Tomb Raider's Lead Writer Is "Not A Fan Of The Dad Plot"

thegamer.com:

The lead writer for Tomb Raider and Rise of the Tomb Raider has revealed that she isn't a fan of the dad plotline from Rise.

Although the first game in the Tomb Raider reboot trilogy mostly focuses on Lara becoming her own person, the second game in the series focused much more on her family, specifically her dad and what happened to him. Criticism was levied upon the story for focusing too much on that and not enough on Lara herself, unlike earlier Tomb Raider games which portrayed Lara as more independent.

Related: Disco Elysium’s Approach To Racism Is Incredibly Cynical

Although Rise of the Tomb Raider came out back in 2015, the discourse is seemingly still going. As reported by GamesRadar+, Gail Simone, a comic book and animation writer, Tweeted, "Here is some free advice to anyone working on Tomb Raider stories, speaking not as a writer, but as a fan. STOP MAKING EVERY STORY ABOUT HER DAD. NO ONE CARES ABOUT HER DAD. THERE'S NEVER BEEN AN INTERESTING STORY WHERE HER DAD IS THE FOCUS. Thank you. Free advice: Dump the dad story, add more SAM. Instant hit!"

In response to the criticism, Rhianna Pratchett, the lead writer on Tomb Raider and Rise of the Tomb Raider and daughter of novelist Terry Pratchett, Tweeted, "Speaking as someone that often gets defined by her dad, I’ve spoken in interviews about not being a fan of the dad plot line in Rise, but it was dictated from above & I had to make peace with it to do my job. It’s a big reason why the comics I worked on were very non-dad focused."

It's clear from Pratchett's Tweets that the main reason for her disdain towards the focus on Lara's dad comes from the fact that she's been compared to her own father, Terry Pratchett. Despite that, Rhianna says that she had to