What TV shows, movies, books and video games helped to inspire Kingmaker?
As a gamemaster, what media should I consuming to get the tone of the game right?
Have you heard of the video game Pathfinder: Kingmaker?
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The answer, like most times, is...it depends...
..on whether or not your game is really political
--you are keeping the cultural analogs that the neighboring kingdoms are protrayed as having
..the tone of the game you and your players are running
Heavy politics I would suggest The Prince for getting in the correct headspace to run NPC rulers, The Art of War possibly for Swordlords, plus other politically inclined things that may float your boat. I used a set of rules pulled from a fantasy novel, The Wolfblade Trilogy by Jennifer Fallon - Elezaar’s Rules of Gaining and Wielding Power. Obviously Game of Thrones could also carry some themes into your game, just like its real life counterpart the War of the Roses from history. I would picking one to emphasize and the others for flavor, whatever you select. Reading up on those cultures and leaning even more into them with beliefs, names, holidays, etc, increases immersion sometimes for PCs.
Cultural analogs you can look to Iobaria, Brevoy, Galt (I had several exiled Galtan noblemen as NPCs in my KM), Pitax, and even Numeria if you want a little Laser Scorpion flavor added in. Iobaria is I think northern Russia, Brevoy is something similar, Galt is revolutionary France, etc. Or you can change them around if you havent made those analogs canon in your campaign version of Golarion yet.
The tone also plays a role. If you like the steampunk feel of things, modify Pitax to be more of that flavor, and add in a bunch of technologies and such flowing in from Numeria. You could also draw some inspiration from Carnival Row for that setting. If you want dark, ominous, strong fey leanings, I used the Old Margreve in my KM game.
Okay thats probably way too much info, but hopefully it gives you some ideas of directions you can lean for inspiration. :)
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Just a final note...sometimes it just a scene or concept from a movie that hits home and sparks a portion of your KM game. There was one scene from The White Queen series that I really loved, but never got to use. There were two warring sides and lesser noble twin brothers. One was always allied with each side loyally, so no matter which side was victorious, the winning brother could argue for mercy for the losing brother.
Before this major battle of the two opposing forces (Yorks and Lancasters), each brother swore their armies on the side of their regular allies. Once the battle began, there was pitched fighting between the two enemies and the big scene was the twins' army running down the side of these hills towards the battle. Both sides were waiting in anticipation of being helped, and even the viewer didn't really know what was going to happen when they got there.
I always thought that was such an epic scene, and that it would be great to create these twin brothers in Kingmaker. Unfortunately, this was something that really needed to be set up earlier, so I just filed it away in my GM notes for a future campaign.