Lara scales the Paris rooftops

Despite its critical mauling, Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness is still riding high in the games charts.

Meanwhile, the similarly snappily titled second movie spin-off Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle Of Life hangs on in the US box office charts.

This is despite receiving an equally critical mauling. One that concluded it was rubbish, but less rubbish than the 2001 movie at least.

UK cinema-goers can decide for themselves when it comes out this week.

Mother knowledge

Poor old Lara, she is not faring terribly well.

There was once a time when she was being hailed as a "feminist cyber icon", a character who not only starred in a great game but also managed to become a household name.

She still may be one of the few video game characters your mother has heard of, but in the gaming community people are simply sighing and shaking their heads.

The multiple incarnations of the character seem to have diluted it which begs the question - who exactly is Lara today? Discuss this story on BBCi Collective

Throughout the late 1990s, Lara continued to appear in the Tomb Raider game sequels, but that was not all.

As with all good franchises, she was exploited to the hilt.

Comics were produced, models dressed up as her - Nell McAndrew and Rhona Mitra partly built their careers by donning tight green tops and shorts - and other young women even starred as her in Lucozade ads.

Although the recent, ironic TV spots amusingly riff on the idea of delusions of Lara.

While all that has been happening, Core slogged away on the latest game sequel which - despite a repeatedly delayed release - ended up, well, just not very good.

The visuals are not bad, and some of the locations are atmospheric. But the control system on PlayStation 2 is so abominable that those moments when you cast aside the joy pad in exasperation are so frequent it undermines the enjoyment.

Jolie good

So what has become of Lara?

Rather than consolidating the brand, the multiple incarnations of the character seem to have diluted it which begs the question - who exactly is Lara today?

The game itself is such a source of irritation that the personality of its heroine gets subsumed into the negative experience of playing it.

At least Angelina Jolie seems to be giving the stunts and iffy dialogue of The Cradle Of Life her all. As such, she is arguably now more Lara than the original digital incarnation.