Lara Croft Go developer on turning an action blockbuster into a turn-based mobile game

I have a thing for spinoffs of twitchy action games that take a slower, turn-based aesthetic. One-offs like Metal Gear Acid and R-Type Command can provide a transparency, showing how the original concept was potentially pieced together, and teach valuable, fundamental lessons about fast-paced play design.

What those lessons are, well, Antoine Routon of Square Enix Montreal and I contemplated that. Routon and the crew in Montreal just released Lara Croft Go, the spiritual offspring of Hitman Go, for Android and iOS. On the day of Lara Croft Go’s launch, he dropped by and had a chat about the formation of the Go concept and the detailed decision-making that went into both Hitman and Lara Croft’s board game-like mobile outings.