So, who else is excited for the new season of Game of Thrones? It should be starting in a week or two. I've listened the whole series twice in the meantime between the finale of last season and now -- got the whole collection minus the 5th book in audio form, narrated by the incredible Roy Dotrice.
The 3rd book is when the story turns into something special. I hope they nail it with the TV series. Even though I've heard they might be dividing Storm of Swords into 2 separate seasons, half of that book still packs enough punch to leave anyone flabbergasted (I know I was).

Anyway, I'll be updating my impressions when the first episode hits.

Kinda related, you guys should watch School of Thrones [link] ... It's really dumb/good.

In other news:
Played through Tomb Raider and really liked it! It's a strong and beautiful game. Not much "Tomb Raiding" going on though. Guess it shows the remake priorities when the titular tombs you raid are optional objectives and the main objective is... well, shooting people and doing parcour.
The story seems like the weakest spot. Too forced right at the beginning, when Lara kinda jumps from a scared lost girl in the wilderness to a gun-totting killer super soldier without much warning. I know it wouldn't be a fun game if you had to play as an inexperienced archaeologist and went the first 5 hours or so fumbling to curve a bow or shoot a pistol, but IF the plot is supposed to be about her journey into becoming the action star Lara Croft we knew, they can't just reduce it to "she picked up a lousy bow, some arrows, hunted a deer and became Rambo"!
Afterwards she still has some "growing up", of course, she does a lot of scary shit and go crazy places, but the main character arch is kinda nonexistent other than the first time she shot a deer right at the first 10 minutes of gameplay. She even apologized back then... 3 hours later she's wielding a grenade launcher against 20 Russians and screaming "run, you bastards! I'll kill each one of you!" (not kidding).
Other than that, the game is great! Solid lengthy campaign, impressive setpiece action sequences and beautiful scenery. I've heard it's not as good as the Uncharted series. But if you, like me, don't have a Playstation, I think it's a nice alternative parcour heavy 3rd person shooter in the Xbox360 and PC.

So Game of Thrones feature this time:



Keep being awesome, folks!