Xbox reportedly paid $100 million for Rise of the Tomb Raider’s timed exclusivity contract. The rebooted Tomb Raider series’ second installment was limited to Xbox One and Xbox 360 for over a year, with the PC version arriving a few months later.
The $100m figure would be roughly in line with another high-profile exclusivity deal that recently had its figures shared in the public domain: the Epic Game Store’s deal for Borderlands 3.
According to a resume posted on LinkIn, former Director of Live Product Management at Eidos-Montréal and Business Development Director at Square Enix Fabien Rossini, posted that they had helped negotiate the deal that was worth $100 million. As you can see here, that text has since been edited out of their profile, but thanks to Twitter user Timur222, we can see where it was said below.
Rise of the Tomb Raider – Microsoft reportedly paid $100 for exclusivity
This isn’t an official statement, obviously, and most likely there will never be one since terms of these types of Microsoft deals are generally kept secret in the industry unless there is a lawsuit involved.
Although exclusive games aren’t rare, creating a sequel to a multi-platform brand was unusual. Coming off the bumpy launch of the Xbox One, Xbox was also in an odd era where the odds were stacked against it, making it difficult for the corporation to portray this decision as a positive.
Overall, Rise of the Tomb Raider’s first sales were underwhelming, with the game failing to crack the top ten best-selling titles of the month.
It appears that Microsoft’s Rise of the Tomb Raider agreement with Square Enix was not cheap. Fabien Rossini, a former Square Enix employee, stated on LinkedIn (via Twitter user Timur222) that he assisted in the negotiation of the Tomb Raider contract with Microsoft, which was valued at about $100 million. Given Xbox’s penchant for extravagant spending, this isn’t the most the firm has ever spent on games, but it is a significant sum for a game that didn’t do well at launch.
