This is another single-file game, and a sequel of sorts to Brimstone Diamond. The monster league’s players go underground for the off-season.
Sudden Death is a roguelike deckbuilder in the style of Slay the Spire. You pick a club, draft three of its players, and take them down through three acts of dungeon: the Sunken Dugout, the Rimegrave Arena and the Brimstone Pit. The Ash Baron waits at the bottom.
Each player brings a signature card, and the deck grows from your three players’ cards plus the league playbook. A Kobold brings fire, a Lich brings the Plague and an Ogre brings an appetite. Your three players share one pool of HP, and it carries over from fight to fight.
One sport per brawl
Every fight is played under one sport’s rules, such as baseball, football, hockey, basketball, golf, bowling, jousting, curling or boxing. The fight keeps score, and cards score by type and how hard they hit. A momentum bar swings with the score: get far ahead and the crowd lifts your hits; fall far behind and you hit comeback mode and draw an extra card each turn. Win the fight and the game for a sports win, which pays bonus gold and a pick from the highlight reel.
The descent
Between fights, the act map branches through brawls, elites, rivalry games, locker rooms, the Pro Shop, treasure and d20 events. The run saves after every room, so you can close the tab and pick it up later. There’s also a Bestiary of every card, enemy, trophy and tonic, and a Records page that keeps each run’s season.