Stuff Ben & Mike Like Ben & Mike

A debatably triumphant return to the world of podcasting for Ben and Mike! We date ourselves poorly by discussing the imminent release of Tears of the Kingdom and struggling to remember the name of 'Starfield'. As we hadn't chatted for a while, we try to get through our thoughts on everything of note that we had watched or played in recent times... Timestamps below as ever!
0:00 Intro and depressing preamble (aka "everything sucks")
5:15 Kimetsu no Yaiba / Demon Slayer: Swordsmith Village Arc
7:50 Mashle: Magic and Muscles
9:00 Dr Stone: New World
12:10 My Home Hero
14:54 Jigokuraku / Hell's Paradise
17:53 Vinland Saga Season 2
20:44 Skip and Loafer
25:10 Xenoblade Chronicles Series
32:09 Golden Kamuy Season 3
36:21 Spy X Family
42:40 Ace Attorney & The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles
48:00 BLUELOCK
55:08 Hikari no Ou / The Fire Hunter
59:05 Honkai Star Rail
1:05:02 Fire Emblem Engage
1:12:07 Ben's Retro Games Corner
1:17:00 Shiroi Suna no Aquatope / The Aquatope on White Sand
1:19:00 Ben's Anime Lightning Round
1:21:10 Microsoft Game Pass + Yakuza: Like a Dragon
Intro song: Pursuit - A Great Turnabout - Yasumasa Kitagawa, from The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles
Outro song: Dai Zero Kan - 10-FEET, from THE FIRST SLAM DUNK (Mike just watched this in the cinema and it's great)

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Our final archived episode! It even includes several references to the fact our archives will never be uploaded. What riveting content. But this one isn't just a rundown of a ton of shows we've watched! After a brief chat about shows we'd been watching recently - and a not so brief diversion into all things Fire Emblem: Three Houses - we deep dive into an age old question... Can the main character of an anime be 'best guy' in said anime? The discussion centres around a bunch of examples we bring to the table where this is the case, so the answer is fairly clear, but it's about the journey not the destination. Timestamps below:
0:00 Intro
2:34 Recent shenanigans
2:43 Dr Stone
7:08 Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba
12:43 Carole & Tuesday
15:07 Too many isekai shows (Not heard THAT from us before)
19:59 Fire Emblem: Three Houses
46:32 Can the main character be 'best guy'?
54:03 Ben's best guys (but actually a joint list)
1:17:34 Mike's best guys (the one's Ben doesn't know about)
1:19:29 Does it make the show better if MC=BG?
The examples we talk about:
Kamado Tanjiro - Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba
Sawamura Eijun - Diamond no Ace
Kaburagi T. Kotetsu / Wild Tiger - Tiger & Bunny
Katsuragi Keima - The World God Only Knows
Kuroba Kaito - Magic Kaito 1412
Sakamoto-kun - Sakamoto desu ga?
Honda-san - Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san
Handa Seishuu - Barakamon
Spike Spiegel - Cowboy Bebop
Nanba Mutta - Space Brothers
Kawachi Daikichi - Usagi Drop
Hitoyoshi Zenkichi - Medaka box
Intro song: HEROES - GLAY, from Diamond no Ace Season 2
Outro song: Anata ga ireba OK! - Serena, from Space Brothers
Both phenomenal shows. In case that wasn't clear yet.

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Another one from the archives, cementing this as an annual podcast! This one possibly never saw the light of day in any form in the past due to us failing to tackle the timestamping of Stuff #4... The format will be very familiar as we run through the anime of the year in something resembling alphabetical order, but this time we put time pressure on ourselves - hurrah! Timestamps below. Spoilers: we still haven't figured out what our email address is.
0:00 Intro
2:21 Games we've been playing and stuff (Into the Spider-Verse shout out)
6:20 A.I.C.O.: Incarnation
6:40 Angolmois
7:10 Baki
7:52 Banana Fish
11:23 Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai (up here because we listed it as 'Bunny Girl Senpai')
14:53 Caligula
15:02 Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card-hen
17:22 Dorei-ku The Animation
17:28 Double Decker! Doug & Kirill
19:23 Darling in the FranXX (it's here because 'Franx')
22:30 Fumikiri Jikan (Crossing Time)
23:42 Gaikotsu Shotenin Honda-san (Skull-faced bookseller Honda-san)
25:02 Goblin Slayer (Ben blows his nose loudly here. Heads up.)
26:05 Golden Kamuy
29:33 Grancrest Senki
29:59 Grand Blue
31:35 Gurazeni: Money Pitch
33:38 Hanebado!
33:59 Hataraku Saibou (Cells At Work)
35:27 Hinamatsuri
37:05 Hinomaruzumou
38:02 Hisone to Maso-tan
39:36 Irozuku Sekai no Ashita kara (Iroduku: The World in Colors)
41:23 Isekai Izakaya
41:56 Karakuri Circus
42:28 Kyoto no Holmes
42:36 Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Die Neue These
43:31 Mahou Shoujo Ore
44:05 Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei Movie: Hoshi wo Yobu Shoujo (The Irregular at Magic High School The Movie - The Girl Who Summons The Stars)
45:50 Megalo Box
48:25 Mirai
49:01 My Hero Academia Season 3
49:34 Rokuhouhou Yotsuiro Biyori
49:52 Run With The Wind
51:15 Sword Art Online Movie: Ordinal Scale
51:48 Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online
53:30 Sword Art Online: Alicization
54:54 Shingeki no Kyojin Season 3 (Attack on Titan Season 3)
55:43 That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime ('Slime')
57:01 Space Battleship Tiramisu (Uchuu Senkan Tiramisù)
57:52 SSSS.Gridman
58:55 Steins;Gate 0
1:00:32 Tada Never Falls In Love (Tada-kun wa Koi wo Shinai)
1:01:16 Thunderbolt Fantasy movie - The Sword of Life and Death + Thunderbolt Fantasy season 2
1:01:48 Violet Evergarden
1:03:41 Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii (Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku)
1:05:04 Yowamushi Pedal: Glory Line
1:07:38 Zombie Land Saga
1:12:05 Top picks from the year
Intro song: Merigo - Cypress Ueno to Robert Yoshino ft. Sky-Hi, from Gurazeni: Money Pitch
Outro song: WHITE of CRIME - REVALCY, from Magic Kaito 1412 (Ben, why did you put this in?)
Definitely check out Magic Kaito 1412.

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Welcome back to our most timely podcast episode to date! This time on Stuff Ben & Mike Like we cover off the shows we watched from the Spring 2021 anime season - the highs, the lows and the disagreements. We also have a bit of a chat about this year's E3 and our experiences watching the Demon Slayer movie in cinemas. Timestamps below! (Mike would also like to remind you that you should watch Thunderbolt Fantasy, even though we don't discuss it here)
0:00 Intro
1:28 E3 2021
6:35 Monster Hunter Stories 2 demo
10:40 Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition
11:42 Wolfstride demo
14:04 Dynasty Warriors Netflix movie
15:34 Demon Slayer -Kimetsu no Yaiba- The Movie: Mugen Train
26:41 Rating the anime of Spring 2021
30:20 86
33:50 Bakuten!!
41:04 Gokushufudo (The Way of the Househusband)
44:17 Mashiro no Oto (Those Snow White Notes)
54:33 Nomad: Megalo Box season 2
1:03:21 ODDTAXI
1:14:22 SSSS.Dynazenon
1:20:28 To Your Eternity
1:29:03 Tokyo Revengers
1:33:37 Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song
1:51:41 Yuukoku no Moriarty Season 2
1:54:51 Zombie Land Saga Revenge
2:03:26 Some shows that we dropped
2:08:21 Ben's Funimation app rant
2:11:30 Upcoming season picks
Intro song: Taiga yo Tomo ni Naite Kure - FranChouChou, the OP from Zombie Land Saga Revenge
Outro song: Victory Jubilee -DW S2h Mix-, from the Dynasty Warriors series by Omega Force and KOEI Tecmo

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What a slick intro! Think that'll be sticking around? Think again! In this episode we talk incredibly quickly about a lot of shows as we try to cover a year and a bit of the anime calendar. There are some gems buried in here though, trust us! Naturally another one from the archives. Timestamps below.
0:00 Intro
5:53 A Place Further Than The Universe
13:09 A Silent Voice
14:58 ACCA
16:30 Alice to Zoroku
19:32 Ancient Magus Bride
29:02 B: The Beginning
32:09 Ballroom e Youkoso
32:43 Children of Ether
33:14 Children of the Whales
38:02 Classroom of the Elite
43:11 Code Geass Initiation
45:37 Devilman Crybaby
47:13 Darling in the Franxx
54:41 Fairy Tail Dragon Cry
54:46 Fastest Finger First
58:04 Fate Grand Order
58:27 Fate/Apocrypha
59:32 Gamers!
1:01:39 Garo: Vanishing Line
1:04:28 Genocidal Organ
1:05:02 Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters
1:06:23 Granblue Fantasy
1:07:10 Grancrest War
1:09:37 Gundam Thunderbolt December Sky
1:11:40 Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens
1:17:18 Hoozuki no Reitetsu Season 2
1:18:06 How to Keep a Mummy
1:20:50 Ikemen Sengoku
1:21:37 In this corner of the world
1:22:21 Juuni Taisen
1:25:47 Kado: The Right Answer
1:27:42 Kakegurui
1:29:40 Katsugeki Touken Ranbu
1:31:37 Kino's Journey -The Beautiful World-
1:36:05 Kekkai Sensen & Beyond
1:38:38 Knight’s & Magic
1:42:10 Koi to Uso
1:43:18 Konosuba Season 2
1:43:46 Kuroko no Basuke Last Game
1:45:05 Kuroshitsuji Book of the Atlantic
1:45:25 Love After the Rain
1:47:22 Made in Abyss
1:50:28 Masamune Kun’s Revenge
1:52:20 My Hero Academia Season 2
1:53:45 Napping Princess
1:53:52 Neo Yokio
1:58:32 Net-juu no Susume
2:00:50 Osake wa fuufu ni natte kara (Love is like a cocktail)
2:02:15 Our love is always 10cm apart + The Moment You Fall In Love
2:03:22 Princess Principal
2:05:35 Rakugo Season 2 (Shōwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjū)
2:08:20 Re:Creators
2:14:32 ReLIFE OVA
2:15:55 Restaurant to Another World
2:18:10 Saga of Tanya the Evil
2:22:04 Sakura Quest
2:26:10 Sanrio Danshi
2:26:50 Shingeki no Bahamut: Virgin Soul
2:30:52 Shingeki no Kyojin S2
2:33:44 The Royal Tutor
2:34:11 Thunderbolt Fantasy movie - The sword of life and death
2:34:43 Tsuredere Children
2:35:11 Vatican Kiseki Chousakan
2:36:19 Violet Evergarden
2:40:36 WorldEnd
2:42:25 Youkai Apartment
2:45:50 Yowamushi Pedal: New Generation & GLORY LINE
2:49:59 Yuru Camp
2:53:35 Favourite shows?
Intro song: Shiny Days - Asaka, from Yuru Camp
Outro song: Freesia - (K)NoW_NAME, from Sakura Quest
Both great shows with great music!

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You know what they say about best laid plans. We incredibly optimistically thought we might squeeze our top 5 games lists into the previous episode with our top 5 anime, and what fools we were! So we're back with an entirely gaming flavoured pod. Once again we're pulling this from the archives so this was recorded a very long time ago and might not reflect our current favourites! Though these lists are probably far more accurate than our favourite anime ones... Timestamps below. (Mike belatedly remembered he was supposed to talk about Discworld Noir. Man.)
0:00 Intro
1:52 Mike's Anime Hot or Not
7:32 Shows Ben May Have Watched
14:33 Ben's current games
18:10 Mike's current games
23:37 List Intro
30:34 Super Mario Galaxy
37:01 Tales of Symphonia
45:46 Lylat Wars (Star Fox 64)
53:26 KotOR
1:02:23 Breath of Fire III
1:09:55 Final Fantasy VIII
1:23:48 Half-Life 2
1:30:12 Beyond Good & Evil
1:37:13 Chrono Trigger
1:44:24 Mass Effect 3
1:47:22 The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
1:49:51 The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask
1:52:09 Assorted games
Intro song: Robo's Theme - Yasunori Mitsuda, from Chrono Trigger. As always, check out the game and the soundtrack! Ben will be sad if you don't.

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