Kicking Prime Evil ass



Genre: Hack & Slash RPG
Developed by: Blizzard
Published by: Havas Interactive

Weepy rain falling gently on the grassy knolls of the region of Tristram
welcome me to this infamous realm
where evil devoured the land
but strangely, still does
Diablo defeated, a certainty by many proclaimed
yet the emergence of a new breed of Hell-spawned demons
seems to baffle all…

Stuff like this I keep saying these days. My loved ones declare me a madman, and perhaps they're right.

Diablo 2, one of the most awaited sequels in the history of pc-gaming, is here! The original Diablo brought our ever-growing community of gamers a new breed of RPG's, a game more simplistic than hardcore RPGs (cfr. Baldurs Gate) yet o-so addictive. And now, the sequel promises the same things that made Diablo a monument, yet in a much better way…

I'm not going to tell Diablo 2's story, since it might be a spoiler to (the very few) who haven't bought this game. Suffice it to say Diablo is back, now along with his demon brothers, Baal and Mephisto. It is up to you to slay these three "Prime Evils".

You begin the game by choosing your character class. You can choose out of 5 classes, 2 more than in Diablo I. The Barbarian and Paladin are melee fighters. The Barbarian has the ability to wield 2 two-handed weapons at once, and is, physically, the strongest character. The Paladin is weaker, yet he has character-enhancing "auras" that can boost various stats of the Paladin. He is also best at killing undead monsters, who are many in numbers in Diablo II. The Amazon excels at archery, but also has adequate melee abilities. Her skills mostly are arrow enchantments, giving an arrow elemental power and so on. The Sorceress is the "traditional" fireball, lightning and cold spells lady and the Necromancer uses curses to negatively influence opponents and has summoning skills (skeletons, golems, etc.)
During the game, by fighting monsters, you gain experience, level up and enhance your stats and skills. Since you can distribute the gained stats and skills as you wish, you can fully customise characters. A Paladin can level up defensive auras, thus giving him strong defenses, or you can decide to enhance offensive auras or combat skills, making him more effective in combat. Since this "distribution" is final and irreversible, you'll always end up with a unique character. This is something that makes character development in Diablo II very interesting.

Diablo 2 is big. There are 4 acts, each of them about the size of the original Diablo, and maps are truly huge. And moreover, most of them are random! This boosts the replayability value. The "Blood Moor" (one of the first areas to explore) for instance is never the same…
Each act contains several quests, which you all must complete to progress in the game. These quests are very varied, as we could expect of a RPG, even one like Diablo. The cinematics between the acts are of prime quality, right in the category of excellence along with Final Fantasy 8 and Blade Runner.
During the game, hordes and hordes of monsters plague you on every step you take in Diablo 2's world. Although this killing (read: clicking) might seem repetitive, as in the original game, it is extremely addictive. When playing with melee characters, the Barbarian and Paladin, this job tends to be easier than when you play with for instance the Sorceress, especially in the beginning. By killing monsters you gain experience and develop your character (as explained above) and you get gold or items. The fact that sometimes you get very rare items like the "Long Sword of Burning", "Tower Shield of Amelioration" or the "Glimmering Ring of Excellence" makes the yearning to keep killing monsters even bigger.

The graphics use a "new" bitmap engine. Whoa, hold it. Wouldn't that deliver sucky graphics? Don't we remember the days when a "real" 3D engine was the ringing word whilst we spat out the term "bitmaps" with all the fumes we had in our rotting carcasses?
I can tell you, the graphics do not suck. They aren't state of the art, I admit, but they do not blow. Optional 3D acceleration offers cool lighting effects (check screenshots), improved magic effects and a unique "relative scaling" of the bitmaps giving an illusion of perspective. And also, a night-day cycle is included, delivering stunning lighting effects. Oh and by the way, the new engine allows big maps (as said before) and limits loading times to short periods (5-10 seconds) between acts only (and not between regions).
In short, although modest, Diablo 2's graphics look very decent.
Diablo II uses an automap overlay to guide you through the worlds. This automap has a feature to "fade" making it less disturbing, since it overlaps the viewscreen. I personally think this automap is great, since you can virtually click on the automap, and going there in real space, in the same viewscreen, you not having to switch to a minimap to span larger areas. The menuscreens by the way are easy to access and allow continuance of play, meaning that when a menuscreen is open, the game continues (see screenshot)

Working our way through the usual list of the "to review" checklist, the sound & music is great. The voices are very moody and natural, rural and gruesome sounds exit your speakers, and impelling music leaves you far away from the "mute" button.

Multiplayer. One of the key elements of this title. Diablo 2 offers complete campaign cooperative play on Battle.Net. The multiplayer mode of Diablo I was severely damaged by cheaters and hackers due to the relatively easy way to trick the game and the Battle.Net servers. This is now resolved: all Battle.Net multiplayer characters are now stored by the Battle.Net servers themselves, eliminating funspoilers, but, sadly this blocks out the possibility to import your singleplayer character into Battle.Net. "Open" Battle.Net and TCP/IP Lan make this possible though, so don't worry. "Open" Battle.Net is riskier, and not recommended by Blizzard.
Something new in multiplayer is the fact you can make a "hardcore" character. When you die, you're dead. End of story. Bye bye experience. These players of a heart of solid rock and a mind more set than the rocks of Gibraltar, receive a commemorate VERMELDING on Battle.Net.

So far, I can only say good things of Diablo II. Now some peculiar things surrounding the Diablo 2 experience.

Death. Each time you die, you leave your corpse, with all equipped items, weapons and armor, along with you belt contents and money. The journey to your body can be a frustrating one, but not if you wisely keep a "just-in-case" gear in your "private stash". The contents of your inventory remains too. But to positively approach this, this greatly improves suspense, and breaks the ever lasting hacking and slashing.
The resolution is pegged at 640x480. Although the engine is capable of more (much like the Tiberian Sun engine), Blizzard decided to make this call to not disadvantage players with less courant pc's in multiplayer sessions. But man, I, as a PIII/TNT2 man demand more…
The manner of saving. The game sporadically autosaves, but if you really want to save, you have to choose "Save and Exit". Fine. But this respawnes monsters. Major bummer. Great for experience and getting extra items though. But what's more weird, is that level bosses also respawn! This scrambles up the storyline bigtime.
Although I mentioned that Diablo 2 is huge I finished it for a first time in a mere 1 week of intensive gaming. Is it me? When the game finishes, you can start all over again, but then at higher difficulty level. Same story, same people (randomised maps though) BUT also same character…So you can keep developing your character. AND you can "stay" in normal difficulty, if you should find the monsters in the new difficulty too hard. This was needed, since I ended at level 27, and some spells are not available until level 30. This peculiar design feature boasts replayability greatly, giving the player extra motivation to go on, but sucks out the life of the storyline.
Battle.Net is slooow. The huge attention Diablo 2 receives kills the servers, as too many players log in. Hopefully, Blizzard can expand Battle.Net, making the Diablo 2 Battle.Net experience a wonderful taste of what's to become of a new breed of RPG's like Neverwinter Nights.

EP sez:

Not all has been said about his game, but this is one of these games you have to play. An explanation of Diablo 2 means nothing, you have to play it, and see for yourself. The minor flaws melt like snow in the sun because of the well-known gameplay and addictiviness. The storyline, scrambled as it is, is very intriguing, the brilliant cinematics take care of that. All aspects of Diablo are included and enhanced, as promised. The magic that made Diablo great, remains.
I'm happy. As for me, mission accomplished, ladies and gentlemen of Blizzard.

May the Light protect us
whilst it still reaches our mortal souls…

Pros and Cons

+ Dangerously addictive: kills (the remains of a perhaps never existed) social life
+ Smooth gameplay
+ Character development & diversity
- Good yet slow Battle.Net multiplayer
- Minor peculiarities

(c)2000 Erwin's Pages
Erwin "Reaper" Husin

Score

Gameplay: 9,5
Graphics: 8
Sound & Music: 9
Addictiviness: 10

Overall: 91,5 %

Links

> Blizzard