As hinted by yesterday's startling cover reveal, the game will not only be a reboot of the franchise, but a reboot of the Tomb Raider brand. Rather than being a heavily scripted third-person action game, the new title will allow for open-world exploration, giving a fresh-faced, 21-year-old Lara new areas to traverse as she upgrades her own exploratory abilities and finds (or crafts) new equipment and survival tools. Crystal Dynamics didn't give any specifics on these tools, but we're pretty sure Knife plus Stick is going to equal a thing with which you can kill things.
As one might expect, the game's survivalist objective sets a grim tone -- Lara will have to forage for food and water to stay alive. She'll also have to avoid the traps and violent inhabitants strewn across the game's island setting, which, according to the article, are capable of dispatching Lara in extremely brutal ways. Like, ways that make the Tomb Raider 2 "Blow Lara Up" code seem like a minor papercut. Keep an eye out for the January issue of Game Informer for even more details about this interesting adventure.
