Well, well, well. (I couldn't resist.) Digital Eclipse is on fire. After their update to MMPR: Rita's Rewind, they've updated their other recent release, Tetris Forever. Surprisingly, they've added a new game to the library. Welltris is now available for everyone. 

The MS-DOS/Spectrum Holobyte version of Welltris was the first follow up to Tetris. It's a 3-D top down version of Tetris, except your pieces are enclosed within 4 walls, as down the sides of a well. Welltris! This is just the beginning too. Digital Eclipse is actively looking to bring more games to the collection. 

In addition, they have updated the option to remap the controls for Tetris Time Warp. You can also do this with the MS-DOS, Electronika 60, and Apple II on all systems. The Switch version took a small hit though. The Rewind feature has been disabled for any of the games that had an audio issue. Those games weren't listed, but the rewind feature will be reinstated soon.

What games do you want to see come to Tetris Forever? Don't answer that. We don't have a comments section. 

The Artificer is controversial. It was introduced in Dungeons & Dragons 5e's Eberron: Rising From the Last War sourcebook, and then in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything. With its steampunk and magical technology vibes, some feel the Artificer character class doesn't sit well with more traditional high-fantasy settings. (Greyhawk would beg to differ.)

When the D&D 2024 Player's Handbook released September 17, the Artificer was the last kid picked for kickball. Correction: the Artificer wasn't picked at all. You will not find it there.

But publisher Wizards of the Coast just released its first Unearthed Arcana in probably a year. And you've guessed it: the Artificer is now in a beta testing phase to bring it forward from D&D 5e (2014) into D&D 5e (2024). If every single class included in the 2024 Player's Handbook is any indication, then Wizards of the Coast is tweaking just about everything it can when it comes to the Artificer's complex blend of spellcasting, crafting, and infusions.

The Artificer is the top level of the character class. Below it are four subclasses:

• Alchemist - An expert at combining reagents to produce mystical effects.
• Armorer - Modifies armor to function almost like a second skin.
• Artillerist - Uses magic to hurl energy, projectiles, and explosions.
• Battle Smith - A combination of protector and medic.

Here are some ways in which the Artificer and its subclasses will be revised:

• Spells. Tweaks makes to D&D 2024's spells will affect the Artificer's gameplay.
• Magic Items. Heavily employs magic items, so changes made to magic items naturally alter how an Artificer plays on the battlefield. 

If you have the time and ability to playtest the new Artificer at your table, or even if you can only read it to get an overview of the changes, you'll be doing the rest of us a service. One of my Dragonlance players is itching for a change, and the Artificer has been calling to him for years now.

Go here in D&D Beyond to download a PDF of the 2024 Artificer playtest. 

Developer Aesir Interactive has announced that Ambulance Life: A Paramedic Simulator will be released on February 6^th for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The studio’s follow-up to Police Simulator: Patrol Officers, and publisher NACON’s next entry in its “LIFE” series of simulators also has a free demo available now on Steam.

Ambulance Life looks to be shaping up well, if a recent gameplay showcase is any indication, with Aesir Interactive swapping first responder uniforms this time around. The paramedic sim is set in a fictional version of San Franciso, featuring a large variety of EMS scenarios and equipment, as well as large-scale mass casualty events that will test all your skills as a first responder.

Pre-orders are open now for both the standard and deluxe editions of the game. The standard retails for $39.99, while the deluxe will set you back $54.99 and includes two siren packs, fire department cosmetic pack, Bay Side expansion, and Paramedic Handbook Dev’s cut. I need this in the worst (best) way.

In my review, I had quite a bit of feedback for MMPR: Rita's Rewind. I said the rangers moved too slow, the AI lacked the "I", and sometimes when you use the invincibility dodge, you're not invincible. I wasn't the only one who showered Digital Eclipse with feedback, and it seems like our voices were heard. 

Announced late last night, they pushed a patch to the Steam and Playstation versions. The Xbox and Switch versions will receive the update soon. In addition to all rangers are now faster, they can also dodge with no cooldown. However, the dodge only grants invulnerability at start up, unless you're in easy mode. Here they are. Easier copied here than those clowns Bulk and Skull annoying people at a juice bar with a fart machine. Now push down the lever on that toaster, because by the time you're done reading this, your pop-tarts will be ready. 

Brawler Gameplay

• All Rangers now move faster (walk and dash speeds)
• Ranger grab and grab attack speed increased
• Rangers can perform the Dodge move without any cooldown, but are only invulnerable for the initial frames of the animation
• In Easy mode, the Dodge move is always invulnerable
• Ranger can chain Rising Strike from many more states
• Rangers can Dodge while holding an enemy to let go
• Ranger Special is boosted slightly by successful Dodge
• Vertical attack collision for Time Disruptors is wider, making them easier to hit
• Time Disruptors are easier to destroy in Easy mode
• Food pick-ups are more spread out when spawning from containers
• In Hard mode, enemies now have the same health as Normal but do twice the damage
• The Speed Run clock is no longer affected by Time Disruptors
• Players can swap to any other NPC Ranger in the Juice Bar
• Localized juice bar dialog for the arcade machines is now correct
  
  

Zord & Megazord Gameplay

• All machine gun fire (bunkers, turrets and flying ships) now does less damage 
• Gravity is reduced when jumping to make pits easier to clear
• Falling in a pit won't take away a life
• Some pits now have additional ledges for landing
• When multiple players are fighting a boss and some players reach a Game Over state, the difficulty (health and Zord damage dealt) scales accordingly
• Harvester encounters have been balanced; laser speeds and laser damage are reduced at lower difficulties
• Megazord boss health has been reduced and damage dealt to bosses has been balanced
• Health power-ups now spawn during Zord boss battles
• Eye Guy's eye bombs do much less damage, and on lower difficulties, his bombs appear less frequently
• At higher difficulty levels, health coin benefits scale downward
  
  

Online

• If both online players have unlocked Green Ranger, they have the option of starting their game from any level
• Please note that all online players have the latest update for the game to engage in successful matchmaking
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General

• The indicator for skipping the intro video has been improved.
• Stability and performance improvements overall
• PS5: Fixed some crash bugs

PS5: Fixed an save-file issue where players couldn't start a new playthrough after completing the game.

Digital Eclipse has promised more fixes in the future, and hasn't forgotten about the 6 player online feature, which will change the game immensely. I won't change my grade, but I will do a playthrough again, once all is said and done. Good work! 

I hate being confused. I just hate it. I hate that I can research something for hours, and watch tons of videos, and playthroughs, and still walk away confused. I think I have answers, but I'm trying to figure out what the difference is between Virtual Fighter 5 REVO, and Virtual Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown Update 2.0. I am hoping the features are not just Steam and Rollback Netcode. So I went to the website, and here's what I found. It's a juxtaposition, and now I'm more confused.  

So is this what I'm supposed to be all starry-eyed about? Does the 2.0 update come with rollback? Are console players ever getting the 4k upgrade? Did Sega use marzipan for the icing on this cake? Was this a Sega and fans congregational decision? Why couldn't Sega just say "Hey everyone, Virtual Fighter 5 is getting updated to REVO on all systems, and it's going to be great! You can beat up your friends in 4K, with rollback netcode, and pop-off as much as you like." 

I need answers, Sega. I have a responsibility here. There are special editions coming, with different costumes, an anniversary sound collection, a legendary DLC pack, and more, but is it enough for me to want the Steam version if I already own the PS4 version? Is it?  I guess I'll have to wait until January 28, because I missed the beta. I was sick. Now you know too much, reader. 

It's not a contest. But before Vecna and Venger, before Strahd and Lord Soth, Tiamat was the #1 big bad in Dungeons & Dragons. What could be more dragon than a dragon made up of five dragons? Tiamat is the Queen of Evil Dragons. She makes a gory comeback in "The Queen's Cradle," the D&D episode of the Secret Level animated series now on Amazon Prime.

Tiamat's got five heads. They're the (evil) chromatic dragons, colored:

• Red
• Blue
• Green
• Black
• White

Along with those five heads, she's got five brains—and five breath weapons, which will stomp a mudhole into any party you throw at her. Designer Chris Perkins doesn't even settle on whether she's a god or not. She's simply so powerful that she is, for all practical intents and purposes, a god.

Tiamat has been around since the D&D 1st Edition Monster Manual. She's been in every edition of the game since. She was also a prime villain in the 1980s D&D cartoon (back when cartoons were only on Saturday mornings, can you imagine?) She would always just show up, wreck things, maybe chase Venger or the heroes for a while, and then go stomping off.

In D&D 5th Edition, she is central to the Tyranny of Dragons campaign which was used to launch D&D 5e in 2014. They had to confine her to the Nine Hells in the Baldur's Gate: Descent Into Avernus campaign. Evil dragons and evil cultists, however, are always trying to unleash Tiamat on the multiverse once more. 

Chromatic dragons are one of three primary foes in the D&D 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide Greyhawk campaign setting. So naturally Tiamat rules that roost. Most people ask who is Tiamat. But what they forget to ask is how is Tiamat. And that's probably why she's so mad all the time.

Marvel Rivals' first in game even begins very soon and will be a Winter themed event including new skins and a limited time game mode. 

This new game mode titled "Jeff's Winter Splash Festival" will have two teams of Jeff's see who can spray the majority of the map more with their team colors in an obvious inspiration from Splatoon so I am really looking forward to this one. Those who take part in the event will get Jeff's winter themed skin for free. 

The event will also include other Winter themed skins for Venom, Rocket Racoon, Groot and Magik Though these will most likely be paid skins but hey, getting Jeff's skin for free is a huge win as this is probably the cutest skin in game right now. 

The Winter Celebration event begins on December 20th.

The book of Revelation

Developer Naughty Dog (Uncharted, The Last of Us) revealed its next game at The Game Awards 2024. Host Geoff Keighley knew it would be something special, which is why he saved it for last. There's so much going on here that I hardly know where to begin. But the Gaming Nexus Slack channel was rolling with speculation, connections, interpretations, and reconsiderations.

The game is called Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet. You too may find that title hard to remember with its 11 syllables and tongue tripping "Tic Tac" sounds. Besides having trouble looking it up on YouTube, however, there is everything else to like—including the fact that it's not another Uncharted or The Last of Us.

Be advised, the majority of what we came up with is pure conjecture. These are just details we cherry-picked out of a four-and-a-half minute cinematic video about a video game without a release date.

Settling the (musical) score

Longtime musical collaborators Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (aka Nine Inch Nails) open with a mysterious synthwave soundtrack. It's one part Sword & Sworcery and two parts Mass Effect. It's pitch perfect and climaxes just in time for the CD disc changer to switch to Pet Shop Boys' 1987 banger "It's a Sin" at the end.

It's a Sin

The first few moments of the trailer are owned by an ancient, theocratic script. The alien lettering is translated onscreen, saying: 

"The suffering of generations must be endured to achieve our divine end." - Ancient Sempirian Scripture, 1986

It's the "1986" that sets the tone for this brand new game world. Try to ignore the fact that "Sempirian" sounds like a mash-up of something called the Simp Empire. Religious dogma sets the heavy overtone of Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet.

I finally got round to finishing off my Slay the Spire platinum trophy on Playstation eaerly last month, just in time for the hype leading into Slay the Spire 2. Now the game itself isn't even hitting early access until 2025, but we just got our first look at gameplay with Mega Crit's gameplay trailer below. 

Most notable in the trailer is probably the character lineup, confirming the presence of the Ironclad and the Silent, the introduction of the new character the Necrobinder, and the tease of another character yet unnamed. Anyway, couldn't be more excited for a game as I am Slay the Spire, and hoping that early access build hits the goals for both PC/Steam Deck and MacOS as was announced a few months back. I'll resurrect my PC if I have to but would much rather get the game on my working Mac instead. If I do have to resurrect that PC, then I guess I'll have to jump in first as the Necrobinder. Seems fitting. 

This kid is in trouble. He's wild-eyed, panicking, and has unfriendly-looking tattoos all over his face. He looks at the other faces looking at his: a heavily scarred warrior with uneven teeth, a pointy-eared sorcerer sitting too close to a fire, and a sleepy-eyed dwarf wearing gym weights as bucklers. 

The warrior named Mora tries to soothe the child.

The sorcerer named Tally knows it's better to shoot first, ask questions later.

The dwarf named Luzum, however, has seen the kid's face markings before. In his (thankfully not Scottish) accent, it sounds like he's saying the kid is to be sacrificed to something called JYAH-mutt. But upon multiple listens, you realize he's saying Tiamat. That's the five-headed Queen of Dragons. She's been around as long as D&D has existed and is inarguably one of D&D's most recognizable villains.

The kid then sees horrible flashes of a huge red dragon, grabs the paladin's sword, and mistakenly runs it deep into the paladin's gut. 

The sorcerer has seen enough. "That's it. You're gonna burn, kid." Which is exactly what a fiery sorcerer would and should say in that situation. You can't convince me otherwise.

This perfectly-cropped snippet is taken from an episode called "Dungeons & Dragons: The Queen's Cradle." You can find the whole animated series—called Secret Level—on Amazon Prime right now. Only the first episode is D&D. The other 13 each center on a different game, e.g., episode 4 is Unreal Tournament, episode 6 is Pac-Man.

Prime dropped the first eight episodes all at once on Tuesday, December 10. The remaining seven episodes will drop on Tuesday, December 17. Secret Level is from the makers of Love Death + Robots. And now you know why this series is already so good.

Pause whatever your tabletop group is doing right now—I don't care if you're in the middle of beating your own campaign-spanning big bad—and watch the Secret Level D&D episode right now. It's a sucker-punching response to all the naysayers out there who think D&D has been getting soft in its old age. Not one person will be left thinking that after watching that episode.