Rise of the Tomb Raider is set to release on November 10 for Xbox 360 and Xbox One.
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Head of first and third-part marketing at Microsoft, Aaron Greenberg, sat down with the guys at Kinda amusing Games to breakdown the mentality behind pairing Rise of the Tomb Raider with one of this year’s biggest releases. A potent schedule of exclusives and multiplatform titles has been assembled for the console – while the outlook for the PlayStation 4 looks a little deficient in comparison. That is always the number one priority. For example Halo 5 is out today, and next week gamers can expect to get their hands on Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, and later towards the middle of November, gamers can also look forward to Star Wars Battlefront.
“And then you go late and then you’re like well, ‘Does the consumer have money left to buy the game?’ So there wasn’t a better scenario for us except that was the week it wasn’t going head-to-head against Call of Duty or Star Wars Battlefront”. They feel like Fallout 4 is a fantastic game but is not a direct competitor and appeals to different audiences.
Rise of the Tomb Raider is designed as a full sequel to the reboot of the series and will take Lara Croft to Siberia, where she is searching for a mythical city called Kitezh, which is supposed to hold a secret related to immortality.
According to the executive, Microsoft and the game’s creator Crystal Dynamics, picked the date based on the development progress of the new “Tomb Raider” title.
Speaking to XBA recently, Game Director on Rise of the Tomb Raider, Brian Horton, mentioned that the upcoming adventure for Lara was only about 33% tombs. November is, as with past years, an incredibly busy month packed with games, so no matter when Rise of the Tomb Raider released, it was going to be a tough hill to climb.
“Most [development] teams pick their dates not knowing what else is going to be there”.
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This means that there isn’t much time in between for publishers to capitalize on if they want to release games in time for the holiday. “And once you know then it’s like, would you rather launch against Call of Duty, Star Wars, or Fallout?”. Tomb Raider, as big as it is, still isn’t quite as popular as a few of the heavy hitters lined up. But, even though “Fallout 4” will launch on the same day, Greenburg is not anxious since the game will also come out for the Xbox One, aside from the PlayStation 4 and Microsoft Windows platforms.
