One of the little-known facts about Tomb Raider is that there was actually another installment in development back in 2005. Unfortunately, the game was cancelled before it ever got to see the light of day.
What's particularly interesting is that this game - entitled Tomb Raider Anniversary Edition - was being developed by the franchise's original creators, Core Design. Here's a quick history lesson, in case you're not up to date on your Tomb Raider timeline.
The Era Of Core Design
Cast your mind back to the year 1996, during what is most likely your blissful youth. That's when the world as people knew it changed dramatically, thanks to one Lara Croft and her game, Tomb Raider. The game was developed by British video game company Core Design, with Lara Croft's character design being headed up by Toby Gard.
The company was acquired by Eidos Interactive (now a part of Square Enix) in 1996, shortly after the first game's release. Between 1997 and 2003, Core Design developed 5 more Tomb Raider games following the monumental success of the first game. Things started to get bumpy, though, around the time the 6th game - Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness - had its equally bumpy development and release. Core Design then went through a series of re-organizations and re-acquisitions before ultimately being shut down completely in 2010.
Meanwhile, following the relative failure of Angel of Darkness, Eidos handed the Tomb Raider reigns over to another studio they owned: Crystal Dynamics. The latter have been heading up the development of the Tomb Raider games ever since.
Tomb Raider Anniversary Edition
At some point during all the rather tumultuous shuffling and re-shuffling that went on, a game by the name of Tomb Raider Anniversary Edition was brewing away quietly behind the scenes. This isn't to be confused with Tomb Raider Anniversary - the 8th game in the series which actually did get released in 2007. The latter was developed by Crystal Dynamics after they received the Tomb Raider IP; Core Design was already out of the picture.
But it turns out that Core Design had actually been developing their own Tomb Raider Anniversary too, at around the time Angel of Darkness' successor Tomb Raider Legend was being developed over at Crystal Dynamics. At this point, Gard was no longer with Core Design, and was actually working on Legend with Crystal Dynamics.
"Work [on Tomb Raider Anniversary Edition] first began in late 2005, we had a year to finish it which would have meant the game would have been released in time for [Christmas] 2006, the 10th Anniversary year." says Richard Morton, Lead Level Designer on the team.
The Legend Of Two Anniversaries
In early 2006, a mysterious trailer for something called Tomb Raider Anniversary Edition emerged online, which got fans thinking this was to be the next game in the series after Legend.
This wasn't exactly correct. While Eidos did soon after this confirm that a game to mark the franchise's 10th birthday was indeed on the way, this particular trailer was actually a leaked showcase of the alpha build for Core Design's (subsequently cancelled) Tomb Raider Anniversary Edition. It's weird because both Anniversaries appear to have been in development separately but at overlapping times by both the Core Design and Crystal Dynamics teams.
Phil Chapman - Lead Artist and Animator on the Core Design team - reveals that there was confusion amongst them too, especially around why their game was ultimately cancelled:
Initially we were totally confused as to why it was canned also. Whilst we were making the game there was never any hint from Eidos that Crystal were also making a version and it must have been developed in parallel.
He also mentions how upsetting it was for his team to have received news of the cancellation, as it seemed to have come out of left field when their game was already pretty far along in its production schedule.
Personally I felt very angry towards Eidos, not because they canned us, that's something you learn to accept in this industry, but because they had strung the team along for so many months knowing that they had Crystal producing their version and that they would eventual end ours...In my books that's pretty disgusting and unprofessional behavior.
From Chapman's perspective, the decision seemed like a politically-fuelled one:"Eidos didn't want their biggest franchise being developed by a third party developer, which of course Core Design had then become."
Farewell, Anniversary Edition
Core Design's game was going to take on a very similar form to Crystal Dynamics' version, but was also reportedly going to include "a co-operative multiplayer version using a new character, Melissa Croft, which involved 2 player takes on many of the puzzles." No more information was given about this Melissa character, unfortunately.
So while we may have lost out on one Anniversary, we did still get the other which was a superb homage to the game that started it all. But it's still sad to learn about the somewhat dodgy goings-on on the part of Eidos at the time, and to hear the disappointment felt by a team who wanted to pay respect to one of the most legendary games of all time, which they themselves created. The aspect of their game which Chapman was apparently most excited about was "knowing that fans of the series would come away with a big grin after playing it."
I'm sure we would have.
Source: WikiRaider