Tomb Raider Definitive Edition dev diary features pretty graphics, big words
The lives of Tomb Raider fans without a next gen console are about to get a little worse next week. Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition hits store shelves, and Crystal Dynamics has issued a new dev diary showing off all the glorious next gen polish they’re putting into the game. They’ve also apparently decided to help us improve our vocabulary. Ever hear of the word re-typologized? Well, read on and you will.
The dev diary was posted earlier today on the official Tomb Raider YouTube channel, and runs just over four minutes long. Narrated by Executive Producer Scott Amos, the video highlights many of the areas they’re revamping for Tomb Raider’s next generation debut. According to Amos, his team wanted to make a truly next gen version of Lara Croft. And to do it, they had to rebuild her from scratch. Her head and face has been “re-typologized” to give her a higher fidelity appearance, with “5x density.” Soooo… I guess that’s good, right? In videogames, anyway. Telling someone that their face looks dense in real life probably wouldn’t be a good idea.
that’s some damn fine typologizing…
It’s not just Lara’s face that has been rebuilt. Her hair has been rendered with Tress FX, which allows each strand to have its own physics, leading to much more realistic movement in-game. Her skin has also been given a makeover. Blood can crack and dry, and beads of water will follow realistic paths across it. Light will also reflect and disperse across her skin in a much more lifelike way. All of Lara’s weapons and gadgets have also been given a next gen polish. Each item Lara carries will now have its own physics, and will react independently, right down to the arrows in her quiver.
Check it all out in the trailer below.
Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition comes out on January 28th for PS4 and Xbox One.
