Eidos announced an official spokesmodel for Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend, the seventh game in the long-running franchise. Twenty-year-old Karima Adebibe, an otherwise unknown model from London's East End, has been chosen to play legendary lead character Lara Croft in a series of TV spots, chat shows, and modeling appearances.
Karima was chosen from "thousands of hopefuls" in a worldwide search for the new Lara model.
While Karima may look perfectly able dressed in Lara's gear, Eidos is apparently not just interested in appearances. The company says it is sending Karima "on a grueling training program which includes an SAS survival, combat and semi automatic weapon firing course in Eastern Europe, as well as a crash course in world archaeology, deportment, elocution and etiquette."
"Karima has all the assets needed to accurately portray the world's favorite female action hero" said Matt Gorman, Brand Controller for Tomb Raider. "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend sees Lara at the very height of her powers so this makes Karima the 7th and most important Lara Croft yet."
Previous Lara Croft stand-ins include Lucy Clarkson, Rhona Mitra, Nell McAndrew, Vanessa Demouy, and Lara Weller. Best known of all, of course, is Angelina Jolie, who starred as Lara in the Tomb Raider movies.
Tomb Raider: Legend will ship on April 11 for PlayStation 2, Xbox, and PC. Versions for Xbox 360 and PSP are expected later in the year.
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Not very pretty don't you think?
