Skua

I think you could do a fair bit by following the priest and his soldiers that are chasing Wander more than the game did. He can provide exposition to the soldiers as they travel, seeing more and more pillars of light in the distance as they do so. Have some banter along the way to get us to like one or two or the soldiers as well. Play up this party’s protagonist energy.

In the meantime, let Wander talk to Dormin more. Dormin remains honest and helpful throughout the game, so I think you could easily add in concern for Wander and curioisity about why he’s doing what he is doing. “What a strange, fascinating little mortal. We do hope he knows what he’s doing.”

I suppose you could probably only show maybe three colossus fights max, including the ending. Picking which ones get done in full would be tough. First one almost certainly has to be on the list. I think the giant flying serpent in the desert is probably the best one visually, so that’d be my other pick

This director did the 2023 Flash film, so if it comes out I’m probably going to pretend it didn’t

We cunningly designed kilts to cover up to just above the navel

I’ve had a somewhat similar experience. I learned that mint is related to catnip while trying to figure out why on Earth my cat would have dunked his entire god damn head into my mug of mint green tea. I didn’t name mine quite so fittingly as you did though

To increase the area of effect when I piss on something to claim territory

My cat got an unexpected chilli experience. I was cooking curry, and chopping up a bunch of peppers, and went back to my computer momentarily to double check something in the recipe. Cat hopped up on to my lap and, when I wasn’t looking, licked my fingers. Poor wee guy had no idea what was happening to him and scarpered for the bathroom sink, where he yelled at me to please come turn the tap on

(I know chilli oil is quite bad for cats; he was okay after this brief but very unpleasant experience)

The pilot’s point of view

I feel like the best way to do a Subnautica painting would be an absolutely gigantic black canvas with only the just enough hints of blue light in the centre to silhouette the diver and a big monster. Which isn’t really practical for most purposes.

The bridge in Shadow of the Colossus, crumbling and ancient yet still striding as a titan across the vast landscape

The opulent neo-classical Indian cityscape of Sonashahar in Pacer

The Hanging City in Outer Wilds, clinging to the underside of a hollow world’s fragile shell

Also, like, all of A Highland Song. It’s intentionally designed to look like landscape paintings anyway. The castle in the loch is probably my favourite, or maybe the giant dam

I think the first time you see Liurnia after beating Stormveil is even better. But yeah god damn that game can set up a landscape shot

We’ll usually understand if you get it wrong. There’s a lot of extremely counterintuitive ones. If you’re American, the most likely trap is Edinburgh - it’s not EE-den-berg, it’s EDD-in-buh-ruh or EDD-im-bruh.

I’ll also just have to ask that the same grace is returned when I inevitably fuck up basically any place name based on anything Native American, because I don’t know how any of those languages work

Unfortunately our linguistic history is a huge tangle and there are few safe assumptions. Depending on where you are in Scotland, the places names might derive from Gaelic, Pictish, Welsh, Norse, or English, and then they probably got Anglicised at some point but it could have happened at basically time within the last five centuries. A substantial number of the non-Gaelic ones are doubly messed up because they got Gaelicised first and then the Gaelicisation got Anglicised. Glenisla is a good example - glen derives from Gaelic, and nobody is sure where isla comes from.

Still, Glenisla is a lovely area! Lots of good hikes there. I hope you had a good time.

UK English spells and pronounces that spice as “turmeric” (so the first syllable is pronounced like “turn” without the N), so I’m now imagining you saying nurmeric

As a marmite loyalist I might have to start doing it too

vuh-JEH-mi-tee

The Scent of the Old Ocean by Those Who Ride With Giants. Specifically the little recurring guitar riff with four quick descending notes, a repeat of the lowest one, and then a slide back up

“Significant other” is the accepted catch-all term for long term romantic partners, regardless of marriage and gender, but because it’s a little bit long it’s common to abbreviate it

I’d say I get about a one in four win rate against my cat when I try to tap him on that head without him catching my hand. I’ve got a big reach advantage

Yeah, at the end of the day I have something like a twenty to one weight advantage here. Yes it will hurt a lot every time the claws catch me, and they will catch me, but it will only hurt. The poor cat isn’t faring so well once I land a kick or a punch

Pumas and lynxes both go after things that are outweigh them several times over, so I maybe wouldn’t count myself safe if I were small enough to ride a domestic cat

Also anecdotally, having lived with pet cats most of my life, god damn they are fast and they’re stacked with more knives than the average kitchen. I would not want to fight a cat that was bigger than me.