For today's #FridayFaves I'm spinning My Chemical Romance's 2010 album 'Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys':

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egG7fiE89IU

Unashamed pop-punk at its finest.

#FridayFaves my partner has decided that the best way to wake me up gently is by turning on @joehills 's morning streams

It works

Today my #FridayFaves is the game Inscryption!

It's a card game I discovered recently, but I think it's already a few years old. You start with a tiny deck and build it to face your opponent, by finding new cards, combining cards, sacrificing them... So your deck is constantly shifting, which is quite fun!
It has a story around it and I found it very suspenseful.

It is a bit gory though.

https://www.inscryption.com/

Artwork screenshots are below. Hidden for staring eye contact of your opponent.

My #fridayfaves is going to be the metal band Rannoch (a school friend!). Prog metal with all the twiddly bits you want.

https://rannoch-uk.bandcamp.com/album/conflagrations

I'd like to do #FridayFaves with my (current) favorite book "To Be Taught If Fortunate" by Becky Chambers! :blobcataww:

It's a #SciFi novel of a small (queer!) space crew exploring distant planets with life forms on it.
Its main focus is the exploring, wondering about how various planets could be like and how the technology may work. Otherwise it's slice of life.

I could really feel with them on their ups and downs. And I was so sad when it was over because I couldn't continue to read. 🥺

A late (and slightly belated, in the UK at least) #FridayFaves for Your Woman by White Town, aka Jyoti Mishra. A proper made-in-a-back-bedroom DIY hit, and arguably one of the best one hit wonders of the 90s: https://youtu.be/lVL-zZnD3VU

@rob_haines

My selection for #FridayFaves today is Nation, by Terry Pratchett.

Pterry's non-Discworld books don't get as much recognition, on the whole, but Nation was written when he was at the height of his craft. It has a grander scope than Discworld novels, social commentary in a pseudo-historical setting rather than a pastiche of modern times.

It has a homely, magical feel without being twee. It out Ghiblis Studio Ghibli itself.

This film inspires me and I've always loved it. #FridayFaves

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LCMdmK8w4M

@rob_haines My #FridayFaves contribution today is the TV series Lexx.

Ever since I read about how HK action films have huge tonal shifts with no warning, and that it's a feature, not a bug, I've been a bit obsessed by other examples.

Lexx is grimdark, but it's also funny, and camp, and even earnestly heartfelt at times.

Sci-fi shows have a tendency to take themselves, and their lore, too seriously. Lexx definitely did not.

@SnarkyLamassu @rob_haines "Seeker's Bane" by P. C. Hodgell.

Jame is a young woman trying to find her balance in a society that wants to control her, while trying to survive the attention of the gods and hold to her honor. Highlights include escaping via walking trees, witnessing a shadow demon killing an invisible assassin, and repeated admonishments to the gods that it's not their turn to try to kill her.

#FridayFaves

Like @SnarkyLamassu (https://mastodon.art/@SnarkyLamassu/110117794183795615), I also read Max Gladstone's Last Exit a week ago.

It's really stuck with me as a striking reinterpretation of the dark tower genre, recognising the past of the genre and King's influence on dark tower stories, while simultaneously attempting to reframe such a journey as a hopeful one.

#FridayFaves

For #FridayFaves this week, a couple of books I read recently:

1) The Red Scholar's Wake, by @aliettedb, a thrilling space opera set around a F/F romance between a bot engineer and the sentient pirate ship who takes her prisoner.

2) City of Last Chances, by @aptshadow, a chronicle of the interwoven lives of the people of a city under military occupation, aching for revolution or magical escape. The way the narrative flows between the various characters and key events is just fascinating!

Oh yeah! As a bonus #FridayFaves I read Max Gladstone's "Last Exit" this week, which I'd been putting off cuz that sort of setting doesn't really do it for me. But I trust Gladstone from his previous books (and bc Rob read it first and recc'd it XD), and ended up really enjoying it and resonating strongly with the topics explored in it.

*kicks thru a wall like the Kool Aid Man*

I'm bringin' back @rob_haines' #FridayFaves and u can't stop me!

The rules:
1) Share *anything* that you've been enthusiastic about this week, feel free to tell us why (but you don't have to!)
2) Don't yuck anyone's yums in the comments.

Mine: I played thru Terra Nil! A few rough edges, but I overall enjoyed it and seeing my work to restore life at the end of each level got me genuinely emotional. Looking forward to future updates!🌳

#FridayFaves

I spent much of this week with the Metroid Prime Remaster, and it's been a genuine pleasure to get reacquainted with one of my favourite games.

As far as I'm concerned, Prime is the last great Metroid game, focused on freeform exploration and a power-fantasy of solitude and competence.

No voices chattering in your ear, no false hierarchies restraining your potential, just you, your courage and a host of high-powered weaponry arrayed against the unknown.

The Divine Comedy is probably my favourite band; Neil Hannon clearly spends his songwriting time amusing himself, and that bubbling chuckle overflows in the performance.

I could fill a whole year of #FridayFaves with their songs, so today I'm going topical.

You'll Never Work In This Town Again is a pitch-perfect satire of machine learning and algorithmic content, with brief stops in Luddism as a pro-labour movement and the mid-20thC vision of a work-free future.

https://open.spotify.com/track/287pnG6TbCCozN42csyYQ5?si=_9c_jRDHQ5-zDm-jQ0X3cg&utm_source=copy-link

It may not be Friday any more, but if any of you have any #FridayFaves you'd like to share - movies, books, games, music, anything that makes your heart soar or feel warm and fuzzy insdie - I'd love to hear about them!

A belated #FridayFaves this week:

Hardspace: Shipbreaker (https://store.steampowered.com/app/1161580/Hardspace_Shipbreaker/) hits a real sweet spot for me. It's a spaceship salvage sim, where your job - set against a background of megacorp bullshit and an ascendant unionisation effort - is to take old starships and break them down for parts.

On a micro level, it's satisfying to categorise all the pieces & toss them into the appropriate buckets; longer-term, repetition breeds both the competence and confidence of a life-long mechanic.

my #FridayFaves winner this week is for sure #acnh

i haven't played in ages (burned out on trying to decorate, hating my creations and then not having the energy to re-do them), but i restarted with a new island (... again) and have been enjoying the more structured game-beginning with its little tasks. really brings me back to that "finally, one good thing 🥺 " feeling of early-pandemic times when it came out. but also it's a lot of fun in its own right, of course. just need to relax. no goals

I rediscovered Embrace a few years back, after being vaguely familiar with their work in the early 2000s; it's wonderful to come back to a band and realise they've been making great albums all the time you were away.

Of all the songs they've written, I keep returning to The Devil Looks After His Own, from their eponymous 2014 album; there's something about the transitions between verse and chorus that make my brain burst into fireworks :D

#FridayFaves

https://open.spotify.com/track/422XokdTnQ7YtBTRQHXfB6?si=43a7bca7986b412f