Tomb Raider first appeared in November 1996 and has subsequently been followed by a new release every year (we now have Tomb Raider 4). The game is produced by Core Design and published by Eidos Interactive both of which are British companies.

In this 3 dimensional action/adventure game, the player guides Lara through different levels and locations (such as Pyramids, the Chinese Wall, London,...) trying to find certain items, kill enemies, avoid traps and solve puzzles. Two things differentiate Tomb Raider from other adventure games: a female main character and a cinemtic point-of-view (the interrelation of these two elements is an interesting question). As opposed to other games where the player pretends to be the character in the game and therefore sees only his hands and the weapon on the computer screen, in Tomb Raider the player closely follows Lara and has her in full view at all times. Rather than pretending to be Lara he guides Lara through her adventures.

Lara does not communicate with the player during the game (she only talks in the training sequence where she explains the player how to make her do certain things like jump over obstacles or climb up a wall). She does make sounds, though, and it seems that many players find her moaning when she is doing a difficult physical stunt a particular attraction of the game.