Anime Sickos

Hello Sicko fans.   If you are a dedicated listener you know that for a long time Joe has been struggling with chronic pain due to a hip impingement and labral tear. Basically his shit is so fucked up and it hurts all the time, and the only solution is a lot of physical therapy, which does not really solve the day-to-day pain issue.    If you have experienced chronic pain, especially pain that can peak unexpectedly and without warning, you know that it makes it extremely hard to plan things. When you hurt all over, the kind of extended mental focus that was once effortless can become a huge energy drain. Unfortunately that's sort of where we're at right now. Joe has a lot on his plate and his family and career are obviously always going to take priority over this show, and we have to be honest and recognize that he's currently in a place where he simply does not have the capability to do Sickos stuff. He's at the point where trying to play through the pain is only going to hurt him more.    We always talk about how the point of Anime Sickos is to be fun for us, and all our decisions are meant to keep it fun. Right now for Joe it has become a stressor that either makes him guilty about having to cancel recordings, or else eats up critical focus that is better spent elsewhere. I go into this detail just so you understand this is not a decision we make lightly, and one that has full support from both of us.    So, what does that mean for the show? First, I'm going to take some time off, probably a week or two. Then we are going to come back with a selection of guest co-hosts similar to when Joe was out on paternity podcast leave. After a month or two of that, we'll see where we're at. The show WILL go on--it won't be the same without Joe, but I also don't want to stop doing it! And Joe is not quitting--when he is stronger and has more focus/stamina he will return. We just don't know when that will be, so until then we'll make do.    I am probably going to keep the Tom's Record Club show going on the Patreon. I totally understand if some patrons want to cancel their pledges or if listeners are not as interested in the show now. Joe is like the funniest guy who ever lived and is much funnier than me. The thing that makes this show so special is the dynamic between the two of us. I totally understand if a version of Anime Sickos without that dynamic doesn't appeal to you. But I will keep da fire going regardless.    I thank every Sicko fan who sticks with us. Please send your love and support to Joe da God. He deserves the best and is instead beset by fucking terrors and torments and it's not fair. If you want to throw Joe a few bucks directly you can go to https://ko-fi.com/joeandersonm. 

Writer, homie, and genius Josh Watkins goes guesto mode. We celebrate Josh's return to Chicago after four years of grad school, discuss the highs and lows of working in a bookstore (sometimes people write fanfic about you where you are a pony), and explain why Josh can't be allowed to touch a smartphone or video game. This guy is one of the all time guys. The vibes on this one are simply stunning

Writer and comedian Dan Sheehan goes guesto mode again! Dan is about to crowdfund Who's A Good Boy: The Game Where Dogs Can Sin, a comedy card game with art by Julia Glassman, and he's here to tell you why it kicks ass and deserves your grubby dollars. Plus, we discuss how we hate the computer and the putrid posts within, and Joe shares all his wisest fatherhood tips as Dan awaits his first child! Check out Who's A Good Boy at dogscansin.com

Joe becomes mentally healthy forever as we curate a therapeutic gaming curriculum designed to provide him with the maximum concentration of vital gaming nutrients such as "dig big hole," "upgrade town," "low-stakes grind" and more. Follow this curriculum yourself and you too will develop a perfect brain Featuring discussions of: SteamWorld Dig 2, Digseum, Donkey Kong Bananza, Slime Rancher 2, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Siralim Ultimate, Dungeon Encounters, Animal Well, Blue Prince, Webfishing, Terranigma, Hades 2, and more

The most important thing in the universe is to chill and hang and vibe. If humanity is chilling then the utopian society must inevitably follow. But the man hates to see you chilling. We discuss this phenomenon and share our tips to ensure your chilling is at maximum effectiveness. Thanks to Cohen Edenfield for playing Jigsaw in our great intro sketch

The Sickos go on and on about the classic 1982 spoof show Police Squad. Its film version, The Naked Gun, is much more successful and well-known, but the TV sitcom original is where this kind of humor shines brightest. As appreciators of comedy, the Sickos really go nuts over the craftsmanship on display. What a show!

How come all this fascism is tariff shit is allowed to happen? Why are so many critical US agencies being deleted? Why isn't anyone stopping this? The Sickos have the answer: We live in Corpse World, a post-function existence where the concept of "doing" has been phased out entirely. Intrigued? Yeah bitch I know it's brilliant. Listen for the full story

We return to our ongoing project to rank all game mechanics, but when it comes to the immersive sim and fighting game genres, we don't have the expertise required to make those decisions. So we had Josh Boerman from the Worst of All Possible Worlds podcast join us to help us with the imsim mechanics and our buddy Dylan (aka Jordi from Sicko Shock 2) do the fighting game ones. What's better than this: homies chilling and yapping about video games baby Check out Josh's podcast here: worstpossible.world

It's another grab bag of bits. We introduce a new segment about the most insanely fatal "non-lethal" attacks from the Yakuza games, find insider knowledge about the grim state of radio, and invent a new coffee sensation: The Americano 2. Check it out! Play our new video game Time Force X: Mission of Lennon here! https://anime-sickos-podcast.itch.io/time-force-x

Dono from the excellent podcast Radio Free Tote Bag goes guesto mode! We yammer about how getting into synth music is just an excuse to make your room look like where Daft Punk does their taxes, Tom & Joe answer relationship questions with their perfect brains, and Dono joins us in ranking some classic game mechanics. It's fun as hell folks, check this one out. You can listen to Radio Free Tote Bag at rftb.me or just do it the same way you listen to any podcast. Podcasts are all in the same place

The Sickos do a special unemployed version of Cog Talk where they do the unthinkable and wish they had an evil computer that took up half their time with awful job tasks. As bad as it is, just sitting around all day is worse! Plus, Tom yammers and yaps about The Bee Sting, a great novel by Paul Murray.

The Sickos continue to fill our their definitive tier list of all game mechanics, this time saying the final word on runs, consumables, joke classes, pressing the thumbstick down, and more. If you skip these episodes you're basically worse than Elon

Shit is so bad! The dumbest evil man is wrecking the country using a cadre of Nazi zoomers named after an outdated meme! Da future is grim and we are miserable! Therefore, we do the only thing we can do to keep our minds from total destruction: complaining!!!

We never thought we'd see the day: it's a posting episode. The insane repliers of Bluesky have stepped up, providing a critical mass of deranged posts without us having to log on to the odious X. We have sex poems, joke correctors, the Hawk Truth, and leaked photos of Heaven. Check it out

After the most harrowing week of fascist American leadership in our memory, the Sickos must seek the healing aura of Resident Evil 4, the platonic ideal of video game, and the real-life manifestation of Bonestorm, the game Bart wants on the Simpsons. We talk both the original and the remake. They both rule. It is fun when you kick an old old Spanish man and his head becomes deleted

The Sickos watched the unbelievable indie silent slapstick comedy Hundreds of Beavers. Here's the thing: This movie is gaming. Watching this movie is the same as Minecraft except every two minutes you see the dumbest image of your life and go haw haw! We are absolutely in the tank for this movie and will go to war on its behalf. It's the only movie with a UI. You can watch the entire movie legally and for free on YouTube right now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guE0Qd8BRw0

Writer, podcaster, game developer and poster Merritt K goes guesto mode! We discuss her new visual novel, Fledgling Manor, the sick soul required to be a wicked Asymmetrical, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, the sick compulsion to play Magic the Gathering despite it sucking ass, and our nostalgia for the bygone stink of a LAN party basement. This shit is so good. Happy new year freaks Get Merritt's game here: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3238510/Fledgling_Manor/ Here's the horrible article Merritt referenced: https://a16z.com/anime-is-eating-the-world/

We really lean in to being in our mid-30s in this one. We jaw about our various home improvement projects, and Joe goes deeper into how to become a genius parent to a wonderful child (this time for real, it's not an extended bit that uses that as a premise). Plus, Joe goes nuts about pachinko deckbuilder Ballionaire, which contains a game mechanic so good that all previous games are rendered dogshit for not including.

italian pawg hits robber baron with negative zone

Games writer and Skulltenders DM Cohen Edenfield goes guesto mode and the chilling is simply off the charts! We jaw about Deadwood again (to the delight of all), yammer about video games, and talk shop re: how to DM a great RPG podcast (short version: depends on a lot of things)

The Sickos go nuts over HBO's Deadwood, a show in a league of its own. You have to watch Deadwood--this is not a request.

Folks, uh oh!! Once again we have experienced a mondo catastrophe! Trump won big time! The Sickos discuss their feelings (bad), criticize the Democrats (morons), and reminisce on how the day before the election they were in a fun live show that made them feel really good (sinful, Trump victory is their punishment) The live show we mention, The Skewer, was recorded for your listening and/or viewing pleasure. Find The Skewer Podcast here: https://soundcloud.com/theskewer/the-skewer-returns-november-2024 Watch the video recording here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7me37SaNIs

It seems like every posting platform sucks. But what does it take for one to not suck? The Sickos answer by creating the Poster's Hierarchy of Needs, a pyramid of requirements that, if followed, will lead to Poster's Paradise.

The Sickos give the final word on a variety of classic game mechanics that all gamers know and love, such as "roll," "homing attack," "homing attack (Sonic version)," "When Dracula shoots 3 fireballs," and "The Wagon." If you disagree with our tier rankings, how dare you?

The Sickos briefly discuss a number of topics: meeting a guy in the West Loop who talked like a bugged NPC, how the Cybertruck is basically this decade's equivalent to the Nokia N-Gage, why moving to Bluesky feels like starting a new file on a 200 hour+ game, and most importantly, that the photo of John Lennon where he's walking like an idiot is not funny and in fact sucks

Tom went to Gay Paris, got Covid (no longer eligible for heaven), and got laid off! We yammer about my dumbass travel anecdotes. It's fun to listen to Anime Sickos Podcast!

OK, this time we're celebrating 200 episodes for real. We reflect on five years in Sicko Mode and bask in the praise and congratulations of our fans and homies. Anime Sickos Podcast forever

Incredible! We've been in Sicko Mode for 200 episodes! What better way to celebrate this incredible achievement than to discuss our favorite dusts and goops! What, you thought we were gonna read a bunch of kind words from fans? That's next episode!

Danette Chavez goes guesto mode! Danette is the new editor-in-chief of the AV Club, an icon of internet culture writing recently freed from a grim period of ownership by the truly boneheaded G/O Media group. We talk about the challenges facing writing online, the pitfalls so many business guys keep stumbling into, and what it takes for a publication to be sustainable and forge an identity. Sites mentioned: avclub.com pajiba.com hellgatenyc.com defector.com aftermath.site

The Sickos yammer. No topic! All minutia! We yap about eating burgers under the L tracks, Home Depot hot dogs, Joe's son getting spooked by the Roomba, Monster Train, and any number of dumb shit. It's fun to hang out with your Sicko homies

Unbelieveable! The Sickos discuss an actual anime: the 2022 Apple TV+ live action thriller Severance starring Adam Scott. This shit is so good. We basically just go nutty over how much we love this show. Some spoilers but we leave the finale and the big twists unrevealed. Also we got a fun sketch with the Worst of All Possible Worlds boys. It's a banger

The Sickos discuss Joe's recent layoff, and how getting laid off is fine, and it's easy to get a new job, and there WILL be a future, and you can depend on it, and it's easy and smart to feel confident in the future, and it's all going to be so normal.

A.J. Ditty from the Worst of All Possible Worlds podcast goes guesto mode! We learn how to act, why seeing your parents shot in the face would make you get all A's in acting school, visual novels, Elden Ring, and the joy of writing lore-heavy serialized interstitial skits to stick in the middle of your chat podcast. You can listen to Volume One of the Odyssey Commercials here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxLT-j2Oh9g

Sitcom pilots tend to suck ass. They have to do boring exposition and the characters haven't settled into a rhythm yet. Well what if we told you there existed a perfect comedy pilot. There does: the pilot for the 2005 Comedy Central series Stella, an episode so good it could have come from season four.

Comedy is an endless playground of creativity and innovation, but some jokes are so good that nothing could ever be better in its niche. We call these "Best in Slot" jokes and most of them are from 30 Rock, The Simpsons, and Venture Bros. Listen to us talk about them!

Remy Siu, creative director of the excellent narrative game 1000xResist, goes guesto mode! We discuss how he & the game's writing staff put together a frankly staggering work that you WILL buy and play, how MMOs were more fun when they made zero concessions to the player, how to use lore for good instead of evil, why only geniuses appreciate Vinland Saga's farm arc, and generally jaw about art and process in a way that you will love. Buy 1000xResist on Steam here: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1675830/1000xRESIST/

The Sickos remembered that we have a form we shared a long time ago where people can submit horror stories from their workplaces, and we finally read some of them! Then, we discuss if Joe should get a Vespa so he can fit in with all the Italian guys. Submit your own cog tales here, perhaps we'll remember to read them one day: https://forms.gle/aBFBueBAGQr4xtcx6

We've had too many high-concept episodes lately that require lots of thought and prep, so we just turned the mic on and had an hour of organic jawing. Just two buds hanging out folks. I think I heard somewhere that people like this sort of thing. Well, I sure hope it's true.

This AI shit sucks so bad folks. We expand on what we found so distasteful about generative AI art and how much it would suck ass to see it expand into mainstream media. The joy of great art comes in contemplating the choices that went into it and what those choices represent. AI makes no choices and sucks ass. Listening to this episode is equivalent to a 4-year degree

The Sickos come bearing eleven killer sketches that will make you hoot and laugh and go nuts. Join us as we travel through time, meet god, become Michelin reviewers, count cards, and more. If you don't listen to this, go to hell!

Are you freaks happy? We come from the toilet battered and bloody bearing armfuls of insane and stupid posts that are very funny to think about. Come listen to us caper and howl. Is this not what you love?

Shevvy from the incredible comedy sensation Crawfish Comic goes guesto mode! We go nuts over how much we like Shevvy's work, and they explain the ethos and philosophy that leads to comics where a whale says "im a whale and even i think this is crasy." Culture today is a diseased mutant thing and Crawfish Comic is a beacon of purity and it kicks ass, this ep rules

The Sickos eulogize the best cartoonist to ever live, Akira Toriyama. Rest in peace king. Your art will live forever, and future generations will understand that it's cool when guys wear genie pants with curly shoes

We welcome Josh Boerman from the Worst of All Possible Worlds podcast. We discuss immersive sims, the value of good criticism, trying to make a living off creative work, and whether or not they still make Spree (the candy from Halloween). You can find The Worst of All Possible Worlds podcast at https://www.worstpossible.world/

The Sickos do a classic two-segment episode. First, we return to our tier list of Every Game Mechanic and rank a bunch of these suckers. Then, we return to our tier list of—wait that can't be right

Turns out books are not homework, but instead stuff a weirdo wrote down for fun. We go nuts about Moby Dick, Don Quixote, and the works of Don Barthelme. Whoever said this stuff was dry needs to shut up

The Sickos moan about guys who have fallen off. Some fear to do this. We have the courage to do what they won't.

Grant Howitt, a game designer who rules, joins the Sickos (plus Gwynn and Allie from Modesty City, Sicko Shock 2, and Shuffle Quest) for a one-shot game of GOBLIN PUNKS, an RPG where you are shitty goblin teens fucking around. Will we be able to disrupt the community car wash and become goth? Listen and see asshole You can get Goblin Punks here: https://gshowitt.itch.io/goblin-punks

Everywhere you look someone's trying to sell you da sludge, and they usually succeed! AI? That's da sludge. Layoffs? Sludge. Airplanes where the walls fall off? Sludge. Some of these folks have replaced their hearts and brains with gray goop. Anyway enjoy the podcast

We unveil a classic new recurring segment in which the Sickos sort every single game mechanic into a tier list. This will definitely not take a long time and will result in a perfect tier list that will help future game designers make every game be flawless. Also, we discuss how we love our induction cooktops which are a type of cooking Anbernic.

Folks, your Sickos are old and dumb and don't know what's hip now. When we watched the Game Awards it was like we got clockwork oranged. Music is scary to us now. But don't worry: we are actually extremely wise and smart. Turns out when you're in your mid-thirties you have a perfect brain