“You just pulled the shit-end of a wishbone”: examining the roles of Vicky Arnold and Heather Stevens, the women behind the early Tomb Raider franchise

Abstract

ABSTRACT Previous feminist analysis afforded to the Tomb Raider franchise, in particular on the early games, has generally focused on the criticism levelled at the promotion and image of Tomb Raider’s leading character Lara Croft, who is commonly assumed to be “designed and written by and planned and conceived by a guy written for guys.” However, such assumption has led to the erasure of two women who held content-creative roles in the development of the early games in the franchise, Tomb Raider (1996) and Tomb Raider II (1997), namely Vicky Arnold, scriptwriter, and Heather Stevens (née Gibson), level designer. To date, neither Arnold nor Stevens have been afforded attention from scholars on the significant contribution they made. Therefore, this article seeks to address the omission of Arnold and Stevens through analysing the key individual agencies that both women had when developing the early Tomb Raider franchise.