Throwing Money at Lara

Eidos Interactive wants to make sure you (and everyone else) know that Lara Croft's latest adventures are on their way. You see, Tomb Raider III is scheduled to hit store shelves before Thanksgiving. Eidos has put together a multimillion dollar print and TV ad campaign to get that word out. Eidos is also splashing Lara's image on 60-foot-tall wall paintings and billboards and is even wrapping a number of city buses with her likeness.

In the campaign, which will carry tag lines such as "Around here no mission is impossible," Lara is compared to action heroes of yesterday and today.

The game will sport 30-second national and cable television spots and will be featured in Sony PlayStation ads, which will run during The X-Files, Friends, Dawson's Creek, Newsradio, King of the Hill, and other programs. Soon, Lara's visage will be inescapable. Be afraid.

In related Eidos news, the TRIII launch party - to be held from early eve to well beyond the witching hour in San Francisco tonight - is distracting the gaming press to no end. We'll have a report in Friday's GameSpot News.