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Xur is back for another few days of rare Exotic deal-making in Destiny 2. His arrival marks your latest chance to snag a few Exotics you might be missing from the Year One collection, provided you have a few Legendary Shards burning a hole in your pocket.

This week, you’ll find Xur in the Tower, behind the Dead Orbit area on the Hangar side. Since we’re halfway through The Dawning, Destiny’s holiday event, you might want to bake a few Strange Cookies to deliver to him as well–and you’re going to want to take advantage of this chance if you want to unlock all the Dawning event Triumphs. Use our Dawning baking guide to get all the recipes you need for the event.

As usual, Xur has Exotic weapons and armor from before the launch of the Forsaken expansion, so you’re out of luck if you were hoping for one of those cool new Black Armory Exotics. Xur’s bag of Exotics includes Merciless, along with one piece of armor for each character class. Merciless is a high-powered fusion rifle, with one of the highest damage outputs in Destiny 2. Its Conserve Momentum perk makes it handy in a lot of boss fights and PvP situations, too–every time you score a hit with Merciless but don’t rack up a kill, the charge speed on the next shot is increased, making it possible to fire faster and faster until you finally wreck your opponent.

In the armor department, Titans can get the Aeon Safe gauntlets, which speed up class ability charge time for allies, especially if they’re also wearing Aeon Exotics. For Hunters, there’s the Knucklehead Radar helmet, which maintains your radar while you’re aiming down sights and offers an enhanced radar when you’re crouching. Finally, Warlocks get the Apotheosis Veil helmet, which instantly recharges your melee, grenade, and class ability when you activate your Super, and gives a buff to recharges for allies as well.

Here are all the Exotics Xur offers this week and what they’ll cost you:

• Merciless (Exotic auto rifle) — 29 Legendary Shards
• Aeon Safe (Exotic Titan gauntlets) — 23 Legendary Shards
• Knucklehead Radar (Exotic Hunter helmet) — 23 Legendary Shards
• Apotheosis Veil (Exotic Warlock helmet) — 23 Legendary Shards

You can also buy a Fated Engram, if you can afford it. Dropping 97 Legendary Shards on the item will grant you one Year One Exotic you don’t already have for that character. You can also snag a Five of Swords challenge card for free, which allows you to add difficulty modifiers that increase your score in Nightfall runs.

This week also saw the opening of the Izanami Forge, the third of the four Forges that are part of the Black Armory expansion. Here’s everything you need to know if you’re still working on the lengthy quest to unlock the Forge, as well as the latest on unlocking the Mystery Box, which requires a key from each Forge and seemingly holds an Exotic weapon.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 has rolled out its December 20 update, and along with it a slew of new holiday-themed events and modes. Two pillars of the multiplayer shooter have gotten their own bit of eggnog and nutmeg flavor to ring in the season: a Blackout holiday event, Winter Calling in Zombies, and a Winter Event stream for the Black Market.

In the Blackout holiday event, Blackout players can use tactical Snowballs and holiday-themed supply stashes. The maps are also decked out with festive lights and decorations. In Zombies, you can complete some unique challenges for new exclusive personalization items. These special challenges can be accepted from the Barracks, and taken alongside your regular Daily Calling challenges.

Finally, the Winter Event Stream has come to the Black Market, offering some winter loot like warpaints and gestures. Those will appear in the Contraband section, and you can complete the new Winter Event tiers alongside the current Absolute Zero tiers to unlock scads of new loot.

Black Ops 4 is currently on sale at some retailers for $40, and Activision appears to be experimenting with letting players buy its pieces a la carte on PC. That means it’s a relatively inexpensive time to jump in if you haven’t yet. Read GameSpot’s Black Ops 4 review for more on why, despite the lack of a single-player campaign, this is a substantial game.

Check below for the full patch notes from Treyarch.

Summary

• Blackout Holiday Event: Snowballs, festive lighting/decorations, and holiday-themed Supply Stashes now live (Xbox One/PC)

• Winter Event Stream in Black Market for MP and Blackout now live (Xbox One/PC)

• Winter Calling in Zombies now live (Xbox One/PC)

• Reactive Camo display issue fixes in Blackout

• Enemy HUD fix for Killcam in Blackout

• Dead of the Night added as Featured Playlist in Zombies

• Misc. fixes in MP and Zombies

Xbox One and PC

General

Blackout

• Event

  • Holiday Event now live in Blackout.

  • Added Snowballs, holiday lighting & decorations, and holiday-themed Supply Stashes.

Zombies

All Platforms

Blackout

• Reactive Camos

  • Addressed an issue that prevented unwrapped Reactive Camos from displaying as completed in the After Action Report.

  • Addressed an issue where unwrapped Reactive Camos would appear wrapped on the ground.

• Outfit Unlocks

• Miscellaneous

Multiplayer

Zombies

• Featured Playlist

• Gameplay

Apparently not content with the buffet of discounts already on offer during Week 2 of the PlayStation Store’s Holiday Sale, Sony has picked a selection of titles that missed out on the discount treatment and–you guessed it–given them the discount treatment. But instead of a multi-week sale, this PSN Flash Sale will only last through the weekend, with prices going back up on December 24. So if you see something you like, jump on it. Like all things in this crazy world, these prices are temporary.

Among the standout deals is Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, which is on sale for $45. It comes with the standard multiplayer and Zombies modes, plus a new battle royale mode called Blackout. If epic RPGs are more your speed, you can pick up Dragon Quest XI for just $36. And while the standard edition of Red Dead Redemption 2 is still full price, the Special Edition is on sale for $70, and the Ultimate Edition is marked down to $90.

If you’re having people over for the holidays, you might want to grab a party game or two. To that end, you can get people up off the couch (and working off all those holiday treats) with Just Dance 2019 for $24. Or, if your cohort is more the trivia or creative type, you can grab The Jackbox Party Pack 5 on sale for $21; it comes with five mini-games that support up to eight players who can use their phones as their controllers.

PSVR owners can get the boxing game Creed: Rise to Glory for half price at $15, and Metroidvania fans can pick up Hollow Knight for a very reasonable $10.50. And if you just want to blow stuff up? Get Just Cause 4 for $48.

You’ll find more of our picks below, or head to PSN to check out the full Flash Sale. And to see a whole heap of additional games on sale, make sure to visit the PlayStation Store Holiday Sale, which runs through January 15.

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Aquaman is one of the craziest movies we’ve ever seen. It’s filled with giant underwater space battles, secret oases at the center of the earth, living, breathing dinosaurs, giant kraken voiced by famed actress Julie Andrews, and more. When we got the chance to sit down with the movie’s writers, David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick and Will Beall, as well as DC’s famed creator and Aquaman executive producer Geoff Johns, we had to ask: How did Aquaman become so outrageous in scale and inventiveness?

“Have you seen James’s Fast and the Furious movie?” Johnson-McGoldrick responded, referring to Aquaman director James Wan’s Furious 7, a movie whose making destroyed more than 230 cars by dropping them out of planes and jumping them between 40 foot tall “skyscrapers” built on a soundstage. Yeah, fair point, we replied.

“James allowed us not to have to feel like there were limitations,” Johns added. “There was never any ‘no,’ there was never that ‘We can’t do that,’ there was never an impossible. He wanted to make a big, huge, epic movie, and it doesn’t get much more epic than the entire oceans of the world and what’s in it.”

Warning: Aquaman spoilers follow. Go see the movie before you read any further.

Johnson-McGoldrick recalled the first time he saw an early animatic version of the scene in which the gigantic Karathen sea monster erupts from the ground during the Atlanteans’ climactic battle. “Even having been part of this process and the script, I kind of giggled when I saw it,” he said. “It was like, you’re gonna start off with this guy rescuing this woman on the shore, and you’re going to end with a giant kaiju movie.”

James Wan did more than simply enable the insanity, though. He also brought the movie’s distinct ’80s vibe, according to the writers. “One of the things that I feel like James brought to this that is utterly appropriate, is there’s an ’80s sensibility, sort of a throwbacky-ness,” Beall said. “You know, like, the slide into the deserter’s kingdom is the Goonies.”

“And what [Jason Momoa] brought into the character is that sort of child of the ’80s, too,” Johnson-McGoldrick added. “He threw in that Cobra Kai reference. You get the feeling that Arthur in this movie is an ’80s kid.”

Watching Aquaman is often an overwhelming experience. It can feel like sensory overload. And the movie’s look doesn’t always hold up when you stop to think about things like whether lava can really flow freely underwater (it can’t) or how those millions of people in the stadium could even see what was going on while Arthur and Orm were fighting. Johns said they felt “emotional realism” was more important than actual, logical realism.

“I think emotional realism is more important than anything else,” Johns said. “You want to emotionally believe in who these people are and what motivates them and what drives them and what challenges them–who do they love, and what do they fight for? As long as you have emotional reality, which to me is more important.

“James really wanted to do a heightened world,” he continued. “I mean, it is Atlantis, and so if you wanna start questioning things like lava under the water, I think we’re kinda failing the story.”

“There’s a sort of fantasy fulfillment that it feels good when you’re watching that,” said Johnson-McGoldrick. “I remember showing early animatic of that scene to my eight and nine year olds, and they saw the lava catapults underwater and they were like, ‘This is the most amazing movie I’ve ever seen in my life.’ It appeals to this inner eight or nine year old that wants this world to exist.”

“I think for us, storytelling is finding something truthful on this unbelievably broad, sort of phantasmagorical canvas,” Beall added. “Like Geoff was saying, if we’ve done that, you’re not sweating the lava so much. You’re embracing it.”

Aquaman is in theaters now. If you want to read more about it, check out our full review and our rundown of Aquaman’s ending and post-credits scene.

Nintendo has added a few new rewards to the US My Nintendo program. As usual, these mostly consist of discounts on a selection of recent and classic games for both 3DS and Wii U, although you can also redeem your points for some holiday 3DS themes and a handful of printable Animal Crossing rewards.

In terms of discounts, 3DS owners can get 30% off of the critically acclaimed Legend of Zelda game, A Link Between Worlds, for 50 Gold points. Additionally, Nintendo is offering 40% off of the humorous 3DS life sim, Tomodachi Life (60 Gold points); 30% off of Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D (300 Platinum points); and 40% off of Picross 3D Round 2 (600 Platinum points).

On top of that, My Nintendo members can get discounts on a couple of Eshop-exclusive games for 3DS, including HarmoKnight, a rhythm-platformer by Pokemon developer Game Freak. You can snag 40% off of the title for 300 Platinum points. Nintendo is also offering 40% off of the tank action game Tank Troopers for 240 Platinum points.

Meanwhile, Wii U’s new selection of discounts are all for Virtual Console titles. Members can get 40% off of two N64 classics, Star Fox 64 and F-Zero X, for 200 Platinum points each. You can also get 40% off of the SNES title Kirby’s Dream Course on either Wii U or 3DS for 240 Platinum points.

Beyond that, My Nintendo members can redeem their points for a couple of holiday themes for their 3DS. Nintendo is also offering printable Animal Crossing holiday cards (30 Platinum points) and a 2019 Animal Crossing calendar (80 Platinum points), the latter of which keeps track of every villager’s birthday.

A number of other rewards are also still available, including discounts on The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD, Xenoblade Chronicles X, Majora’s Mask 3D, and Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, among many others. You can find the full list on My Nintendo.

While there are no dedicated Switch rewards on My Nintendo, members can use their Gold points to purchase Switch games or DLC on the Eshop and Nintendo’s website.

Mario’s most recent sidescrolling adventure is coming to Nintendo Switch next month as New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe. The title bundles the original Wii U launch game alongside its more challenging DLC expansion, New Super Luigi U, with a couple of new playable characters thrown in for good measure. As it turns out, it boasts another surprise feature over the Wii U version: NES controller support.

As GameXplain discovered, New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe is compatible with Switch’s NES-style controllers, which are one of the company’s exclusive offers for Nintendo Switch Online subscribers. Nintendo had advertised the NES controllers as only being compatible with Switch’s NES game library, but they can indeed be used with other titles; however, given how few buttons the gamepads boast, most games are effectively unplayable with them.

New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, on the other hand, very much follows in the vein of Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World, so the lack of buttons isn’t an impediment here. As GameXplain notes, you’ll need to tweak the default control scheme so that B serves as the run button, but it appears there will otherwise be no issues if you try playing the game with the NES controllers, just like a classic Mario platformer.

As previously mentioned, the Switch NES controllers are only available to Nintendo Switch Online subscribers. If you have a membership, you can order them through Nintendo’s website. Each set retails for $60 and comes with two controllers. Just like standard Joy-Cons, these can be recharged by slotting them into the sides of the Switch itself while it’s docked.

New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe launches for Switch on January 11, 2019. New to this version are two playable characters, Nabbit and Toadette, both of whom have abilities geared toward helping newer players; the former is impervious to damage, while the latter can grab a new power-up–the Super Crown–and transform into Peachette, who can double jump and hover in the air using her billowy dress.

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Microsoft has announced free Funimation anime titles on its store. Most of the series are shonen, but they represent a wide range of different types of the stories within the genre.

All of the free anime offered are the first part of the series’ first season, so you can take advantage of these deals to easily jump into a new series you’ve had your eye on. We suggest starting with My Hero Academia if you haven’t seen the anime yet. It’s the uncut version of the anime, so expect a bit more blood, sexual fan service, and other adult material that might not have made it onto other streaming services. MHA tells the story of Izuku Midoriya, a young boy who wants to be a hero but is one of the few people in the world born without a superpowered Quirk. That won’t stop him from trying to get into Japan’s number one school for aspiring heroes though, and when the world’s number one hero offers some unexpected help, Midoriya might have just found the strength he needs to fulfill his dream.

If you’re looking for something a little more fantasy based, both Fairy Tail and Assassination Classroom are being offered for free as well. The former is about a guild of rambunctious wizards who fulfill contracts for non-magical folk and participate in fights that last for multiple episodes. The latter is about a classroom of students who suddenly get a strange octopus-like creature for a teacher, who promises to destroy the whole world if the class can’t manage to find a way to kill him before the end of the school year.

Attack on Titan is also free. The story of humans striving to survive against monstrous Titans is jam-packed full of explosive action–all of which is beautifully animated–and the first season is regarded as one of the best anime series of 2013.

If you’re looking for more anime to watch, check out our list of our favorite series of 2018. We’ve also highlighted the series we’re most looking forward to in 2019.