The actual quote doesn't say that Tomb Raider cost $100m budget, but tbh I wouldn't imagine it's far off given the long developement time, huge marketing push and size of the studio which made it. It's a high production value game and every bit your definition of AAA - in the sense of large budget needing large sales to repeat large rewards. It's impossible to know but I'd say a game like this probably needs something around 4m-5m sales to 'hit targets'. but at somewhere around the 3m it could hit break even point - especially after DLC sales.
There's nothing really surprising here though, every company is trying to make a COD, a FIFA, a battlefield, a Skyrim - something which literally prints money. If they fall short then the reality is sales around 3m arn't good enough to hit expectations.
The industry is becoming more and more all or nothing - THQ didn't do a great deal wrong but they just couldn't compete with the bigger publishers and make IP which could sell the 3m+ required. At budgets go up and the bigger publishers continue to dominate further, it's gonna be the turn of SE, Capcom, Konami, Namco etc to feel the pinch - luckily they all still have a fairly healthy, profitable Japanese market to fall back on.
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