Last week, our big brothers pokerfuse and Poker Industry PRO revealed that PokerStars is gearing up to launch a major software upgrade to its desktop clients.

Dubbed Aurora, the new game engine offer a richer experience, with higher resolution graphics, smoother animations, and new sound effects. Each of the theme tables, game types and poker variants have been tweaked giving players a whole lot new experience.

On F5 last week, we compared the old table themes with the new ones and also showed you the new animations that are used for PokerStars Spin & Go games.

Today, we will show you the new table theme that 6+ Hold’em will be having in PokerStars upcoming new game engine.

All together now: Oooooh, aaahhhhh. Sparkly!

This is actually a pretty good demo of what Aurora can do—and how PokerStars wants to use the new capabilities. High frame-rate animations are being peppered throughout these game variants. Each game will have its own identity, and for casual players you can definitely understand how this can be a draw.

In this case, whenever a player goes all in, fireworks (fitting the Chinese theme of 6+) go off with a satisfying bang. Crank up the volume and get the full effect in our short demo vid.

Poker legend Tom Dwan has joined hands with Triton Poker, known for the world’s best high stakes poker action.

Tom Dwan now joins Jason Koon to become the second player to represent Triton Poker Series as a brand ambassador. Jason joined hands with Triton back in January ahead of the Jeju series.

“I’m thrilled to be in the company of Tom Dwan as a Triton Ambassador,” said fellow brand ambassador, Jason Koon.

“When I began my journey as a poker player Tom was already crushing the biggest games in the world. When the poker action started booming in Asia Tom was one of the first to dive into the action. He’s one of the most exciting players to watch, and play against, and I can’t think of a better addition to the Triton roster,” Jason added.

Tom Dwan’s addition to the Triton team seems to be a natural choice. The American pro has been a supporter of Triton Poker since its inception back in 2015 by Malaysian businessman, Richard Yong.

He is also one of the main proponents of the Short Deck poker game along with Phil Ivey. The duo has been promoting the stripped-deck Hold’em for years when in June 2014, Tom and Phil chose to appear in an “Asia Gaming Fans” YouTube video to endorse the game.

Since then, both the players have been actively participating in Short Deck games and both of them are considered one of the best players of this format.

Dwan will be representing the brand at the upcoming Triton Poker Series in Montenegro from May 5 to 17. It is set to be the biggest series till date with 11 events, with six of them to be played as Short Deck events.

High stakes poker pro and three time WSOP bracelet winner, Antonio Esfandiari has won yet another prop bet. He took comedian Kevin Hart down in just three rounds, as part of a boxing prop bet.

The deal was struck around nine months ago with expectations that it would be an easy win for Hart—having had previous boxing experience. The amount wagered between the pair has yet to be disclosed, but CardPlayer revealed that Esfandiari will get 35:1 on his money.

Hart said on Esfandiari’s win “I wanna take the time to congratulate my guy Antonio Esfandiari on a amazing sparring match today. We went 3 3min rounds and both gave it our all. In the end you were the winner by decision. You worked hard and deserve the W champ. Good shit….I want a rematch as soon as I catch my fucking breathe again 😂😂😂😂....To all boxers WE ARE NOT FIGHTERS AND WE DON’T WANT TO BE….this was a challenge between 2 friends that had a great time and put on a hell of a show!!!! We have so much respect for this sport…You guys are amazing!!!!!! #HartvsEsfandiari #Part1 …..P.S I will post some highlight videos of both of us when it’s all edited. Shit was so dope….I’m glad we did it man!!!! Love ya.”

For those that bet agaisnt Esfandiari, he does have a habit of winning physical prop bets.

Back in 2009 Esfandiari won $1,000 off Nick Cassavetes in a pushup prop bet on High Stakes Poker.

2016 saw him get disqualified from the Pokerstars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) thanks to his dedication to a lunge prop bet between him and Bill Perkins.

Sasha Salinger returns with the weekly poker news round up.

This week is all about the potential change of venue for the World Series of Poker (WSOP) for 2020 as pressure mounts for Caesars Entertainment to clear their $18 billon dollar debt. Fear not, as even with a sale of the The Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino on the cards, the WSOP will be returning for its 2019 outing come hell or high water.

Salinger also talks us through partypoker’s crack down on bots, pennsylvania legalising sports betting for a July 15 start date and Maria Ho making the World Poker Tour Final Table.

Doug Polk returns to Joey Ingram’s Poker Life Podcast with a bang after taking some time away from the poker scene in recent months.

At over 2 hours long, Polk and Ingram leave almost no stone unturned during the podcast as they cover everything from, the GPI awards, Doug’s travel plans, weight loss, fake positive people, the future of online poker, bots, and the upcoming Phil Nagy podcast & much more.

Watch below.

Talking of Phil Nagy, the America’s Cardroom CEO went on Joey’s pod in a no holds barred conversation. Watch it below.

With all eyes on Twitch these days, PokerStars ran a Best Bluff competition as part of their 200 Billionth hand celebrations.

For everyone that voted for the best bluff, a chance to win Spin & Go tickets were up for grabs.

The 200 billionth hand celebrations at PokerStars has finally come about. And here’s the deal, PokerStars is giving away more than $2 million through a variety of promotions across all major markets available directly from the operator itself and through the most reliable affiliate poker rooms online.

For the Best Bluff competition, that sits within the snappily named “Spin & Globes” brand, fans could choose between the following bluffs from Spraggy, DramaticDegen, Gripsed and Fintan as streamed on Twitch. Voting took place exclusively on twitter.

Spraggy was crowned as the winner by fans with 45% of the votes.

Watch Bluff in the WS24-H: $1050PKO from Spraggy on www.twitch.tv

Watch Bluff in the WS24-H: $1050PKO from Spraggy on www.twitch.tv

Nowadays all major poker operators have embraced live streaming on Twitch. Its common to see brand ambassadors using Twitch to engage with their fans.

For instance, partypoker announced that it will be focusing its efforts on streaming as part of a wide, overarching strategy for 2019.

It will focus on collaboration, content creation and investment into Twitch as it works on building a global online poker audience.

Part of the strategy is the creation of Team Online which is being leveraged “to raise awareness across the Twitch platform and showcase our suites of games and offerings,” as told to Poker Industry PRO by a partypoker spokesperson.