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Lara at
the Movies
Release Date: June 2004
Size:
PC 330 Mb - MAC 328 Mb
File Type:
TR4
No of Levels 21
Platform
PC and Mac
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These downloads are self installing. Double click the
exe and the game will automatically install.
Report by
George Maciver
Lara at the Movies
Lara at the Movies was
a collaboration by 12 level builders and Michael Prager, who was
the Project Manager. 300 limited edition CDs were burned and
individually numbered and are destined to become collector's
items. This was indeed a mammoth project which required much
expertise and team work to bring it all together and make it
work.
Lara at the Movies is not for beginners to Tomb Raider. It is,
for the most part, an
expert's challenge. If you are in the mood for some serious
Raiding, utilizing all your skills and mental prowess, then
this is highly recommended playing. If you're looking for a
quiet afternoon's romp, try something else. This is a demanding
game that will challenge even the experts. Having said that,
this is a unique collection of levels from some of the best
custom level designers out there and as such offers an
experience in Tomb Raider that is unique and not to be missed.
The
Movie Theatre
Michael Prager
Level
Report
Finally getting a bit of rest from all her adventures, Lara
decides to have a relaxing night out at the movies and through
the rainy evening makes her way to the local theatre, only to
find it strangely empty and deserted. Of course her inquisitive
mind gets the better of her and she decides to explore the
various cinemas and all of a sudden finds herself each time
propelled right into the movies, living through them and taking
a major part in the plot herself...Will she make it through and
get out of the Movie Theatre before the break of dawn with the
help of the six collected movie stars that will help her solve
the puzzle to open the exit door?
Walkthrough
Cinema One
The Blair Witch Project - Elvis
Tupcijenko (eTux)
Level Report
In October 2003 a British tourist - Lara Croft - gets lost
during a hike in the forest near Burketsville, Maryland. For 10
days there is no sign of her whatsoever, but then, on the 11th
day, she comes out of the forest past the rescue teams as if
nothing had happened. During many inquiries she confirms that
she is fine and refuses to answer what happened in those 10
days. In June 2004 she finally agrees to share her story.
Apparently the first 9 days were pure survival lessons, while
the last few hours of the 10th day were very interesting...
Walkthrough
Rebecca - Debbie Overstreet
Level Report
Rebecca (1940) Maxim de Winter’s wife Rebecca died tragically.
He was the one who killed her accidentally. He gets remarried to
Lara and she is now the new Mrs. de Winter. Rebecca's evil maid
Mrs. Danvers never takes her eyes off Lara once she arrives at
Manderly Mansion. Rebecca's presence is felt everywhere. Lara
must explore the Mansion and eventually overcome the evil
presence in the home and get out alive…
Walkthrough
Psycho - Debbie Overstreet
Level Report
Psycho (1960) Lara finds herself in the role of the victim's
sister and will have to re-trace her sister's steps to discover
what has happened to her. There is hidden evidence that will
solve the mystery of her disappearance. Getting to that hidden
evidence will not be easy…
Walkthrough
Cinema Two
Indiana Jones and Temple of
Doom - Todd Shurtz (Raider X)
Level Report
While looking through some books on ancient Temples and Tombs,
Lara stumbles across a newspaper clipping regarding Indiana
Jones. Looking closer at the article she discovers that he never
returned from the Temple he discovered. He was looking for the
remaining Shankara Stone that was said to be there. So Lara sets
out to find the Stone that one of the greatest archeologists in
the world died looking for.
Walkthrough
Blood from the Mummy's Tomb - Josep Borrut
Level Report
Lara becomes instrumental in unleashing unmitigated horror by
bringing back to England the gift of Tara, the Egyptian Queen of
Darkness. The Egyptologist Professor Fuchs has been looking for
the Queen Tara idol hidden in the Cat Temple. When he was close
to get the objects to open the temple, communication with the
base had been suddenly lost. Lara starts her own search for the
idol…
Walkthrough
Cinema Three
Pirates of the Caribbean -
Michael Allan (The Cowboy)
Level
Report
Lara finds herself on a small Jungle Island, which was once home
to a tribe and pirates. She has to recover the artifact that the
pirates looted from the ancient temple to escape, only to find
that those pirates are cursed and are still protecting it. Also
Lara is not alone - there is a strange mercenary group after the
artifact and will stop at nothing to get it…
Walkthrough
The Treasure Island - Antonio Tarantello (Psiko)
Level Report
Having found the ‘Treasure Island’ book from her huge library,
Lara reads about the treasure of Flint, a dead Captain of the
Seas, hidden on an unknown island of the Pacific. Lara falls
asleep and the book drops from her hands revealing a double
cover, which seems to exactly reveal the location of the island
described by Flint in his treasure map and that's why Lara
decides to leave again for the Pacific Ocean…
Walkthrough
Cinema Four
12 Monkeys - Thierry Maynard
(Thierry Stoorne)
Level Report
Lost in the future, Lara must find the machine which allows
James Cole and herself to cross time again and return to the
present. Will the ‘Army of the 12 Monkeys’ help her or be her
enemy? And what about the virus that has spread…
Walkthrough
Hound of the Baskervilles - Szymon Cupryn (Emoo)
Level Report
A fiendish evil lurks beneath the mist-shrouded cliffs of
England's fabled moors in the form hellish hounds, feeding upon
the trembling flesh of the heirs of Baskerville Hall. But before
those savage beasts can sink their teeth into the newest lord of
the manor, they must pit their vicious fangs against the searing
intellect of the most powerful foe they have ever encountered -
the incomparable Lara Croft…
Walkthrough
Cinema Five
Star Wars Episode 1 - Scott
Ginn (EssGee)
Level
Report
Lara, having been inducted as an honorary Jedi, finds herself on
the planet Tatooine run by the Hutts. Not only is this desert
planet home to some very seedy intergalactic travelers, but it
is also infested with forces from the dark side. The Sith Lord,
accompanied by his apprentice Darth Maul, recognises this planet
as a strategic stronghold and wishes to take control of it. This
planet has always attracted its fair share of rebellious
characters with its famous pod racing events so Lara will not be
out of place here. Although the ways of Jabba the Hutt are not
exactly Lara's 'cup o'tea', she detests the motives of the Dark
Lords with a passion, and in her own inimitable fashion will
fight to suppress the evil forces of the Dark Side in their
takeover bid, in order to let the inhabitants of Tatooine retain
their freedom…
Walkthrough
Stargate - Titia Drenth (Titak)
Level Report
Lara makes her way into a military installation at Creek
Mountain, Colorado, where a mysterious Stargate is being
examined and tested. She has to find four Chevrons in order to
activate the Stargate and will be transported by it to a
desolate world bearing the marks of an ancient Civilization. Ra,
the Egyptian Sun God, visits the planet once in a while to get
the precious minerals to keep his ship operational. Lara needs
to find two new Chevrons to reactivate the Stargate again.
But... she is not alone. Ra is watching her closely and sends
down his soldiers after her to retrieve the first Chevron. The
second Chevron is already in Ra's possession. Lara has to make
her way through the ship, retrieve the second Chevron and make
her way back through the Stargate to the military installation
and escape with the artefact she has found in Ra's ship…
Walkthrough
Cinema Six
Jurassic Park - George Maciver
Level Report
Lara is visiting Site C, a previously unknown dinosaur genetic
testing and breeding facility. During the explorations of the
jungles surrounding the facility, a strange electric blue stone
was unearthed near to the gates of a lost Temple. Lara is
intrigued by the stone and the Temple, and has arrived as part
of an archeological team to examine the stone. However, before
their work can begin, there is a disaster. The dinosaurs are
loosed, and Site C has become a hunting ground...
Walkthrough
Alien Resurrection - Kerstin Schlott (Codo)
Level Report
On board of the USM Auriga scientists succeeded in cloning an
alien species. Their intention was to use their potential for
military purposes. Because they did not realize the menace of
this species, the aliens broke out of their cages and the ship
fell into chaos and many people died. Because of an emergency
program the autopilot of the lost ship is heading towards Earth,
as a collision was the last possibility to kill the aliens.
Lara’s mission is to go on board and blow up the ship before it
crashes into Earth by finding the main computer to give enough
energy to the ship and start the self destruction sequence. But
be careful, there are still lots of hungry aliens on board. And
hurry up when you started the sequence and get off the ship
before it explodes…
Walkthrough
***
Of course, it took a lot more than just level building to make
this thing work. There were objects to be made, Lara's wardrobe
to be designed, musical scores to be composed, graphics to be
designed, levels to be beta tested, baddies to be made, and a
few other bits and pieces. Regina Rabmann did a fabulous job on
the CD cover artwork. But the star of the show had to be Michael
Prager. Without his Project Management skills, Lara at the
Movies would never have happened.
The Making of TRLE Gold ’04 – Lara at the Movies
by Michael Prager - May 2004
As with any great project this one has its origin way in the
past. It was in April 2001 when I got a surprise email from the
other side of the world. A guy from New Zealand approached me
and asked whether I wanted to join this huge project and
contribute my level building skills to it. He had played and
liked my level ‘Seven Islands’ and thought I could be a great
asset to the undertaking. How flattering indeed. I mean, those
were the early days of custom level building – a contact with
somebody you didn’t even know just because of something you
created with the editor was a thrilling experience and I was
more than happy to commit myself to the project. Over the next
few weeks I learned that this project took the same course many
of those alleged huge projects took at the time…it drifted….the
energy slipped…then communication ceased entirely….and it
silently disappeared into nothingness. But – it was back then
when the idea sparked. Being asked for input on how we could lay
out the project I had the thought that it could be a cool idea
to sort of build levels that relate to well known movies. The
other folks on the project team liked the idea but had already
sort of started into a different direction, so the idea got
shelved at the time….
Almost three years later….the custom level scene had massively
evolved. A few sites had materialized as the centers of gravity
for the TR community. There were almost 1000 custom levels out
there - many, many truly impressive ones – and then suddenly in
early October 2003 I reached a point were I seemed to have a
little time at hand, as I had played and reviewed all available
custom levels for my site and the inflow of new levels was
comparably low. So that little spark of an idea from 2001 came
back - and later in the month I put together an email outlining
the rough idea of an integrated game of movie-themed custom
levels with a movie theatre hub level as the connecting element
to a list of about 80 custom level designers, whose work I had
appreciated and who I thought could be interested and available
to join such an effort.
I was absolutely amazed by the responses which came in during
late October and early November 2003….the line up of builders
that emerged and showed an interest and offered up a movie theme
they would throw into the mix was way beyond what I could have
hoped for… within a few days after sending the email a team
began to form which read like the ‘Who is Who’ of level
building…Mirai, Loren Golden, Claude Gross, Emoo, EssGee,
Thierry Stoorne, Titak, Debbie Overstreet, eTux, George Maciver,
Michael Allan…and they all brought in another angle, a new
movie, a new setting and the project very quickly began to take
shape…and then Psiko stepped in and wanted to join as well, and
Josep Borrut came up saying he had been working on a level since
August and now will find a movie for it so that he can join
in…and then George brought Raider X in, whom I had not emailed
as at the time he had not yet even released his first level and
finally, finally a member of the German community kind of
completed the crew – Codo, who already had experience in project
work through her participation in the Bravo Screenfun project
which was released in November 2002. I also tried to talk
Richard Lawther into joining the project and he kind of
tentatively agreed as well. I almost couldn’t believe my luck –
all those people coming together…but it also felt like a big
weight on my shoulders. It became clear that if this should not
turn out to be one of those huge projects that everybody talks
about for a while but that then never sees the light of day –
things would have to be done a little differently and it would
not be an easy, low key job to make it happen.
So, we began to set up logistics – a forum to be able to share
status and questions and some of the team members immediately
got down and worked on their levels while others still had
projects to finish first and decided to get started later. From
the very start the target date for completion was the late June
2004 TR-Meeting in Lage, Germany – what could be a better event
to present such a project – a meeting with 70 TR addicts in one
place for a whole weekend….
Later in November….a TR-Meeting in Hamburg, Germany where a
selected small group of people got the first glimpses of levels
that were already available to play at least parts of them. It
was a very early view of some bits and pieces but already the
feedback was encouraging and an energy boost to press on…With
the initial levels that ended up as sort of ready, it became
clear that several iterations would be required to ‘get them
fully right’ and therefore very soon we began to engage beta
testers beyond the people who were actually on the project team
– representing PC and Mac players to ensure compatibility and we
also gave them their own forum to discuss and ask questions as
they tested through the levels. Progress was really encouraging:
Debbie building as fast as usual, George full of energy for the
project delivering an ever growing set of levels, Scott getting
all his fabulous custom objects and enemies built, Josep’s level
basically ready and being fine tuned only, Michael Allan coming
up with his stunning jungle setting and Raider X surprising us
with a very intricate and solid Indiana Jones setting….the only
bad news around this time was that Loren Golden dropped out from
the team to focus on other personal things.
As we moved into December 2003 Titak began to share early
versions of her Stargate levels and the project kept growing and
growing. I began to get a little nervous with those builders who
had not yet shared a lot of news about their work for the
project…Psiko was still working hard towards the release of his
massive TR-A series, eTux fine-tuning his Armageddon’s Temple 2,
EssGee worked towards the release of Legend of the Golden
Scorpion sort of in parallel to his Star Wars efforts for the
project. All the activity was quite overwhelming at times. Then
Thierry Stoorne presented a first part of his 12 Monkeys set
with stunning use of AoD Textures – another great addition. More
and more, everything began to fall in place.
In January 2004 Richard Lawther dropped out of the project as
somehow he could not get his ideas to work for the movie he had
in mind – a pity, but it couldn’t be helped. Just before the
release of his stunning ‘Recruiting Demon Smalls’ level, we
tried to kind of bring him back into the project but hit a
number of technical limitations that stopped us from
accomplishing that. Meanwhile more of the levels became ready
and made it through beta testing successfully and the overall
game setup began to take form. Also work began on the design and
layout of the planned limited edition CD version of the game.
Regina (Gandalf) kindly agreed to give this a go and from coming
up with a ‘simple’ CD Cover, over the coming weeks this evolved
into much more, including Label, Inlay, Cover, Booklet and she
even came up with a brilliant flash trailer, which worked well
as a teaser for the project.
Still March and April 2004 were hectic months, as slowly but
surely we ran out of time. But Psiko, eTux, Emoo and Codo pulled
off their contributions in very short time and through quite an
effort even those levels did get their decent share of beta
testing done. We did unfortunately lose Claude Gross along the
way, who had some trouble with his City of the God series that
apparently took his full attention and also Mirai was busy with
his work as a musician and could not continue his work for the
project, but he did agree to contribute the excellent title
track. End of March Regina’s Trailer got released – starting the
advertising campaign for the project. It did not give away too
much just yet, but it looked so professional that Eidos got very
nervous about the project and the potential violation of
licensing rights, so after only a few days the trailer was
removed and the whole ‘advertising’ moved to a much more low key
level behind the scenes, based on a set of Newsletters that
people registered for.
Throughout the whole project two very remarkable things
happened. It was amazing to see how the team grew into being a
team versus being individual level designers doing their own
thing. The help, assistance, open feedback and general
communication was truly impressive and definitely one of the key
reasons for the quality of the resulting product. The other one
was the help and support from outside of the project team. There
were simply too many people from the community to name them all
who had at least a small stake in this production, be it through
contributing an outfit, technical tips, objects, enemies,
testing or just general advice.
May 2004 was the month in which all the pieces were finally
being put together and in very short time we had to run through
beta testing of the full game. Many, many hours of raiding were
put in by a selected few people and feedback was very
encouraging as the overall game seemed to work together really
well. Also the graphical design of the CD was finalized and the
agency received the order to produce the limited edition CDs in
time for the meeting on the weekend of June 25-27.
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