky to even get the 6 months that TOR has now. Theres just no reason to ever pay a sub when you can play something just as good or better for free. (And really TOR just isnt that good)

DayZ, well i may get flamed for this, but its nothing more than a fad. It will be talked about for a couple of weeks, then disappear. I could be wrong, i admit, but im usually not. This type of PvP will never make it into a full MMO thank god. A developer would have to be high to even try it. People are asshats, and any form of OWPvP, or full loot PVP will never have anyone play it but asshats. Gank squads are really the most fun you can have, and only if youre a part of them, not on the recieving end.  That being said, i think the change is needed. It asks the player to spend a little time in the world without just gank/respawn in mind. If the point is to survive and not just kill and loot other people, this is a step in the right direction.

Tomb Raider. I just absolutely love what they are doing here. Its a fantastic reimagining on Lara Croft. Seeing her as human, not "superhuman". Building her up from zero to hero, brilliant.

I look forward to the next Game Face as usually, and i cant wait to see what i disagree with next :)

MaxJac:

"Likely to distance many gamers from the franchise."

Did you play Tomb Raider: Underworld? Did you play Tomb Raider: Legend / Anniversary / Angel of Darkness?

If you did, great.

But guess what, dood? Most people didn't.

The franchise has already been "distanced" from the hands of gamers and thats why its being re-envisioned in a more gritty and realistic way.

And yet again, i re-iterate that there is no sexual assault in the new Tomb Raider.  There's a grapple and a shooting.  There's MURDER IN THE GAME.

The game is FULL OF MURDER, but nobody is focusing on that one!  Because in video games, murder / violence and gore are all PERFECTLY fine! ^.^ But the HINT of a sexual innuendo and people like Pokket make a bad web blog.

And it also wasn't that sole element in the trailer that "turned her into a "badass".

That entire sequence was lead up to by a series of other CATALISTS that lead her to strive harder as a survivor to do whats right, and come out alive on the other side in the process.

No sir, this game... regardless of 'Quite Popular Pokket" commentary, will be the most successful Tomb Raider in the past decade.  Infact, probably the most successful in the entire series history.

They don't have 1.3 million subs.   That's why your opinion is fail.

They had 1.3 million subs at the end of March.   It's the end of June.   And games with 1.3 million subs don't do 200+ to 20 server mergers through the voluntary transfer system.

Heh TR is not an mmo and you are talking about it  so score one for the developers. It seems to be a great game btw and more realistic, which is cool. Didnt play TR before but this one I will try. I like playing an underdog sometimes.

You talk about realism and then you mention previous TR games - yep  all things are very realistic starting with her boobs and her badassness.

hmm I forgot somthing

... oh right ... swtor has 1.3M players /facepalm

lol 1.3 m is a speculation tho i dont think it have  even a million ,and yes the game going ftp very soon and evryone see that coming

SWTOR: I'm going off what they last said in regards to their numbers. I'm not going to make up imaginery numbers just because they may or may not have gone down since then.

DayZ: I ran to the woods, as well. Looted a dead man's body for a gun. However, I spent 5 minutes running from zombies that ran as fast as me. I couldn't seem to lose them... until I ran them into some other Survivors and they attacked them instead. Hence why a defensive weapon is needed.

Tomb Raider: People act as if the only way to make a strong female character is to let her get sexually assaulted by a man, then she comes back for revenge. My point was that is an overused plotline that you see on characters that basically have no depth beyond that.

Not to mention if they are going for realistic, a lot of women (and men) who suffer from sexual assault end up messed up in the head. Very few actually come out "stronger" and read to kill others.

Also, despite them saying they have no sexual assault in the game (AFTER the Kotaku interview went up), the trailer and photos prove otherwise (just Google it)... unless they pulled that part of the story out of the game for safe measure.

For SWTOR, I agree that though it hints that they are not opposed to the possibility in the future, there's nothing to say that they definitely are going FTP.

That said, I personally think it would be a good move fr them to try going with a Freemium model similar to, say, STO or Global Agenda. Maybe keeping some kind of initial purchase price, like lowering the cost of a digital copy to $20 and not requiring an initial paid subscription to get the first month of premium content.? I don't see that happening for a while yet, but I do see something like that possibly working; giving everyone a taste of being a subscriber so they have the chance to decide if it's worth it, but then letting people play the game for free in some fashion.

I've only played the beta so far, so I don't know all the details of how the game works right now. Is there an in-game cash shop? I heard somewhere that there was. Frankly, if they're going with subs, they should not bother with a cash shop at all, and I feel that way about all MMO games. If you're not F2P or Freemium, cash shops are insulting to your customers. I think SWTOR would do very well as a Freemium game, and there's lots of opportunity for cash shop items that would bring in more than enough revenue. Heck, even additional player character voice sets would work as cash shop items. I'd buy them.

Pokket.

Listen to me...

There is... no... rape... in the new Tomb Raider.

Why can you not understand that?

Cujo, there is a sexual assault. We know the difference. It doesn't make it any less of a weak plot point that also has harmful social implications. Pokkets last post hit it on the head.

Pokket

Watch this: Interview with Karl Stewart from Crystal Dynamics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfHUgmULIVU&list=UUdVrPfq-B9N5v01axUoDfLA&index=2&feature=plcp

"Its not part of our experience.  And should you play that part, it is not how that scene will play out."

MaxJac:

There is no sexual assualt in the game.

http://i.imgur.com/CDZ5P.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/boREM.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/ntjyW.jpg

I don't know what world people live in, but feeling up and kissing a tied up woman is defenitely sexual assault.

@CujoSWAoA - Actually, I've seen the trailers and interviews, and yes, rape is actually a huge theme in the game. They never depict the actual act, but even the suggestion of it happening is enough. I know several hardcore female gamers who have been victims of rape and they are just as outraged by its inclusion in this game as myself and Pokket Anf guess what - they are well within their rights to be insulted and furious. To say that the only way for Laura Croft to become a badass is to fight off a constant swarm of rapists is bulsh*t, and is exactly what the game devs are implying, intended or not.

You know this is going to degrade into the Senfeld discussion of when does Sex begin?

Jerry Seinfeld defined it as. "I'd say when the NIPPLE makes an appearance!"

AthenRahl:

You can't even spell LARA Croft properly.  I don't want to sound rude, but you clearly aren't informed.

There's no actual depiction of rape, sure; there doesn't ahve to be to have sexual assault and the implied intent of rape, and that's enough to be wrong.

I'm informed enough to know the difference between sexual assault and entertainment.

You obviously missed the trailers, interviews, and even the screenshots posted here by jfz133. What I'm making are statements based on the released info that you're blatantly ignoring. these "implications" have been there long before I joined the discussion; jsut because you've chosen to be blind to them doesn't make them any less there. You can live in your little world of rose-colored glasses all you want, feel free; you wanna attack me for seeing what you choose not to, now THAT is a mistake. You're wanting to pretend that sexual assault of a woman in a video game is fine does not change what people are justifiably angry about, and don't think you can bullsh*t those of us who see what is there and are sickened.

This has nothing to do with sex.

I'm not going to define sexual assault and sexual harassment, people can do their own research if they don't have the common sense to understand it.

This needs to stay out of games, just like shooting hundreds of civilians with a machine gun in an airport should have stayed out. It is not OK to use these as if they were banal events.

Attempted rape is no less wrong than rape. If someone attempted to murder you, how'd you feel if the police said, "Oh, it's ok, they only attempted it, it's only wrong if they succeed." You'd be pretty furious, wouldn't you? And rightly so.

Suggesting that the only way to push Lara Croft into becoming a badass is by having several "dirty, bad men" attempt to rape and kill her is insulting to women and gamers, period. A lot of die-hard fans are insulted and disgusted by the writing for this game, period. You can go ahead and play it, you can enjoy it, I don't care. That does not make the complaints of others about the messages this game is making any less valid.

AthenRahl, I haven't "attacked" anyone.

The bottom line here is, Video Games are very much like major motion pictures now.

And major motion pictures have had far worse sexual content than anything that you're going to find in this new Tomb Raider game.  From films like Rob Roy, to Thelma and Louise to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. NOTHING like you'll find in those films is in the new Tomb Raider.

And guess what? You don't have to play the game, just like you don't have to watch those movies.

Nice video, and I mostly agree with the editorial opinions. I think the same thing about SWTOR - until they explicitly announce it as F2P then most likely its going to be a free trial-type system.

Also, Pokket pronounces DayZ correctly, it is "Day-Zee" not "Daze" like someone else said in the comments.

I'll wait to reserve judgement on TR until more is concrete although as an adult I think I can handle whatever sexual content is thrown my way.

Yes, games are now more like motion pictures; and jsut like long standing film franchises that get a "reboot," fans are very pissed by what is being done to Lara Croft. How does this even shock you? It's not so much that this content is in a game, it's that it's in a Tomb Raider game, and how it impacts Lara Croft as a character.

"Oh, hi AthenRahl, and now you're suggesting that I enjoy the made up content that YOU are putting into the game to make me sound like a monster! ^.^ Thats sweet of you!" 

No, I'm suggesting you approve of the content the game developers already admitted is in the game, in numerous interviews and trailers. It's not made up, and I'm not putting any of that content into the game, the dev's are. You're making yourself sound like a monster by approving of it and supporting it, you didn't need my help for any of that. This content isn't anything I made up; if that were the case, why are so many hundreds of people I've never met and don't know all furious that it's there? You wanna turn a blind eye, fine, go ahead, but you picked a fight with me specifically. That was just stupid.

I'll repeat - this isn't about sex, violence, or rape being content in a game; this is about it being forced into a beloved franchise and the fans being furious.

I do approve of everything in the new game.

I approve of every ounce of it.   I think the game looks outstanding, like a real action-adventure thriller made for adults.

It you don't, then don't play it, don't buy it.  I'm a huge fan of the Tomb Raider series, I've played all the games. I know their stories, I know the character of Lara Croft.

I think this is a great step for the franchise and look forward to seeing the series develope in this direction. 

Good for you. Just don't be surprised by others who find Lara Croft getting sexually assaulted being what makes her a badass dmeaning, insulting, and disgusting.

And don't think you can bullsh*t others by telling them that's not in the game. We're not stupid. Saying you approve of the story is one thing, saying those elements aren't there when it's blatantly obvious that they are is... something else.

I'll be bluntly honest - I am curious to play the game and see how the story plays out. The prospect of rape and sexual assault are not unheard of and are very realistic for the setting of the game. That said, the devs are walking a razors edge with this game. If they make the sexual assault and prospect of Lara getting raped too prominant in the gameplay, then the concerns of many people will be jsutifird. If it's a very minor story element, however, and plays a back-seat to other aspects of her survival and victory, then I can see it not being a major issue. The trailers and interviews make a big deal about focusing on that too much, which is where the whole controvercy started.

Damn typos...

i've gotten my money back at the movies...twice.

Yes, be more outraged. The marketing gurus are counting on it.

The physical violence against Lara Croft is "enough" RAPE is not like being bitten by a Radioactive Spider and getting superpowers, and it is a stupid & cynical move that just does not need to be in the game, why does rape need to be a part of becoming a strong badass woman it's a freaking cop-out lame stereotypical fall-back of poor writers that don't understand female psychology, it's like making an excuse for Lara being tough that she was sexually assaulted, like she could not possibly BE tough without it. Put it this way, this single storyline part disgusts me enough that I will boycott the game.

*puts down fundip pouch.*

There is no rape in the game.

*goes back to fundip pouch.*

I'm glad all you folk are so cool with people being shot in the face and murdered, but rape is off the table.  Drawing an imaginary line in the sand shouldn't make you feel better--This is art.  This is entertainment.  So long as people are getting shot in the face and murdered in video games, nothing should be off the table.  This isn't even rape.  There's no rape in the game.  And the term "Sexual assault" is so damn grey nowadays that the Producer at E3 could've meant he told Lara a dirty joke and she reported it to HR.  I saw a good thing on Facebook the other day that sums up exactly how I feel about all this: Announcing, "I'm offended" is basically telling the world you can't control your own emotions, so everyone else should do it for you.

So glad an entire group of individuals can get so blinded by straight-up misinformation and hearsay that they'll never see the forest for the trees.  I can run into something on Gears of War 3 and skewer it with a giant bayonet, but a cutscene portraying a pirate being a bad guy and brushing her arm is across the line.

An 'uproar' from people like you Pokket, apparently.

It makes me laugh how in the course of any TR game Lara can fall to 1000 horrible deaths, be gunned down in cold blood, and can be repeatedly victimised and assaulted in many other ways, but as soon as the term 'sexual' is applied to it there is drama.

The TR games have always been about Lara addressing adversity and overcoming it, and this one looks no different. A lot of fuss about nothing imo.

How many people causing a fuss about this point in the story have even played the game I wonder..

Typical American hypocrite. Yes, you read that correctly. I see from your videos that you enjoy pvp. What is pvp? You enter a game, by choice, to kill other players. Other humans. In the legal world that is cold-blooded, pre-mediated murder. But that is ok because everyone is trying to kill you and it does not mean anything - it is a game.
In Lara Croft there is a sexual assault. OMG! This demeans women! Take it out! Censor it!
No wonder that the murder rate in the United States is so high in comparison to the non-Third World countries. Killing (the more visceral the better) in video games is fine, sex is wrong. I support what the vendor is doing with Lara Croft. It is shocking. Good. Maybe those who are horrified and relate it to real life will wake up and realize that killing fellow humans is just as bad.
I don't condone rape. I had a girlfriend who was raped and that was a nightmare in Hell for both of us. However, I think that murder is worse. The pvp violence in today's video games are no different from the arenas of Rome - and just as wrong.  

I stopped the video at 1.3 million subs. If you really believe that pokket then you lost touch with all realitly. Sorry.

Tordurbar:  Typical brainwashed liberal non/anti-American rhetoric with no basis in reality.  In fact, the USA does NOT have the highest murder rate per capita than every other developed nation.  Do some research before you jump on the whole 'But Americans love violence over sex and it should be the other way around!' bandwagon.  Too:  The fact that you are unable to differintiate actions taken in a virtual world -by a character you are controlling through kayboard/mouse or gamepad- with actions taken in real life speaks to a slipping grasp that you and your ilk seem to be having on reality.   Also, here's something interesting.  In other developed nations, rapes are much more prevelant than in the United States of America.  http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_rap-crime-rapes.  So I guess it being acceptable for sexual assaults to be in video games by people in your country is equitable to higher rape statistics...Using your arguement.  (Of course, now you'll go and claim to be from a country that is lower on that list than the US is).

SWTOR is losing subs every month, it has only been going for 6 months. Their initial growth and leveling off period was what? 2 or 3 months? Some reg sub players of any MMO don't like f2p because mostly, it's annoying to see a huge influx of noobs running around doing casual shtuff. From what I have seen though, when an established(and I use that word loosely with SWTOR) MMO goes f2p due to declining re-subs, the f2p players are returning players that don't mind infusing some cash as long as they get to decide where it's spent. Could be on group saving pots or personal vanity items. All that matters is the money is saving a game that would otherwise eventually fail or at minimum, limp along with a handful of devs and volunteer player support staff. I was an anti-f2p player until I took advantage of some f2p MMOs that I had dropped because it wasn't worth my money anymore. They got me back because they gave me a choice of where my money went, plain and simple.

DayZ must be pvp. As far as I am concerned, anytime you willing enter a pvp game at the bottom ladder, you are roadkill. Whether the game depends on players working together or not, the pvp signals an end to worry-free teamwork and carefree exploring/killing/crafting/etc...

TR "attempted rape" incident is apparently the work of an ill-informed exec producer(exec producer not knowing the complete story? that never happens! ;P) spilling the beans that never existed. Sure grabbed the headlines and made everyone look though right? Some smoke and mirrors here, couple distractions over there and voila, instant publicity that they didn't have to pay for. The plane crash and stick though the abs survival is plausible but like you said, one in a million, but then again, so is lara croft. My dad fell off a roof, flat onto his back, onto a board, with 3"'s of nail sticking straight up. Missed his spine, didn't break any bones and nothing major punctured. A local man, logging in the boonies, accident ripped half his arm off, alone, he made it to the hospital and survived. Another local man, car accident on the highway, part of his jeeps rolecage went through his chest, removing a portion of his lung, fire dept sawed off the bar, got him to the hospital, he lived. I agree none of these are the same a getting a branch through the stomach but I myself, recently had a 12cm tumor rupture in my abdomen(stromal tumor). So if ya think about it, there was an undetected 12cm in diameter ball in my abdomen, pushing everything else away from it. No, it's not a pointy stick, but like the surgeon said, we're not indestructable but we're tougher then we look, most of us anyways.