psychedelicsaber replied to your post: @noficbyhalves This might be a less popular...
@seethem-dancing You’d just be handling Lara as per usual just like in every tr game, you play as Lara. Kurtis would be an extra character put onto the screen that would otherwise complement the gameplay(aka Lara’s mechanics). Like using farsee to look for a clue from a hard to reach place that even Lara couldn’t crawl into. Basically Kurtis would act as an ‘extended arm’ for Lara with his supernatural powers and both benefit from each other whereby Lara could perform other feats of strength that would aid them both in advancing into further stages. It’s just a matter of playing 1 character over the other and since it Tomb Raider, it’s pretty clear who the player’s will get to play as :) Beside Kurtis was a nice complementary character to Lara and I don’t see him as a helpful ai would hurt his overall character. It’d be a nice dynamic to see them both in action on a single screen.
seethem-dancing replied to your post: @noficbyhalves This might be a less popular...
I get what you mean&it is good in concept. The reason why I’m personally wary of it is because in practice - speaking from the place of my own, admittedly limited experience with gaming - it rarely benefits either character. Because the main player character can handle all the same challenges on their own&the sections where the additional player character’s help is required are often contrived&added with the sole purpose of making the sidekick character useful (in most cases such sections could’ve easily been avoided altogether&the main character would’ve benefited from acting independently). According to Richard Morton his original vision was to have Lara&Kurtis as separate player characters whose actions within the game-play would’ve indirectly affected the other (i.e Kurtis was supposed to be opening doors for Lara with his telekinesis which she would’ve later been able to enter through). That, to me, was an ideal scenario.
@psychedelicsaber @seethem-dancing What you two are describing really reminded me of in Prince of Persia Sands of Time. Occasionally Farah (not playable) will go through a crack the Prince is too big to fit through and pull a lever to open a gate for him (video). There is a section where you’re on opposite sides of a room and need to pull a series of levers to reach the bottom of the room. When it’s her turn to pull one there’s a little cutscene of her doing it and then it’s back to the game and your turn (video).
Asides from these scripted parts, she doesn’t really play a role in the gameplay. During fights she will stand on the sidelines and attack with her bow and arrow, but she is pretty useless and will even hit the Prince with them (he goes “OW!!” and she says “Sorry!!” lmao). But her role is definitely “the sidekick” aiding the Prince.
In TR, for the parts you would need to use Kurtis it would probably be quite clear that nobody else could do it, be them a man or woman. But they would have to give Lara crucial actions only doable by her, or else there’d be no reason you’d need to use her. They would need to handle it properly or else they’d be reducing Lara to Farah’s sidekick role as “she’s skinnier than him, she can enter smaller areas!”.
Definitely have only Lara can use certain weapons/equipment, but it would have to be more than that because Kurtis would obviously be capable of being able to fire a different type of gun, even if he doesn’t. It would need to be something only she is capable of doing, something like she is more accurate at shooting, she can run faster, she is more intelligent so can solve a puzzle (but that makes no sense because the player would still be solving it? idk just throwing some ideas around, I’m sure there are some obvious ones I’m missing!!)
If they were going to put this sort of thing in a AOD sequel then it would be best if you could swap between the two characters (they actually did this in the GBA version of Sands of Time - video). That way it’s still single player and up to you to work out who has the skills you need, or maybe a level can be completed in two different ways depending on who you currently have selected? Something like a collapsing floor and Lara is fast enough to run over it, but Kurtis is slower [and heavier] so he would fall through and have to take an alternate route? Then you’d need to play the game twice to explore everything, so it would be like 2 games in 1.
I think that would be the best approach but they could just keep it like they did in AOD. Lara’s actions in her levels would affect Kurtis levels and vice versa, but them being playable is still confined to their individual levels and all the changes would only be conveyed through cutscenes/dialogue, and not real time in game.
