Why Lara Croft almost looked completely different in Japan

Lara Croft is one of the most recognisable characters in gaming, but her original look wasn’t always guaranteed to stay the same around the world. When the first Tomb Raider was being prepared for release in Japan, there were serious plans to give Lara a different appearance. Not just a new piece of box art, either. The proposed version had a more manga-inspired face, larger eyes and different proportions, and the idea went far enough for a 3D version to be created. It never made it into the finished game. Still, the redesign gives us an interesting look at how differently publishers approached localisation in the 1990s.

Lara looked very different in the Japanese concept art

Core Design introduced Lara Croft in 1996 with the original Tomb Raider, released for Sega Saturn, PlayStation and PC. Her sharply defined, low-polygon appearance quickly became part of the game’s identity. For the Japanese market, though, there were concerns that the character’s Western design wouldn’t connect as easily with local players. The proposed solution was straightforward: change Lara’s look.

Japanese artwork gave her much larger eyes, a bigger head and softer facial features. She looked younger and more stylised, with proportions closer to manga and Japanese game artwork from that period.

At the same time, the designers kept the parts that made Lara instantly recognisable. The outfit stayed familiar. So did the hairstyle and general silhouette. You’d still know it was Lara. She just looked like a very different interpretation of her.

The redesign wasn’t limited to drawings

This is where the story gets more interesting. The alternative Lara wasn’t simply an illustration produced for a manual or magazine advert. A 3D version was also created, showing what the redesigned character could have looked like inside Tomb Raider itself. That mattered in 1996.

Character models were extremely limited compared with what developers can do now. Lara’s original face had very little geometry, so artists had to rely on simple shapes, textures and proportions to make her readable on screen. Change those proportions and the whole character changes.

The larger eyes and more exaggerated facial features worked naturally in 2D artwork, but translating that look into an early 3D model wasn’t quite as simple. The result would have given the Japanese release a noticeably different visual identity.

Core Design decided not to change the in-game Lara

The redesign reached Core Design late in Tomb Raider’s development. Lara’s creator, Toby Gard, wasn’t keen on replacing the established in-game character, so the original model stayed. That didn’t mean the Japanese artwork disappeared completely.

Instead, the alternative design appeared in localised printed material such as manuals and guides. Japanese players therefore saw the manga-influenced version in artwork while controlling the same Lara Croft that appeared in European and North American copies of the game. It was a practical compromise.

Other Tomb Raider characters also received similar visual treatment, including Jacqueline Natla. So this wasn’t just a one-off experiment with Lara. There was clearly an attempt to give the Japanese presentation of Tomb Raider its own visual style.

Regional game artwork used to change a lot

This kind of thing wasn’t especially unusual during the 1990s. Publishers often changed game covers, character art and advertising depending on where a title was being sold. A Japanese box could look completely different from its European or American equivalent, even when the game on the disc or cartridge was exactly the same.

Sometimes characters looked tougher in Western artwork. Sometimes Japanese versions leaned harder into anime or manga influences. Publishers were trying to present the same game in a way they believed would work best in each market.

Tomb Raider is a particularly interesting example because Lara wasn’t just another character in the game. She was the game. Her appearance was already becoming closely tied to Tomb Raider’s identity. Changing her actual 3D model would have been a much bigger decision than swapping a piece of cover artwork.

Tomb Raider came close to having two versions of Lara Croft

If the redesign had been approved, Japanese players might have experienced the original Tomb Raider with a Lara Croft who looked substantially different from the character seen elsewhere. That didn’t happen. Core Design kept Lara’s original model across the different releases, while the Japanese artwork took its own direction in manuals and promotional material.

It’s a small piece of Tomb Raider history, but an interesting one. The alternative design wasn’t just somebody experimenting with a sketch years later. It became a genuine 3D concept and came close enough to development to show that Lara Croft’s famous original appearance wasn’t quite as fixed as it now seems. For one of gaming’s best-known characters, things could have looked very different.

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