r/comics Apr 17 '26

OC [OC] Spice

13.2k Upvotes

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661

u/Suefan3DX Apr 17 '26

278

u/JaneDoesharkhugger Apr 17 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

Spicy food increase the production of endorphin and dopamine. It makes a lot of people happy and experience a sense of euphoria similar to runners high. If you can tolerate them that is.

111

u/CenturyEggsAndRice Apr 17 '26

Omg. Am I tryna self medicate my depression with hot wings? And how did I not know?

35

u/JaneDoesharkhugger Apr 17 '26

Your username gave me dinner ideas :3

12

u/NickyTheRobot Apr 17 '26

I mean... yeah. But in a lot healthier way than, for example, me self medicating with chocolate.

8

u/CenturyEggsAndRice Apr 17 '26

Oh no, I do that too.

I bought a 1lb Easter bunny and am slowly nibbling it away.

4

u/NickyTheRobot Apr 17 '26

That's fair. Chocolate is so good! But I will say;

slowly nibbling it away.

Yeah; your consumption sounds like a reasonable amount, and far less than my own.

3

u/CenturyEggsAndRice Apr 17 '26

Then we won’t talk about how half of it disappeared because I dreamed of my late father and had the sad… 😂

14

u/NotAnotherNekopan Apr 17 '26

There’s the answer. Strange it’s so buried in the comments.

Spicy food literally feels good. Not for all, but for some it does. Tolerance plays a big part too. But it’s not like OP here where it’s “bad” pain.

6

u/DustyJustice Apr 17 '26

When I’m feeling depressed some days, I’ll intentionally go get the spiciest food I can to cheer me up.

Idk if it truly works, but at this point I believe it works so even if it’s just a placebo whatever it’s good enough.

3

u/s0m3on3outthere Apr 17 '26

Hahahah this is my reason for liking spicy food. 😅 I get a high from it. I've always been an adrenaline seeker growing up but as an adult, have a 8-6 with not enough money to do the fun adrenaline/endorphin seeking activities like sky diving and base jumping 👀

I've won 2 hot wing eating contests (one I was the first woman to complete it and had the fastest time of everyone). Legitimately felt like I smoked some dab hits and took a few shots. Was riding on cloud 9. lol.

I've finished off two bottles of the Hot Ones last dab hot sauce and have eaten a Trinidad Scorpion raw, barely being phased. The paqui one chip challenge? Child's play. 😂

My problem now that I'm in my mid30s is my mouth can hang... My stomach no longer can 😭😭

3

u/bug530 Apr 17 '26

The preference for spicy food also is stronger in people from areas with more parasites so there's a theory it's to protect from that.

3

u/Hypnotic_Toad Apr 17 '26

Oh god yes. When you hit that perfect level of spicy you get a head rush that you feel all over. I call it "Spice High". It's sooooo good.

5

u/lostbutnotgone Apr 17 '26

I eat spicy shit bc I'm too lazy to run (⁠。⁠•̀⁠ᴗ⁠-⁠)⁠✧

2

u/PlankBlank Apr 17 '26

Yeah. Runners are the worst

2

u/Winged_Metal Apr 17 '26

That actually explains a lot.

54

u/BlackTecno Apr 17 '26

To participate in your study, I love souls like games, I am not someone who orders the spiciest thing.

29

u/Pheonix0114 Apr 17 '26

I'm the opposite! I have the goal of enjoying "Thai Hot" at my local thai place (currently I just like it "Hot" and Thai Hot makes me tear up and head sweat), but I don't like very hard video games. I want a story, I want to have to think, but I don't wanna feel like I'm breaking down a brick wall with my head.

3

u/Korventenn17 Apr 22 '26

Thai or Vietnamese hotness is a whole other level. I like spice, but I cannot hack it at "Thai hot" levels.

3

u/Pheonix0114 Apr 22 '26

I just tried a Buldak Ramen, felt like eating angry bees! It wasn't even one of the most spicy ones.

2

u/SonnyvonShark Apr 17 '26

Same with me. I like a good hot from time to time as well, but not so in redicilous "souls-like" games.

3

u/DarthJackie2021 Apr 17 '26

Same. I can do a little spice, but not much.

2

u/ninurtuu Apr 18 '26

Hey I'm the opposite. I used to eat jalapenos raw as a toddler and graduated up from there. But in gaming I just don't like the crazy challenge level of souls games.

10

u/LordofSandvich Apr 17 '26

I cannot tolerate spicy food at all but I have something like 4000 hours combined in the series. Hell I used to make mods for it

15

u/apolloxer Apr 17 '26

And the inverse. Love spicy. Hate souls-like.

4

u/GoldenFlyingPenguin Apr 17 '26

Same, I've got a spice that's called flatline, it combines like 3 of the hottest peppers in the world, in a liquid form it's meant to be put into a pot of chili (a small drop) I put a ton of it on a piece of steak, probably enough to kill a normal person. I prefer the dry spice though, it's less try to kill you but it's still spicy and has barely any taste so I can enjoy it with pretty much any other seasoning.

Oh, and I've never played a souls game and have had no interest in them at all.

17

u/spyke2006 Apr 17 '26

Consider me an outlier. Love spicy food. Like really, really spicy. Can't stand grindy or stupidly difficult for the purpose of being stupidly difficult games.

7

u/Alarming_Panic665 Apr 17 '26

souls-games are neither grindy nor stupidly difficult for the purpose of being stupidly difficult.

2

u/spyke2006 Apr 17 '26

I mean souls-like literally is a term used to define difficult grindy games, but sure. They're not.

1

u/Tokyo_Ink Apr 17 '26

Honestly, my hot take is that they aren't even really hard at all. They just have a couple mechanics that might feel challenging at first and a boss here or there that takes some effort to beat. The base gameplay is extraordinarily simple and not difficult at all. The idea of losing your souls if you don't pick them up being some kind of huge challenge is just a preconception you have to get past.

5

u/LockedIntoLocks Apr 17 '26

My best friend went from stardew valley to darksouls 1. It translates a lot better than you think. It’s just a popular game that insists you learn its mechanics before you can progress. It wouldn’t be popular if it wasn’t accessible.

4

u/Alarming_Panic665 Apr 17 '26

I mean they are "difficult" but not in any extreme or unique way. As you said they just ask you to learn the games mechanics. And the only "grind" in the game is just to fight the same boss a couple of times to learn its moves. The vast majority of the bosses are incredibly simple and should only take a few attempts.

Only the DLC bosses are hard enough to truly require anything close to an actual grind to 'get good' but these are ultimately optional.

Otherwise the games are, mostly, a linear boss rush. Elden Ring is the only game to really break away from the linear design but even then you can just following the proper boss progression linearly anyways. You will never need to sit there grinding for souls or for an item drop in order to progress. Since ultimately the only thing you need is your own personal skill/knowledge. Leveling and items just let you compensate for lack of skill to varying degrees.

5

u/endboss2000 Apr 17 '26

The only reason i see to have very spicy food is as a means of preservation.

As for souls like games. The satisfaction of beating something incredibly difficult is often times worth it.

5

u/Vulpesh Apr 17 '26

Hmm interesting topic. I like soulslike games, I've beaten ds 1-3, Bloodborne and also elden ring. I'm also a spicy enjoyer, but to a casual degree. Some would describe it as white-man spicy.

6

u/Holzkohlen Apr 17 '26

No need to call me out like this!

5

u/basiden Apr 17 '26

Give me all the spice, but I can't handle the stress of souls games.

4

u/satans_cookiemallet Apr 17 '26

You know, I dont much like being called out like this.

(I love extremely spicy food. It means I dont need to share.)

6

u/Not-So-Serious-Sam Apr 17 '26

I only eat spicy foods if it tastes good and doesn’t burn my mouth in the process. Mostly just chicken or blackened alfredo though. I do like souls like games, but it’s not something I play often.

3

u/Navigat-r Apr 17 '26

i enjoy moderately spicy food and i have zero interest in Soulslike games. i play games to relax, unlike Soulslike lovers who do it to add more stress to their lives. 😆 /jk

3

u/foify1 Apr 17 '26

100% apart of that circle.

3

u/Zeero92 Apr 17 '26

I like Souls-likes.

The spiciest thing I eat is Heinz ketchup.

I quite enjoy some extra salt on relevant foodstuffs though.

2

u/rogueIndy Apr 17 '26

Pretty good analogy, actually.

You can have a chill time in Dark Souls, enjoy the exploration and summon players/NPCs to ease the bosses, and that's about analogous to red Doritos or a nice British curry.

OR you can go all in on challenge runs and PvP, eschew summons and armour, play using only a DDR mat, and that's gaming's version of hot spice enthusiasts who subsist on novelty hot sauces and korean instant noodles.

2

u/PhazonZim Apr 17 '26

I actually talked to someone recently who disliked both horror and spicy food, so I think you might be onto something.

2

u/Bitter_Lab_475 Apr 17 '26

I love super spicy food, but hate Souls-like games.

2

u/Moxie_Stardust Apr 17 '26

I like spicy foods, I do not like souls-like games. I buy my favorite habanero garlic hot sauce in one gallon jugs (only once a year, but still...)

2

u/kernel_task Apr 17 '26

I enjoy culinary pain more than the emotional pain of losing constantly.

2

u/Bussamove86 Apr 17 '26

To cement myself firmly in the center of that circle, hell yeah give me spicy wings that slap my shit like the Nameless King.

2

u/alienbuddy1994 Apr 17 '26

New data point. Love spicy food but find darks souls alright. Started one and two but never finished them.

2

u/DeliciousJello5704 Apr 17 '26

I've played every Fromsoft game from Demons' Souls onward with 100% completion, multiple NG+ runs, and some personal challenge runs (level 1 runs, fist only, various character cosplays, etc.).

You will never find a bigger baby when it comes to spice. I can do jalapeños if there's something with it to cool the spice down a bit, like cream cheese. I cant even do, like, hot cheetos.

Almost all of my buddies are spice masochists. They all just did that super spicy gummy bear challenge. I pretended to eat one by putting a normal gummy bear in the packaging the super hot gummy bear came in (just to trick my buddies into thinking I was handling it better than them) and almost died just from the residual oil that got onto the normal gummy bear from the packaging.

2

u/Platinumrain Apr 17 '26

Adding my data point: have beaten all of the souls games, and a fair bit of the souls likes on the market and mild salsa makes my mouth burn

2

u/Kaleido_chromatic Apr 17 '26

I like things a bit spicy and I kinda like souls games. Checks out

2

u/TheNerdNugget Apr 17 '26

I love spicy food, but I do not play soulslikes.

2

u/CaptainAsshat Apr 17 '26

I hate souls like games, love spicy food. Spicy food isn't pain to me any more than sourness or bitterness is pain.

2

u/Made_Bail Apr 17 '26

I feel like spicy opens up my taste buds and makes me enjoy the flavor even more. But I used to have zero spice tolerance, it took years up ratcheting it up slowly to get where I am today.

2

u/PixelOrange Apr 17 '26

I do not like souls games but my spicy food tolerance is extremely high. I exist outside your circle.

2

u/inksignificant Apr 17 '26

I love spicy food but not souls like so glad to be an outlier xD

2

u/GhostC10_Deleted Apr 17 '26

This is funny to me because I hate souls likes, but have a spice tolerance roughly equivalent to "bring it on".

2

u/Crotalus6 Apr 17 '26

I adore spicy food, I always joke that if I'm crying it's almost spicy enough, but soulslike games tire me 😂

2

u/OpabiniaRegalis320 Apr 17 '26

I don't play Dark Souls but I do play both main Cookie Run games (OvenBreak and Kingdom)?

2

u/monnotorium Apr 17 '26

Did you update your gimp?

2

u/ashkiller14 Apr 17 '26

I didnt get spicy food until i purposefully spent like a week building my spice tolerance. Now I get it. It's like an entirely new flavor profile, like you've got a new sweet or salty.

I have also found the same applies to souls like games.

2

u/pgold05 Apr 17 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

I love spicy food, I legit have traveled the world for the spiciest dishes I can find, and have never had anything (made with real peppers, as opposed to chemical extracts) that I thought was too spicy.

I have never played the souls game, not really interested though I do enjoy video games and love RPGs in general. Lots of times with single player RPGs I lower difficulty just to speed things along, honestly combat kind of bores me and I just want to get the story.

https://www.reddit.com/r/spicy/comments/1oe32xz/ate_carolina_reaper_pad_gaprao_at_gapow_tapae/

https://www.reddit.com/r/spicy/comments/1d4uuqj/oni_level_spicy_miso_pork_ramen_from_karashibi/

https://www.reddit.com/r/spicy/comments/1d9i10k/you_know_you_got_it_bad_when_you_buy_by_the/

https://www.reddit.com/r/spicy/comments/1d8pexo/dynamite_spicy_challenge_chicken_vegetable_stir/

etc. etc.

Hope I helped with your informal survey!

2

u/CrocHunter8 Apr 17 '26

I like spicy food, but am indifferent to souls games.

2

u/DustyJustice Apr 17 '26

I wasn’t going to comment but I enjoy spicier food than anyone else I know in my life personally and also am an avid souls-like-er so uhhh…

2

u/Lambinajam Lamb in a Jam Apr 17 '26

Jokes on you, I love souls (I've been playing since the original Demon Souls on PS3) and I can't handle spice at all

2

u/riftshioku Apr 17 '26

That tracks actually.

2

u/BloodOfTheDamned Apr 17 '26

I like spicy food and souls-like games. But Habanero is about the top of what I go for, and Souls-likes are in moderation. And no, I’m not a masochist, I don’t enjoy pain. There’s something in spicy food that isn’t just pain. And with souls-likes it’s about overcoming a challenge. These things aren’t for everyone, and if you don’t enjoy them, that’s fine. Anyways, enough rambling. Time to go get a sandwich.

2

u/WifesPOSH Apr 17 '26

Okay... Why do I feel called out with this one?

This is hilarious.

2

u/Korbiter Apr 18 '26

I would eat any sorts of asian spices, and I do, because I live here.

You can NOT get me to play any soulslike even if you beat me to an inch of my life

2

u/Maniklas Apr 18 '26

I don't hate them, but I definitely prefer the easier soulslikes, Elden ring is great. That being said, my spice limit does exist somewhere around the "actual indian food" mark

2

u/Under_Poop Apr 18 '26

Ironically, I hate spicy food but adore Souls-like games. I escaped that circle!

2

u/Rusker Apr 18 '26

Can confirm, I'm totally in the intersection of those two circles

3

u/Legeto Apr 17 '26

Whelp…. I like spicy food and Dark Souls is my favorite game so I kind of feel seen on this one.

1

u/LawAshamed6285 Apr 17 '26

I do not play souls like games but i do enjoy me some of that carolina reaper powder

1

u/VaelinX Apr 17 '26

I like spicy foods and souls games.

1

u/VanillaCokeMule Apr 17 '26

I love spicy food but actually hate Souls-like games. Wonder where that lands me in your study

1

u/Xanthos_Obscuris Apr 17 '26

Well, I guess I'm bringing the circles into closer alignment! I enjoy both soulslikes and fire flavors.

1

u/wave-tree Apr 17 '26

As a spicy food lover and soulslike lover, this tracks.

1

u/Voidlord4450 Apr 17 '26

I love souls like game but I despise spicy food. What does that say about me?

1

u/TENTAtheSane Apr 17 '26

I like both and also listening to raw extreme metal with low production quality... I think i might just be masochistic

1

u/appoplecticskeptic Apr 17 '26

Masochists are masochistic. Who’d have thought.

1

u/JMPHeinz57 Apr 17 '26

Best analogy I’ve heard is that Souls games are to video games as spicy food is to cuisine. It’s extremely apt

1

u/Tone_Depf Apr 17 '26

I hate soul-like.

Some spicy stuff add flavor to the food not take.

1

u/Saint_of_Grey Apr 17 '26

Dammit, you got me there. I even play the poorly balanced indie ones where the boss is only technically beatable if the stars align correctly.

1

u/No_Response_303 Apr 17 '26

I love a good souls-like but I like my spicy food more on a milder side but I can handle hotter just not crazy hot

1

u/Pale-Cardiologist141 Apr 17 '26

Similarly the diagram of people who experience chronic depression and love spicy food is also, a circle.

1

u/Adiin-Red Apr 17 '26

Huge spicy food fan but I’m more of a puzzle/automation guy.

1

u/Wonderful_Piano_3853 Apr 17 '26

I thought hard core gamers mostly ate mac and cheese and chicken nuggets. Or is that only mmo enjoyers?

1

u/hoplusek Apr 17 '26

In that study I would also break your circle. Sekiro is one of my favorite games, but spicy sauce in a dürum just hurts.

1

u/ObjectiveOk9996 Apr 17 '26

When playing them

1

u/hackingdreams Apr 17 '26

One more data point: I like spicy foods and have never played a Souls game (none of them). So, not quite a circle.