For today’s Media of The Day, we decided to show off the original sex symbol of gaming, Miss Lara Croft. Before the release of Tomb Raider, video games in the 8- and 16-bit era didn’t really have many heroines for players. They were either guys who were plumbers, hedgehogs that were blue or earthworms named Jim.The female’s role was normally marked down to the damsel in distress. If a female was a playable character, they weren’t considered the main character and, even if they were, you wouldn’t be able to tell without beating the game within a certain time (Metroid anyone?).
When Tomb Raider came out in the fall of 1996, things changed for the better. There was now a female character that was visible to the audience. She wasn’t the damsel, but a heroine who used her agility and brains to get out of danger. As if smarts weren’t enough, she had sex appeal like no other. She wasn’t covering up her body by wearing a dress or armored suit. All she had on was a shirt and some shorts and it worked for her and the viewers. In the end, the original Tomb Raider ended up being one of the biggest games in the world, selling over 8 million copies worldwide and spawning spawn numerous sequels.
Not only as Lara had success in the gaming world, but many artists have stepped with their own rendition of Lara. Various artists have created their own version of Ms. Croft and many are great, but Detomasso truly takes the cake. Very few can truly match what Detomasso has done. His focus on using Lara in all his artwork has paid off in creating the most genuine version of Lara in 3DX.It’s with that reason we went with Detomasso’s Lara Croft for the MotD.
If you love to see more of Detomasso’s Lara Croft , check more of her out over on his blog and check out our interview with him.
Epoch
April 11, 2012Everyone loves Lara! And yes, it was her giant breasts that did the trick for me 😉
renderfan
April 11, 2012That should be a lesson for future video games. Bigger breasts do sell better than smaller breasts. As much as I loved Beyond Good and Evil, Jade was very flat chested. Same for Mirror’s Edge, Faith was flat as a board. Nariko from Heavenly Sword is another flatty. (=_=) Those games score well and were fun, but didn’t sell.
On the flip side, Lara has been milked too much. They didn’t give her time to develop before milking her again and again. (^_^;)
The video game industry need more big breasts to take the pressure off of Lara. Poor Lara! (._.)
renderfan
April 11, 2012I would watch my sister play Tomb Raider. I think Lara had a big influence on us. It’s hard to explain why Lara became so popular when so many other VG girls are mediocre. But, I think her large breasts had something to do with it. It’s not just men that like them, but women like them, too. (# ^_^ #)
Victoria
April 11, 2012The artist knows both subject and audience.
I just visitd the site and it rocks.