If you’ve ever been a Tomb Raider fan, well, it might just be a bombshell chilling on your mind. The official account dropped a bombshell that everyone was talking about on National Video Games Day. To say it simply, Lara Croft, gaming’s most iconic heroine, never really had that infamous braid in the original 1996 game. Wait-what?? Yeah, you’re reading that right. The braid that everyone identifies with classic Lara? They didn’t have it. Not in the least.
The reason is purely 90s tech-limitations. The hair was tied into a bun simply because polygon-wise, a braid would be too expensive. Like, the whole character model had 250 polygons. Would you be able to imagine that? Characters nowadays have a million polygons in their bodies. The polygon count was actually being considered back then. The braid could eat up too much of the polygon count for the character design, so it was dumped. Kind of uncomfortable to think about, isn’t it?
In any case, the reply to the tweet is an experience in itself. Gaming folks are absolutely shocked. One particular user named Anna demanded, “WE NEED IT IN THE REMASTERS.” And frankly, it is a fair point. The Tomb Raider I-III Remastered collection just came out recently, and the players are noticing. Another user, tacopuppy783, added, “I noticed it playing the remasters back and forth between games. She doesn’t get her ponytail until the second game.” This is something you never really notice until someone tells you, and from then onwards you could never see it in the same way ever again.
And it actually gets even more interesting. More context is provided by Through The Looking Glass, which suddenly makes everything click into place. Apparently, the animators simply couldn’t animate the braid properly, either! That pre-alpha tech demo had an early iteration of the braid, and it was super glitchy. It kept disappearing through Lara’s backpack. They actually included a picture of how bad it looked. So polygon count was not the only problem, it had now turned into a technical nightmare. They fixed it before Tomb Raider 2 though.
An actual Mandela Effect moment is happening on the players. TheOnlyJoestar responded, “Ohhh I thought the bun was just a glitch. I thought she had the full ponytail in the cutscenes no?” And that is honestly quite common. Our memories do play tricks on us, especially with things from decades ago. Another user, norbert_chapman, even asked when does collectively misremembering things become the “Mandela-effect.” That’s a good question because so many people are thrown aback by it.
Of course, there is always some sort of demand for updates and fixes by the gaming community. baseqq said the remasters were the “perfect opportunity to add this hairstyle to celebrate this iconic moment but instead u updated game with meaningless golden pistols.” They want a patch for the braid to be added as an optional feature. And geraltrrivia said, “you know what would be nice? adding the optional braid in tr 1-3 thank you.” Looks like a bunch of people would incorporate that iconic look if they could, even if it wasn’t in the original design.
There’s also some love for Lara’s origin design, minus the braid. Diaochan commented, “I love her in-game character model. Her silhouette is so iconic. The fact that it doesn’t have the braid just makes it more unique and sets her apart. I find her very charming, also her triangular chest.” Which is true-the triangular chest thing is another iconic trait of early Lara of is really just a result of technical limitations as well. It’s funny how those limitations ended up creating such a distinct look.
But not all the chat is good news. Moogylight returns with criticism over the usage of AI voice lines in the recent content and demands respect for the voice actresses. Meanwhile, CROFTAOD wonders about playing Tomb Raider Underworld on PS5 these days-from the look of things, players are always wondering how to make it easy to play their old games.
At the end of the day, then, that bit of gaming history provides a fascinating insight into how technical constraints shaped one of the most iconic characters in video games. Lara Croft’s braid is such a big part of her identity now that it’s kind of hard to imagine her without it. But back in 1996, they had to make do. And honestly, that bun killer look, too. It’s just one more reminder of how far gaming technology has come-from struggling to render a simple braid to the insanely detailed worlds we have today. It’s just fun to hit pause on this moment and take in the creative effort that went into working around limitations. Maybe someday we’ll get that braid option in the remasters. Until then, we’ll just have to appreciate classic bun Lara for what she is- a polygon-counting queen.
