Cory Barlog, who helped weave three tales with Kratos, will now get a chance to work on another gaming icon: Lara Croft.
After you’ve murdered the gods, what’s left to do? For Cory Barlog, director and storywriter for multiple God of War games, the answer is pretty simple: Hunt treasure with a sassy British archeologist. Barlog has kept busy as an independent agent since leaving Sony, but soon, he’ll have a studio to call home once again. Crystal Dynamics, a division of Square Enix, has taken Barlog under its wing to potentially assist with the next entry in Tomb Raider, as well as an unannounced new IP.
“Cory’s heritage in building industry-defining action adventure titles, together with our focus on delivering quality character-driven blockbuster entertainment, makes Cory a tremendously exciting addition to the team,” explains Darrell Gallagher, studio head at Crystal Dynamics. While Gallagher does not detail Barlog’s exact duties, he states that the studio’s teams will “deliver against upcoming projects and future IP.”
Whether Barlog finds himself working on the Tomb Raider reboot or the new IP – or both – is anyone’s guess, but he seems like the right man for the job. While God of War and Tomb Raider are fairly different series, they have both been seminal examples of action-adventure gaming in the past. Both Kratos and Lara Croft are strong characters who are instantly familiar to gamers, and fairly recognizable for the general public.
Previously, Barlog served as the writer and director for God of War II, the creative director for Chains of Olympus, and the story creator for Ghost of Sparta. Will the action-adventure skills he put to use for Sony transfer neatly to Crystal Dynamics? If not, at least he presumably has the requisite chain-blade skills to deal with unruly fans.
