This week on CORE, the hosts are feeling the heat with only 42 days left until Nerdtacular 2026! Scott, Beau, and Jon dive deep into a massive week of gaming news, starting with the official launch of the Diablo IV: Lord of Hatred expansion. We break down the new classes and whether the Horadric Cube lives up to the name. How stoked are we for the Black Flag remake? Very. We also look ahead at a packed May release schedule, featuring heavy hitters like 007 First Light, Forza Horizon 6, and the Switch 2's Yoshi and the Mysterious Book. Plus, we discuss the technical wizardry of Vampire Crawlers, the mysterious ""30-day check-in"" from Sony, and the strange allure of Shapez 2’s new Manufacture Mode. From Resident Evil movie teasers to the ergonomics of the new Steam Controller, it’s a full show.

Games we played!

Scott

• Diablo IV: Lord of Hatred

• Vampire Crawlers

• Resident Evil 9

• Shapez 2

• Crimson Desert

• Avowed

• Windrose

Jon

• Diablo IV: Lord of Hatred

• Vampire Crawlers

• Dead as Disco (demo)

• Mouse: P.I. for Hire

• Halo: Combat Evolved

Beau

• Vampire Crawlers

• The 3

• Boomerang Fu

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The Big Stuff:

- Nerdtacular All-Stars trivia team, all three hosts ended up on the same team with Scott's sister Wendy

- Team name brainstorming (Cerebral Cortex, Obsessive Core Pulsive, Psycore Logical Corefare, etc.)

- Trivia seeding test results and strategy

- 500 episode milestone / mugs still available

- Patreon/Core.show support plug

Games Discussed:

- Diablo IV's new expansion (record-breaking second expansion, early buzz positive)

- Vampire Crawlers

- Windrose

- Blacksmith Master

- Mouse: P.I. for Hire

- Lucky Tower Ultimate

- Pragmata

- The Witcher 3

- Syntopia

- Slave Spire 2

Listener Stuff

- Letter from EdOrange correcting Scott on Cockneys being from London, not Manchester, plus Dragon Warrior Monsters on Game Boy Color

Some chaos for you at the end:

- Bo sharing weird Amazon product recommendations that escalated into adult toy territory

- Ottawa sex shop / the Glebe neighborhood rabbit hole

- Tax write-off bit inspired by a Conan podcast segment about buying nerd stuff and expensing it

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We talk a bit about all this Windrose news in our feeds. But then to the deep stuff, like a visual grid of the kinds of gamers we are. Baldurs Gate 3 is getting modded with a remake of the original GB game, done by fans. Microsoft is rethinking gamepass, and saying its too expensive. Maybe they go with ads, bundles, and more? We kinda hate this. Rockstar got hacked and it was kinda lame what came out in the leak. Star Trek game PULLED from stores, and the larger story of running out of time on license deals.

Scott and Jon played more Crimson Desert and Resident Evil 9. Scott also played Kulo Niku: Bowl Up! And some WoW raiding. Beau hit more Kiwami 3, Hades 2 Dream Dives, and Absolum. He also had some time in Replaced and Slay the Spire 2. Plus your milk bag emails and more!

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No Man's Sky adds Pokémon-style Xeno Arena minigame. Split Fiction studio hits 50M games sold. Graveyard Keeper is free on Steam. Brief OW announcements note. Swear word appreciation, Warhammer 40K musical announcement, StarCraft tabletop minis preorder, Barrett/Animal Crossing crossover bit, scissoring education, game you bounced off question, memorable NPCs question, EverQuest Legends hype, Transformers Matrix of Leadership replica preorder, Marble Madness remix song search. GAMES! RE Requiem week 2 with Scott and Jon. Crimson Desert (Jon hooked, Scott sucked in). Scott on Raccoin (coin pusher meets Balatro). WoW and DQ Builders 2. Jon played Eternal Life of Goldman demo. Beau on Yakuza Kiwami 3.

VIDEO: https://youtu.be/FhDew_TgQyg

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Nintendo's surprising decision to make physical Switch 2 games more expensive than digital versions. EverQuest is relaunching in a format designed for time-strapped adults and old farts like us, Capcom is patching out some “accidentally” written incest from Street Fighter 6, Clair Obscur's devs confirm there's no canon ending, new gameplay footage dropped for both Exodus and The Expanse: Osiris Reborn. And loads more on top of that!

Scott

- Crimson Desert

- Dragon Quest Builders 2

- WoW Midnight

Jon

- Crimson Desert

Beau

- Crimson Desert

- Slay the Spire 2

- Diablo 4

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Nerdtacular 2026 tickets holding at early bird pricing, plus a swag bag-only option now available at frogpants.com.


News:

- NetEase pulls funding for Gang of Dragon — future of the game unknown

- Valve still targeting 2026 for Steam Machines despite RAM shortages; rumored to be a factor in Sony/Xbox strategy shifts

- EA lays off Battlefield staff post record-breaking launch

- Jeff Kaplan on his Blizzard exit — plus his one Overwatch regret: making it too team-focused when players want to shine individually

- Fortnite raising V-Buck prices

- Timberborn hits 1.0

- Xbox pushing "everything is an Xbox" / Project Helix, leaning into Windows 11

- Valve reports 6,000+ games made over $100k on Steam last year


Shared Play: Slay the Spire 2 — all three played it, early GOTY contender

Scott: WoW: Midnight (great time, nearly max level, campaign a little cheesy), Thysiastery (turn-based dungeon crawler, very positive on Steam).

Also: The Instance now posting Fridays at frogpants.com/instance.

Jon: Finished and 100%'d Resident Evil Requiem

Beau: Slay the Spire 2, more Star Trek Voyageur, dipped into new Diablo IV season (may have bought the Doom skin)

Feedback: Listener thinks he catches Scott being simultaneously terrified by AI and delighted by one-button AI rotations in WoW. And he is wrong about it.

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