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dexter void
14-07-09, 13:10
I’ve recently started reading Thomas More’s Utopia.

After getting to grips with the writing I started to envisage the world in which Tomb Raider’s Greek levels are set. Or in our case the remains of what was once a Utopia.
When More describes the buildings it’s exactly the same as what I imagine the Greek levels to be. Maybe it’s my way of relating my thoughts to something that is quite hard to decipher i.e. the text. Or maybe the cover(!)

http://i26.tinypic.com/2name6a.jpg

Maybe it’s the epic structure of these levels as they incorporate obscure Religion and the Gods. For instance in St Francis Folly, Thor and Neptune rooms are incorporated.

We can imagine the Colosseum level once had a lot of violence and bloodshed.
More’s Utopia indeed had slaves but were sometimes treated with additional respect than actual Utopian dwellers due to the fact they were from a ‘foreign’ land and wanted to be part of this ideal setting. Utopians were also punished for adultery and lust etc but there is no mention of blood sports in the book.

Palace Midas for me represents the decadence you could be in. Although Utopians are living in a meaningless harmony, they appreciate all things good and beautiful, they do however hate consumerism. This can contradict with my thesis as Utopians do not regard gold as important. We do turn lead to gold in that level so maybe I’m wrong. But I also view the turning of lead to gold as a gift to almighty God

And with this gold we can enter the Cistern, on our way to the resting place of Tihocan. The Tomb of Tihocan seems to have a very holy essence. This grown up feeling often scares me as it’s so stark.

Anyway, this is my thesis. I’m not saying the makers of Tomb Raider based these levels of Utopia but it struck me how these influenced my imagery when reading this text that was written in 1516!

This probably reads as a bad blog and sorry if it’s not relevant!
I just thought it was quite interesting...:D:o

Megalith
14-07-09, 21:38
You got me quite interested in this book!Thanks for sharing.:)

How does he describe the buildings?Does he envision them as a single tower like structure?

rr_carroll
14-07-09, 23:17
...More’s Utopia indeed had slaves but were sometimes treated with additional respect than actual Utopian dwellers due to the fact they were from a ‘foreign’ land and wanted to be part of this ideal setting...
Wait, did they show up and volunteer to be slaves? I'm not even sure "slavery" is the right term - how about "non-union life-time employment"? If they could earn their way out of servitude somehow, maybe "indentured servant".

Raider1969
14-07-09, 23:41
Interesting post, thanks for sharing.

aussie500
14-07-09, 23:59
Cannot say I can see any connection between the book and the Greek levels. The mountain St. Francis' Folly is perched on is no Island and there was nothing in it to suggest the inner workings were built by some ideal society, or that that society had slaves. Utopia never had bloodsports although they were trained in the military arts, they usually hired someone else to do the fighting and dying. And no utopian society would have have anything to do with the erratic and unsymmetrical layout of the inner areas of the mountain. You would have done better to have compared it to Plato's Atlantis.

http://books.google.com/books?id=pRxxnh3KTJYC&lpg=PP1&dq=thomas%20moore%20utopia&pg=PP1
http://books.google.com/books?id=lPhjPIaj-tMC&lpg=PP1&dq=thomas%20moore%20utopia&pg=PP1

scremanie
15-07-09, 06:31
Look's more like Babylon from the Prince of Persia.

dexter void
15-07-09, 09:20
Wait, did they show up and volunteer to be slaves? I'm not even sure "slavery" is the right term - how about "non-union life-time employment"? If they could earn their way out of servitude somehow, maybe "indentured servant".

I read in the book that if foreigners wanted to live in Utopia they had to be slaves or have the lowest possible jobs.

@ Aussie500: I think you're probably correct. I don't read and take in literature like this often enough so I don't have a varied knowledge of all texts like this. I will have to seek out Plato's 'Atlantis'.
I was more refering to the way the Island was described and thought maybe, possibly the creators of Tomb Raiders could've based the Greek levels on this. I think the levels are very epic.

aussie500
15-07-09, 12:22
The levels were based on Greek, Roman and Norse myths and the real retreat St. Francis built perched on a mountain is actually in Italy, not Greece. I always just assumed Core Design were trying to tell us some of the ancient gods, and well known characters from ancient times could have been connected somehow. Another possibility is just that or whoever built the trap rooms to protect the tomb just liked themed areas, there might not have been any connection between them or Tihocan, St. Francis might not have been the only one to build a folly there.