Core Design

Based in the city of Derby, England, Core Design was founded on 13 May 1988 by Chris Shrigley, Andy Green, Rob Toone, Terry Lloyd, Simon Phipps, Dave Pridmore, Jeremy Heath-Smith, Kevin Norburn and Greg Holmes. Most were former employees of Gremlin Graphics.

The studio was taken over by CentreGold (the parent company of U.S. Gold) in October 1994, with CentreGold itself being acquired by Eidos Interactive in 1996.

Heath-Smith regarded the acquisition as a relief, commenting, "The funding of development is so expensive that I doubt we could have continued to fund ourselves as an independent company." Eidos subsequently sold most of CentreGold, but retained U.S. Gold, the owners of Core Design.

The company is widely known for the Tomb Raider series. The first game was created by Toby Gard and Paul Douglas, released in 1996, and followed by several sequels. The success of the first Tomb Raider has been credited with making Eidos Interactive a major force in the industry, and turned Eidos's 1996 pretax loss of $2.6 million into a $14.5 million profit. In September 1997, Sony Computer Entertainment's US arm, SCEA, signed an agreement with Eidos to make the sequel exclusive to the PlayStation console. The deal was extended to include Tomb Raider III (1998). Fourth and fifth games in the franchise, Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (1999) and Tomb Raider: Chronicles (2000) respectively, followed.

After the critical failure of Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness in 2003, parent company Eidos put Crystal Dynamics, another Eidos-owned studio, in charge of Tomb Raider franchise development. This prompted the Core Design management team, Jeremy Heath-Smith along with his brother Adrian, to leave the company and establish a new one, Circle Studio. According to the brothers they hired many of Core Design's creative staff "We asked 37 people to join us and 36 came." and that "Core Design is now floundering around with a handful of people trying to get a project off the ground, and no real leadership, which is sad."

The remaining staff at Core Design worked on a timed puzzle game, Smart Bomb, for the PlayStation Portable (PSP), released in summer 2005. The company then worked on a proposal to remake the original Tomb Raider game, also for the PlayStation Portable. This version was cancelled by the publisher, Eidos, in favour of franchise development remaining with Crystal Dynamics.

In May 2006, Eidos announced that independent developer Rebellion Developments had acquired Core Design's assets and staff, while the Core brand and intellectual property, including Tomb Raider, remained in Eidos' possession. Under the new banner of Rebellion, the company went on to work on several titles including Free Running (2007), Shellshock 2: Blood Trails and Rogue Warrior (both 2009). Starting in January 2010, due to an expiring lease on Rebellion Derby's offices, Rebellion Developments started seeking restructuring opportunities for the studio. As no other possibility than closure was found, Rebellion Derby was closed down effective on 17 March 2010.