Tomb Raider Profitable “From the End of Last Year”

A lot was made of the “irresponsibility of publishers” when Square Enix announced Tomb Raider was a stinking failure (although they didn’t use those words). Despite the fact it had managed to push millions and millions of units in a matter of months, it had still not been profitable. While Crystal Dynamics’ latest had garnered sales most developers would never even think possible, it still managed to sit in the red.

Until the end of last year. In an interview with Eurogamer, Scot Amos has revealed that Tomb Raider has finally covered its development costs. Almost everything from here on out is pure profit.

By the end of last year – Tomb Raider is in the black. We’ve crossed the line of profitability for the last-gen and PC versions.

More importantly, was it bad that Square ever expected to sell so much?

I think that, as far as realistic or not, what the market can bear… It’s a very interesting time. How many people can sell games like Clash of Clans or Candy Crush and make that kind of money? Or Minecraft’s sales? Expectations can get shifted so quickly it’s difficult to know what realistic even means anymore.

And, looking forward, clearly Square and Crystal are invested in the franchise. So, despite how it was said, what was said – we had a lot of people scratching their heads and asking about it – we’re very happy to say that from a partnership internally, we’re committed to it totally. Square Enix talks about it as a key franchise, so we’re very happy with where we’re at.

In recent months, it’s become clear that Square Enix are playing the long game with their titles. Sure, they might come out and do relatively well, perhaps they’ll even become profitable. But it’s when they hit the sub-£10 mark that they start to become really big, especially on PC. There’s rarely a day in the Steam sale that doesn’t have Tomb Raider, Just Cause or Sleeping Dogs at the top of the charts. And that’s a clever move, although denizens of the fast-paced internet might not see it.