Yet there are two video game franchises that I absolutely love - not surprisingly Tomb Raider and Uncharted. I cannot play the games to save my life but I love their expanded universes - not surprisingly they both are "descendants" of Indiana Jones.
This was initially just going to celebrate the catching up with Tomb Raider but I hadn't really talked about Uncharted that much and there wasn't enough Uncharted material to justify it's own post (but I have notes for an Uncharted timeline similar to what I did for Tomb Raider. I'll have to get back to that.)
I've been collecting now for a long time - nearly forty years. Series and franchses went in and out of favour. It's easier to collect things as they come out - I jumped on the extended Uncharted material as it came out. One novel and a six issue miniseries and I'll get the associated material for the Tom Holland/ Mark Walhberg movie assuming they make it before Tom Holland looks old enough to play Sully. (although I hear it or Spiderman 3 are his next films once the virus allows filming to start again)
Tomb Raider pretty much captivated me from 1997 when I first heard about her. I admit we got a PC version of the first game and I could not play it to save myself but the character was interesting.
I saw the first movie in the cinema when we lived in Emerald, a city in the Outback. I got the novelisation, and the technical manual which came out then, the book store could order things for me.
I also got the Tomb Raider Magazine in the newsagents that reprinted the Top Cow Comics from issue 5 and none of the crossovers with other Top Cow characters. By the final couple of issues Lara was sharing her magazine with Aphrodite IX. There were no comic shops in Emerald and buying things on the internet wasn't really a thing then.
I remember trying to get the Tomb Raider action figure from the Emerald Toyworld and they just flatout refused to order it or even aknowledge it was a thing. My wife rang the Toyworld in Rockhampton (three hours east of Emerald and the closest town) and bought it for me over the phone with the credit card and they posted it out to us.
By the time the sequel to the movie came out we had moved back to Ipswich and could get to the comic shops in Brisbane. I saw Lara Croft: Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life in the cinema in Ipswich and bought the novelisation.
Then they brought out the first three novels The Amulet of Power, The Lost Cult and The Man of Bronze. SOOOOO good with references and easter eggs galore.
The Top Cow Tomb Raider comics were a little more elusive and trying to buy the back issues was difficult. I eventually got the bulk of them when Dark Horse did the Archives in 4 volumes that reprinted the issues 1-24, 26-50, the 12 issue Journeys and the various one shots. issue 25 was a crossover with EVO and Witchblade and wasn't included.
I also bought the new comics that Dark Horse printed to tie in with the 2013 reboot game and the 20th anniversary of the original game in 2016.
But I wanted those Top Cow comics - I found a list and started working my way through it. Ebay and comic shops selling on line have been a godsend.
I thought I had most of them only discover that there were two one shots that had not been reprinted in the archives. Top Cow had done two books for Dynamic Forces - Scarface's Treasure and Sphere of Influence. Both were bought fairly soon thereafter. I discovered the French comic Dark Aeons and grabbed it too (sadly there is no English edition but I found a translation on line)
Then last week , it arrived the final two books I needed to finish off the Tomb Raider comics - the two issue event Dark Crossings.
I enjoyed both these series - Uncharted is fun and Tomb Raider is just solid action adventure. It was a fun hunt to chase these books down, discovering new appearances and false leads. I may have to revisist my Tomb Raider timeline to include the books I wasn't aware of at the time I wrote it.
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