The first three entries in the iconic action-adventure franchise were developed by the now-defunct British company Core Design, with the series then going through several developer switches that started and ended with Crystal Dynamics. And while the Embracer Group-owned studio is still the lead on the series, the Tomb Raider 1-3 Remastered collection was primarily developed by Aspyr Media, its sister company.
Yet it is Crystal Dynamics and not Aspyr that is responsible for the newly emerged content warning, which was originally spotted by Tomb Raider Forums users on February 13. "The games in this collection contain offensive depictions of people," the notice reads, adding that these renditions were influenced by ethnic and racial stereotypes that run contrary to Crystal Dynamics' values. Even so, the U.S. studio said it decided to leave the offensive content in its original form in the hopes that its "harmful impact" could be acknowledged and used to inform modern sensibilities.
Crystal Dynamics' Warning Possibly Refers to the South Pacific Section of Tomb Raider 3
The warning doesn't actually contain any examples of the content that the studio deemed offensive. But the fact that it references depictions of "people" does help narrow down the list of contentious levels by quite a bit, because the original Tomb Raider trilogy doesn't have that many human enemies or friendly characters to begin with. Excluding ethnically white and completely obscured human enemies from the equation leaves just two levels that Crystal Dynamics' warning could ostensibly be referring to: Coastal Village and Temple of Puna in Tomb Raider 3, both of which are part of the game's South Pacific section.
The games in this collection contain offensive depictions of people and cultures rooted in racial and ethnic prejudices. These stereotypes are deeply harmful, inexcusable, and do not align with our values at Crystal Dynamics. Rather than removing this content, we have chosen to present it here in its original form, unaltered, in the hopes that we may acknowledge its harmful impact and learn from it.
Namely, this segment of the 1998 game features several types of Tribesmen—equipped with spears, axes, and poison darts—that are implied to be cannibals. There is a long string of evidence suggesting such depictions are rooted in cultural stereotypes that tribal people find highly offensive. E.g., in 2011, human rights organization Survival International submitted a formal complaint with UK authorities over "ludicrous" media reports that a German tourist who went missing in Polynesia had been "eaten by cannibals." The filing argued that the media had painted an extremely offensive narrative that tribal people are "primitive savages." The complaint equated the act of implying contemporary tribal people practice cannibalism to "calling Germans today Nazis because of their past."
According to early player reports, the content warning appears just once after booting the collection of the Tomb Raider remasters for the first time. Seeing it again afterward is only possible by deleting one's save file.
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Source: https://gamerant.com/tomb-raider-remastered-collection-racial-stereotypes-content-warning/
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