Rhianna Pratchett Is Tomb Raider's Lead Writer

@Toug said:

@jackDanger said:

Oh I get it, the rape stuff is ok now, there's a woman working on it! Also I'm not racist, I have black friends.

^^ This. Yeah.

What rape stuff?

Bit odd that they're formally announcing this is she's been working on it for the last two years. Oh well, as long as it's better written than Heavenly Sword anyway.

This only makes sense as troll-pr, and it will work exactly as planned.

So is Chris Brown the main antagonist in this game, then?

This should not change anyone's opinion on the Tomb Raider stuff, because no one should have been mad about people trying to make a unique character that goes through some tough shit to begin with.

I think waiting with this announcement is smart. It isn't them just trying to cover their ass, because they know they don't have to. Other than some whipped idiots and some victim card playing non-victims, no one thought the game was being racist.

@ManMadeGod said:

@OneManX said:

@Vortextk said:

"Knowing a woman was chiefly involved in setting the tone and establishing the context of this new game, one that finds Lara Croft put in harrowing, formative situations, would have framed the conversation differently." Would it? Should it? And why? If it's wrong it's wrong, whether it came from Hitler or Ghandi. Vice versa in that context. Is it the company's fault for not producing her earlier, or every other person's fault for going fucking crazy over some perceived sexism or whatever they had problems with? Is it suddenly not sexist just because a woman is behind it? Meh in any case all around, still interested in the game, still don't care about the meta commentary on it.

I think a lot of people jumped on it, b/c it was men talking about a female character and what she had to go through. It makes more sense for a woman to right a good coming of age type story starring a female, than a male. Iguess is what the quote was going for. I dunno, I found all the "outrage" about the whole demo dumb to begin with.

Funny that most of the white knights were in fact men. Nerdy gamer men to be more specific. You had gaming dudes criticizing (and acting offended at) other gaming dudes for making a game about a women in with they perceived was sexist. The entire thing was laughable. Thankfully everyone seems to have moved on.

Yes, because the only people who should stand up against perceived ills are those who have those ills perpetrated against them. That's why I close my ears to racism and other prejudice, because I'm an average white man, so obviously I have no concept of what is and is not ok.

The original commenter has it right. If something is wrong, or you think something is wrong, you should be willing to stand up to it. It doesn't matter who you are; the notion that you can't be offended by something that isn't directed toward you is kind of disgusting. We should all be willing to stand up to idiocy regardless of the target.

@tapuki said:

@leejunfan83 said:

@Toug said:

@jackDanger said:

Oh I get it, the rape stuff is ok now, there's a woman working on it! Also I'm not racist, I have black friends.

^^ This. Yeah.

If this was the goal by throwing out this information about the writer, which it probably is, then, as I and others have said previously, this changes nothing. If you're still bothered by the game and the meta-commentary that has been laid out be the creators thus far, saying, "A woman is writing this!" doesn't suddenly make everything better. Plenty of women have written work demeaning toward other women. Hell, 50 Shades of Grey is full of that and it's crazy successful.

oh dang the shit-storm is here.

Wow, I had no idea that the daughter of my favorite author wrote for games, let alone a number of games that I rather enjoyed. I was already looking forward to this release and this has increased my interest threefold. Give me Pratchett or give me death. Or actually, just give me Pratchett.

@adam1808 said:

@Tidel: There is only one Pratchett. And Tell-Tale need to get him for a Discworld adventure game before he loses his marbles.

Don't remind me. It's so sad :'(

@BrockNRolla: Well, as a black male, I think I would be able to tell racism better than a white person, b/c they dont go through as often as I have. We could discuss, but it's hard to have an opinion over something that doesn't effect as much as another person.

But with the issue at hand, There is no problem with the discussion of females in games, but the tone a lot of people took was, dismissing the game and labeling it one way or another, without creating any discussion, was dumb. If we are gonna discuss it, then let's get men AND women to discuss it, Ihaven't seen any of that and it's just been piling on this or the booth babes, or the quote from PR about Tomb Raider. The same thing with the FGC, there is room for discussion, but no one is doing it.

@MordeaniisChaos said:

I think waiting with this announcement is smart. It isn't them just trying to cover their ass, because they know they don't have to. Other than some whipped idiots and some victim card playing non-victims, no one thought the game was being racist.

This is a definitively true statement.

@adam1808 said:

@Tidel: There is only one Pratchett. And Tell-Tale need to get him for a Discworld adventure game before he loses his marbles.

Oh lord. Telltale and Discworld - that's a combination that might actually work ... that would probably be very cool.

@Gordo789 said:

oh dang the shit-storm is here.

better get my umberella ella ella eh eh eh.

I read the title as "Rihanna is Tomb Raider's Lead Writer" and it all made sense. Then I realized it actually read Rhianna Pratchett and now I'm confused again.

This whole reveal is fucked.

1. It's a smart PR move at this point. People's minds are simple, and this will quell some of the anger.

2. A woman writing the game doesn't change anything. It can still be sexist.

3. Look at that picture of Pratchett. There's your sexism right there. So many women (except Hennig) who are involved in games development are shown like this. If she was a man it'd be 100% casual.

Writer of Mirror's Edge? Yeaaaaaah, that doesn't make me get all excited over Tomb Raider, Mirror's Edge had some pretty terrible writing.

@wewantsthering: @wewantsthering said:

@fluxbit said:

Maybe they didn't trot her out because they, and she, are better than that.

If they were beyond that, why did they wait until a big event trot her out? Because they're not better than that. Haha. It shouldn't be a bullet-point that a woman was a lead in something. It should be normal by now.

That is my point. Who's making it a bullet-point? Not them; Patrick.

@OneManX said:

@BrockNRolla: Well, as a black male, I think I would be able to tell racism better than a white person, b/c they dont go through as often as I have. We could discuss, but it's hard to have an opinion over something that doesn't effect as much as another person.

But with the issue at hand, There is no problem with the discussion of females in games, but the tone a lot of people took was, dismissing the game and labeling it one way or another, without creating any discussion, was dumb. If we are gonna discuss it, then let's get men AND women to discuss it, Ihaven't seen any of that and it's just been piling on this or the booth babes, or the quote from PR about Tomb Raider. The same thing with the FGC, there is room for discussion, but no one is doing it.

I would never presume to understand racism better than someone who has themselves experienced it. But the human experience isn't so divided that one person can't understand at a basic level what someone else would experience in a situation. While I would never claim that I could speak for black men, I do understand that when my former roommate spoke of "black youth" making our neighborhood dangerous, he was being a disgusting human being and I called him out.

So while I don't experience racism on the level of someone who is effected by it, I still know it when I see it or hear it and do my best to stand up to it. My grandparents used to have a tendency to refer to black people as "coloreds" and Hmong people as "chinks." After enough times of me telling them to stop using those terms, they finally did. Would that discussion have benefited from representative members of these minority groups being part of it? Definitely, and grandparents probably wouldn't have even used such monikers in their presence, but just because I was the only one there and wasn't directly effected by it, didn't mean I shouldn't stand up and try to stop something I thought was wrong.

I agree with you that discussion is ideal when numerous groups are represented as it brings a better chance of reaching a consensus less influenced by one person's idiosyncrasies. AND discussion should be the preferred over indignant shouting matches. BUT, it is better to stand up to something even if you're not the ideal spokesperson than to let some things slide unchallenged. That's my stance anyway.

I'm starting to get the "trying a bit too hard" feel from Tomb Raider. I cant really articulate it properly, but the line from that quote "...but nothing comes close to the challenge of re-writing her." just put me off for some reason.

*whispers* Hey! She's the daughter of Terry Pratchett, author of the Discworld books so she must be just as great at writing as her dad. You liked the writing in Mirrors Edge and Overlord right? No? Fuck...

This was their big reveal for Comic-Con: that the daughter of a beloved nerd author (and I mean that sincerely) was working on Tomb Raider. That's why this reveal happened. That's it. If they revealed it earlier in an attempt to put out the flames for the backlash the game got, it would have looked goddamn TERRIBLE on their part. It's the equivalent of saying "I'm not racist, my best friend is black!"

@CornBREDX said:

Hahahaha That's fucking hilarious. If I was with Eidos I wouldn't have said anything either. Makes a lot of people look like idiots looking for something to crusade (which is all I saw in the whole controversy thing), and this is just perfect. Thumbs up to Eidos. That's great.

this. A million times this.

@mbr2 said:

*whispers* Hey! She's the daughter of Terry Pratchett, author of the Discworld books so she must be just as great at writing as her dad. You liked the writing in Mirrors Edge and Overlord right? No? Fuck...

Her GB page says she worked on the Prince of Persia reboot, too. I thought that had some good writing, at least the back and forth between the two leads. Never played Mirror's Edge or Overlord though, so I can't comment on those.

@Rmack said:

This was their big reveal for Comic-Con: that the daughter of a beloved nerd author (and I mean that sincerely) was working on Tomb Raider. That's why this reveal happened. That's it. If they revealed it earlier in an attempt to put out the flames for the backlash the game got, it would have looked goddamn TERRIBLE on their part. It's the equivalent of saying "I'm not racist, my best friend is black!"

Yes. Exactly.

The only reason this shit has continued is that they responded poorly when the controversy broke.

Nobody actually cares about any of this crap. The game will live or die based on its quality. Having a good writer on staff sounds cool.

In what fantasy world must you live in for this to be anything close to news? Let's have a news post about random lead writers for every upcoming game then!

We don't have a more normal picture of Rhianna? Ah well. This actually makes me more excited for it, I rather enjoyed Mirror's Edge and Overlord.

It's cool, I have a black friend.

Sure, put that photo out to the internet, just bait the tide of rape jokes so we can start all over again.

@EthanML said:

Sure, put that photo out to the internet, just bait the tide of rape jokes so we can start all over again.

I'm confused by what you mean by this. A photo of a woman is baiting people to make comments about rape?

With regards to framing Tomb Raider's narrative, perhaps it is a meta commentary about sexism in games that a woman CANNOT be the subject of the terrible, horrible things we so frequently see our male protagonists, such as Nathan Drake go through, or deserving of some at least. Kind of funny in retrospect that people blew up over the scant details we had and a marketing misstep, almost everyone saying "well if a WOMAN signed off on it, it would be okay" when it's was a woman's work anyway.

I don't think it matters who wrote the story so long as I can enjoy it. That said, I enjoy Pratchett's work so here's a bonus for me, also, I think who writes game plots should be better publicized a la the movie industry.

@BrianP: Well, to the trolls of the internet, yeah. Not just a photo but the type of photo, as others have mentioned, if the story was about a male it would probably be some totally casual photo.

@EthanML: Well that is the photo from the "about" section on her own website, so let's just call out and blame the trolls when they say fucked up things rather than blame someone for posting a photo (which by the way is just her face with some makeup on) which will somehow cause an uncontrollable reaction from the internet.

Suck it, misogyny caller-outers.

you had me at pratchett

@BrianP said:

@EthanML: Well that is the photo from the "about" section on her own website, so let's just call out and blame the trolls when they say fucked up things rather than blame someone for posting a photo (which by the way is just her face with some makeup on) which will somehow cause an uncontrollable reaction from the internet.

SHE LOOKS LIKE A GIRL IT MAKES ME UNCOMFORTABLE IT MUST BE SEXIST!

Been excited from day one!

But does it really change anything? The game is still the game.

Also... noone has played the game yet.

Mirrors Edge has an almost unintelligible story. I know that has a lot to do with how the development of that game was mismanaged but she hasn't proven herself as a writer yet. It seems strange that she is so vocal about writing in games. I assume her reputation has more to do with that than the rabid Overlord fan-base.

@CornBREDX said:

Makes a lot of people look like idiots looking for something to crusade (which is all I saw in the whole controversy thing),

@Hailinel said:

Where is your sexism now, internet crusaders?

@billyhoush said:

What a misogynistic bitch!

Yeah, because all that rape and "want to protect her" shit was totally called for and not worthy of criticism. You're absolutely right, guys! What a bunch of overly sensitive sissies getting upset about a serious issue.

So Patrick couldn't find a picture of Pratchett so he just posted a picture of Morgan Webb? Also I find all the Sexisum talk very interesting now.

HOLY SHIT! Lauren Winter is real?!

Great she wrote all stories I hated.

I find it almost sexist on behalf of the internet now that it's okay just because a women wrote it. That's like saying 'oh it's okay that he said faggot because he's a gay person." That's... called a double standard, people. If you're pissed off at the way she was written, you can't just double on that because a woman wrote it. It's still the exact same thing that was written!

@jackDanger said:

Oh I get it, the rape stuff is ok now, there's a woman working on it! Also I'm not racist, I have black friends.

This exactly. It's naive to think that women can't have "sexist" views. Ayn Rand is one of the most sexist writers I've ever read. We also don't know how heavily directed the writing was. As someone mentioned these games tend to be driven by set pieces. She could just be stringing along dialog for events and settings that were already decided. Nor does having a female lead writer change the stupidity of that producer's comments. To say that a woman is on board, its ok sounds like an excuse to push away uncomfortable feelings about this game and the creators' previous comments.

Man, the comments section got super retarded right from the get-go!

Woot for female writers for video games!

Any other female writers?

Amy Hennig (Legacy of Kain, Uncharted)

Susan O'Connor (Far Cry 2, Gears of War)

Jane Jensen (Gabriel Knight)

Good for them, hopefully this will shut up all the people complaining about sexism and such in the game - since a woman wrote it and all.

If they had said this earlier, they could have avoided some grief over sexism I think, but maybe they decided to wait - the game did get plenty of press and mentions because of that - and the majority of people talking about the game wasn't attacking it.

Still remains to be seen whether moe, moe 'you want to protect her' Lara will be worth a damn.

Mirror's Edge wasn't bad, but everything about the story was quite bland. I'm not automatically sold on Pratchett Jr. as a writer.

Man, the comments section got super retarded right from the get-go!