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A new book charting "the untold story" of a "pivotal period" in Tomb Raider's history is on the way, from the publisher Pen & Sword Books.
The Making of Tomb Raider 1997 - 2000 is the follow-up to Daryl Baxter's 2021 book The Making of Tomb Raider and is now available for pre-order from Pen & Sword's store, Amazon, and Waterstones.
It picks up from where his last book left off, documenting some of the exciting stories behind games like Tomb Raider III, Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, Tomb Raider: Chronicles, the expansions for the original trilogy, and the very first Game Boy title.
As with the last book, Baxter has yet again interviewed various members of the Core Design team and others who have a prior connection to the series, to tell the story as accurately as possible, with the book also including exclusive photos from the height of the character's heyday, and details about scrapped ideas and cut content, including a cancelled "multiplayer mode, cut levels, and a fourth expansion pack that never came to be."
There are also discussions about how a new team within Core Design ended up picking up the reins of the series and how the continued success and the annual release schedule "began to take its toll", pushing some of the team almost "to breaking point."
"The Making of Tomb Raider: 1997-2000 has been one of the biggest and most difficult projects I’ve taken on," wrote Baxter. "But it’s been all kinds of worth it. Many involved in these games took time out of their schedules to talk to me about how these titles came to be, some of whom have never done that before. I’m very proud of this book, and you can be sure that not one AI-generated word is in this 90,000-word story.'
As for the cover, Baxter and Pen & Sword Books approached the Ukrainian artist Inna Vjuzhanina to design it, having first heard about her work from The Dark Angel album project on Kickstarter, which aimed to recreate Peter Connelly's The Last Revelation, Chronicles, and The Angel of Darkness soundtracks.
The book is priced at £35 and will be released on October 30th, 2026. That same month, Baxter will also be in attendance at TR30 in Derby (October 24th), where he will answer questions about the project, ahead of its wider release.
If you want to pick up the first volume, it's currently on sale for £12.50 from Pen & Sword's website.