Diablo

The Good
Just about everything.

The Bad
The only thing I came across that I didn't like was that character names are too short - I couldn't be as expressive as I would have liked.

The Bottom Line
A favorite recipe, executed almost to perfection.

Having read most of the other reviews, I have to say I agree with almost everything they have to say, both good and bad. It's both addictive and repetitive. So? As long as one gets pleasure from repeating the same basic actions, what's the problem? When you no longer get pleasure, then you stop.

The basic game concept certainly isn't original. The town on top, dungeon below arrangement isn't original. Getting quests from those you come across isn't original. Even the online component isn't original - the 'Avatar' and 'Moria' graphical dungeon games on the old Control Data PLATO system drew dozens of people from across the country every night in the early 80's (Robert Woodhead and Andrew Greenberg saw them while in college and created a single-player microcomputer version called 'Wizardry').

But again, so what? The proper question isn't 'Is it original?' - after all, original concepts aren't all that common - but 'Is it enjoyable?'. And in this case the answer is 'YES!'

The Good
Diablo is, in and of itself, an okay game.

The graphics are pretty nice. The town feels morbid and hopeless, which annoys me, but then again, so does the rest of the game; still, the town graphics work well, for what they are. The dungeon graphics are very nice and the random dungeons fit together well.

Enemies come in many different varieties, but you really won't notice until half way through; until then, the whole game is a cakewalk. Go down to a level, smash monsters to bits, sell loot. Perhaps it's just because I've played games like this for a long time, but I didn't even drink a health potion until halfway through. As I was saying, enemies, once you need to notice, have different resistances as you get lower. Fire for cold bad guys, cold for burning bad guys.

Items have very nice graphics and the inventory system is excellent. I think the whole item system is just about the highest point in the game. There are item 'prefixes' and 'suffixes'; imagine getting a "Burning Plate Mail of Fire Resistance." The possibilities are many. This might not seem too neat, but Diablo was the first commercial game to use the prefix/suffix system.

That's basically it. You can waste days of your life on this game (playing games is a waste of time in general, albiet a fun one, I know; my point is, looking back, you won't understand why you wasted this time). Once you're done, you can play as a different class, or online.

The Bad
Okay, minor gripes first.

For one thing, the whole game atmosphere is dark, oppresive, and hopeless. This annoys the hellfire out of me. Not only that, but in the sequel you find out that all you did by winning the game was doom the world even more. Just great-- I really want to finish now.

The game is also pretty unbalanced. Sorcerers can happily blast away with spells and Fighters can use all sorts of weapons and armor, but poor, hapless Rogues are stuck halfway inbetween, wondering what in the world they shoul do. The only good reason to play them is because they are the only class that looks good no matter what they're wearing...

Now the major problem.

Diablo stole all these ideas from roguelikes. The idea of a town above a big dungeon filled with monsters. The idea of random dungeon generation. Even the word of recall scrolls and the prefix/suffix system was grabbed! Nothing in this game is original, and yet absolutely no credit whatsoever is given to the brilliant masterminds who developed the roguelikes. I'm saying 'roguelikes' here, but it's mainly Angband that these ideas are taken from. Go ahead and play the game. It's the exact same darn thing.

Another major gripe is that the game is really darn short. You can finish it in a day of full playing if you don't spend time clearing everything out of levels anyways. Playing online ads to the fun, but not much-- teamplay just dosen't work in Diablo, because there is no teamplay element. Get some heroes, get some evil corrupting malicious essenses of utter destruction and primal gore, and toss them in a big, dark dungeon. That's it.

The Bottom Line
You may have noticed that this review is very down on the game, although I said it was an okay game in itself. That's because it is an okay game, but only because it stole ideas. It's a 2.5/5.

I actually do recommend buying the game at the price it is at right now. If you add on the Hellfire expansion, you've got 3 new classes and about a day more of play time. The game does have its high points. But all the acclaim it got for being a breakthrough, brilliant game should have gone to Angband-- a free game that started decades ago, and hardly anyone knows about it.

The Good
Set up for some hack and slash, this game offers some real balance. The end enemies don't have outrageous HPs, and the stores actually offer decent weapons and armor.

The graphics were acceptable (640x480) for the era of game, and the price is right nowadays (I keep seeing it for $10 and less). There was a good story line for a hack and slash game, though you didn't need it to keep playing. The atmosphere was pretty good, too.

The Bad
It was pretty much down to hack and slash. There really wasn't any other aspect of the game (not a bad thing if it's what you like). Better PCs can't take advantage of any special graphics or enhancements.

The interface was not the easiest I've ever seen, but it worked. If you've played Diablo 2, you'll find this interface very limited.

The Bottom Line
A classic game that if you can find on the store shelves, you won't be sorry you bought. You might be sorry about the amount of time you wasted, but ... :)