Say what?! Gaming is just "one notch up from porn"? Not literally, but seriously, the British parliament pays little attention to the gaming industry, treating it like some cultural minority. As a result, gaming in the UK has gotten so bad that developers from other countries are buying British companies out. More in the full article.

We've reported to you folks a lot regarding Tomb Raider: Anniversary. We've given you screenshots, concept arts, Ian Livingstone's take on the whole thing, and even announced to you guys that the official site is open.

Well, if in case you guys plan to purchase the thing the moment it comes out this April, you guys better know what box you're going to be looking for. So to help you guys out, here's how the box-art looks like, courtesy of the folks from PSP only.

You like? We like.

 

Remember all those Fighting Fantasy books? You know, those books that added a dice mechanic to their Choose Your Own Adventure counterparts? Well, gaming legends Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson are teaming up with veteran development consultants Bad Management to bring the classic series of books to portable console platforms.

Here's Mr. Livingstone's comments on the move from book to handheld game:

Fighting Fantasy built up a huge, worldwide fan base over the years. We believe that players will really enjoy the adventures in a new way on DS and PSP. Fighting Fantasy's interactive structure is ideal for bite-sized chunks of gameplay which is important for these devices

We've given you Mr. Livingstone's credentials before, so we don't really have to tell you guys why he's big. So what about Steve Jackson? Well, he's not the guy who made manuals for those tabletop RPG folks, that guy happens to be American, although he did also write several Fighting Fantasy books (adding to the confusion). This particular Steve Jackson is a Professor of Game Design at London's Brunel University. Aside from the Fighting Fantasy books, he's also notable for having created 'F.I.S.T.', the world's first interactive telephone game.

If you can make a game that can make telephones interactive and fun (no gutter-minded phone-lovin' jokes please), you can probably make good games for the DS and the PSP.

In a lengthy interview over at Gamespot, Eidos' product acquisition director, Ian Livingstone gave several details on Tomb Raider: Anniversary, the future of Lara Croft, and his opinion regarding the next-generation console wars.

What? Who's Ian Livingstone and why should you guys care? Well, if in case you're too lazy to wiki him up, his game cred starts with Games Workshop and Steve Jackson, moves on to D&D, gets big during the 90s with Eidos, and reaches a high point when he got awarded an Order of the British Empire last year for "Services to the Computer Games Industry." So snotty fellow, can you top that?

Here be the pertinent details from the interview:

So how's Lara?
Livingstone says that the brand and franchise will continue. According to him she's now much like James Bond now. Hence, there are no plans to kill of the character any time soon. She's recognized everywhere and according to Livingstone there was a Time Magazine survey a few years back that ranks her as more recognizable than the pope.

In Livingstone's words:

There are other great characters, but they're all aimed at a younger audience--Zelda, Sonic, Mario--there have been none that have been aimed at the more mature consumer. If you think of other successful games, you don't always remember the characters.

Women don't object to Lara because she's strong, independent, intelligent, athletic, sexy, and essentially she doesn't need men. And of course, men wouldn't object to [her] for the same reasons... And, as she's virtual, she can be anything to anyone.

He adds that he isn't really allowed to say much about Tomb Raider: Anniversary, but he does hint that we should all be thinking about that first time Lara met the T. Rex.

Get the rest of the article after the Jump!