Diablo

The Good
There is no doubt that when Diablo came out in 1996, that it was destined to be one of the top video-internet games ever. Strangely enough, though, I feel what most have said to be it's biggest downfall, that of hacks, cheats, and dupes, are one of the things that makes the game even more interesting from a sociological standpoint. With chatting available while playing or in a chat room provided by Battlenet, one can taunt, challenge, or trick an opponent into going on a dungeon crawl. The number of different and unusual people I met, while being enhanced by the gameplay, was to numerous to mention. Pk's or player killers, were perhaps the most interesting ... as I often found new ways to torture these little devils without the use of hacks by simply utilizing plain old fashioned guile. The monsters are good, but the people involved made the game a creative bonanza. Also, being a health nut, I never once had high blood pressure in my life ... until the pk's and bounty hunters were on my heels. Praise goes to those who created Diablo with such an open ended strategy ... though it might not have been intended! By the way, the shrines comments of wisdom and the vast array of fantastic and slightly spooky equipment and maps, didn't hurt.

The Bad
Ummm well, in town was kinda drab and eventually boring with the same old NPCs around. It would have been nice to have more character types like in AD&D games as well as, say, 2 or 4 more people capable of playing in the game.

The Bottom Line
Diablo is a haunting, (accidently?) open-ended, dungeon crawl you can play online with friends. But watch out for the occasional Player Killer (PK) who might ruin your game by destroying you with hacked characters. Otherwise, the graphics interlaced with conversation (you can type messages to those in the Diablo game) can help you and your team conquer the numerous quests and mysteries of the Diablo world.

The Good
When you won't care of being beheaded, won't fear of raging horde of skeletons. When you're okay with being alone in the dark, surounded by the glowing eyes of memories. When you're sure you'll become what you kill, and feel no regret, then you can enter this realm of undead. It's time for you to reveal your dark side to youreself, or let be killed instead.

Now, I agreed to these terms, and came out in one piece, victorious. But I only got acquainted with dark side of my victory. I became everything I used to hate, everything I used to fight; slice and dice without mercy. I became diablo. A creature without emotions, the one to hate the light, and fear the goodness. I knew nothing but what the crystal told me. I changed. I changed a lot. I was unrecognizable to everyone, but to my minions. Aaah, am I gonna be a bad guy now, waiting for someone like me to come and release me this fate, hoping to destroy the crystal mistake I made. Noo..., my thoughts can serve me still, but my power is way out of my control. I fear something horrible will happen, I can feel it, but I'm hopeless to help, 'cuz I'll be doing these fatal menaces.

My minions are obeying me, and my power serves me well now, but my thoughts have been released, and new ones came. The dark visions crystal implanted in me. I'm beginning to like them, to worship them. They're growing a part of me, and I let them enter. I'll rule upon this kingdom, and crush whoever oppose me. Only one thing can stop me from doing that - Blizzard. Their only hope is to release "Diablo II" before time, and save theirselves from the hand of fate.

So much of a story telling, but that's how it all was, is, and will be if you start this game up. First to mention the music. The village theme is such a nice and lovely gitare tune that I don't believe it could be made better then it already is. When you enter the dungeons, you won't pay much attention to music anymore, 'cuz if you do, hack you'll be dead before you know it. Characters are very well made as well as other creatures, and voice talent is really great, at least for the time being, but let's make it real - you can't improve voice talent, games you can, but not the people :)

Game controls are great and easy to use. You have two potions all the time, red one (for the health and energy) and blue one (for your mana) as it usually always is, with more or less the same colors. Only way back to the village/small town is through the church where all the demonish things started to happen, or using teleports like gates into the city and back. This game made the well impression and I hardly believe that Diablo II will get more points. Blizzard also made "Diablo: Hellfire", add on for this game, where you start in the same town, only another passage is discovered, and you get one more extra character to choose. As much as I prefer "Revenant" or "Nox", this is the first game that used good engine and show us fast performance wandering through the 3d mazes, and will always be a part of classics, at least in couple of decades if you think it's still rather fresh now.

The Bad
Only places in this game are the town where you do the communications and shopping, and belove the church dungeons and crypts where the main fight is. Walls in the game changes after every 5th or 6th level, and there's about 15 in total, and that's about it. It's okay that you after each 5th level get new way into town, so you can directly approach to that level from up the town.

Aaaaaaah!!!! They made such a huge mistake not giving us the option to save our position more than once. I came about level or two before the endgame, and since I was close to stairs, and running from bunch of creatures, whenever I got down, I couldn't get to swing my sword, and since my position was saved, my only way to finish the game was from the bottom of the start, so I did the only reasonable thing - uninstaled it. Thery really shoud've done more saving positions than one... sigh

The Bottom Line
RPG classic that will show you the dark side of your mind. Everything is great, from atmosphere up to gameplay and controls. Graphic, audio, music, everything's great, except one thing - you don't get to save more than once. That thing really sucks! I can only hope they'll consider (or already did) that option in the sequel.

The Good
You can never be totally objective when it comes to rating a game, book, movie, whatever you can think of… there is always that subjective notion of whether you liked something or not. And let’s face it – tastes differ in oh so many ways. Which is quite alright, different tastes bring different demands, which results in diversity rather then boredom. But when I was reading various reviews of Diablo written by different people I found that some people who didn’t like Diablo unfoundedly criticized the game, but also (which hit me even more) other people who really liked it praised the game to high heavens also unfoundedly. Tastes differ, opinions differ, which I said – is quite alright (I for one am not the most objective person in the world), but still I was compelled to write this review to set some things right, and to try to correct some misleading about it. And in a way, I think this is my way of personal reaction to all those people who tried a game (not just Diablo, any other game in generally) for a little time - didn’t like it and stopped playing or liked it but played it a very small amount of time – and then went on writing a review thinking they understand it enough. For that kind of gamers – I dedicate my review.

What could be said about Diablo that hasn’t already been said a thousand times? As everyone - except the people who lived in a cave for last ten years - knows it is action based hack’n’slash RPG. And from today’s point of view it is a classic game, almost cult game in many things it did and changed at that time, revered by many and hated by some. As it always is with this kind of games.

The game has a classic, if not unoriginal, fantasy story which includes mythical land Khanduras, precisely small village of Tristram where action takes place and it all revolves around maddened king Leoric, his missing son, treacherous archbishop Lazarus and of course the lord of terror himself – Diablo. This is a story in a nutshell, and as it is it reminds to any other RPG there is. But Blizzard took a great length to produce a deeper, background story for those players who want to know more. This tale deals with the Great conflict, or war between the forces of High Heavens and Burning Hells, which ultimately becomes the Sin War on earth. What is great is that this entire story is used (and preconceived) for the sequel. All the notes and information we get about for example the Horadrim order, the three prime evils (or lesser ones) even the Vizjerei sorcerers – all of that is hinted in Diablo and then effectively used in Diablo 2. So here we get to face Diablo, and then in the sequel and its expansion we meet finally the Lord of Hatred and the Lord Destruction – Mephisto and Baal. Also lesser known adversaries like Andariel or Duriel appear in the sequel. So to anyone who would say that Diablo has a lame story, I say it is much deeper then they think and it connects in such a fine way with its sequel Diablo 2 making it broader and more involving. Not very original I agree, but worthy of what the game represents. Very common misconception that I get irritated about is that Blizzard made the Diablo expansion Hellfire (but it didn’t, license was given to Sierra and it’s entirely their work which is obvious from the lack of Battlenet support), where there is no real connection to the story between Diablo and Diablo 2. Well, fact of the matter is – Hellfire is add-on which would function fine like a separate game (and a good game also) if it weren’t for the upgrades of Diablo. But story wise – it all starts from Diablo then continues in Diablo 2 and finishes in Lord of Destruction.

Let’s go on. You can choose three characters: Warrior, Rogue and Sorcerer. Everyone can presume what every “vocation” brings to the gameplay so I won’t go into details. Just to point out that playing with warrior is probably the easiest, rouge is very balanced also, and playing with sorcerer is the hardest at the beginning (you can die very quick) but as sorcerers become very powerful at high levels (30+), which especially reflects on PVP combat over Battlenet where sorcerer can kill everyone and everything very fast, I say it is worth of effort to try to play with sorcerer foremost when playing Diablo online.

The intro cut scene was amazing for that time, and I used to watch it a couple of times amazed at how good Blizzard managed to make it. Without a single spoken word, its is self-explanatory, haunting, gloomy… and that last shriek of Diablo brings chill to the bones. Well, Blizzard was always known for brilliant cut-scenes. And great games.

As I’ve said, the main setting is town of Tristram with its darkly and pestering mood, where you can meet (if I counted correctly) only seven NPC’s which isn’t as much as we would hope for, but I guess Blizzard concentrated more on the action part and less on creating a life-like world. Most important characters you will meet (or the ones whose services you will need the most) are Griswold, Adria, Pepin and of course Cain, who will reveal most of the plot for you. The town of Tristram is the ONLY place you can visit, but you will spend most of your time exploring and fighting in the dungeons below the haunted Cathedral. The game itself has sixteen levels divided into four main sections, each section being very different and meticulously designed. Positive thing is that when you finish each section, another way to town opens up, so you don’t have to rely on town portal spells so much (and its easier to go back when you die in a multiplayer game)

The action part is simply flawless. When you go down in the dungeon, you are thrown straight into the action, and you can manage it without a problem because the game has very fast learning curve and almost everything can be done (attacking, using magic, drinking potions) with a click of the mouse. Diablo is about action, action and guess again – action; and everything is subdued to the factor of action in a positive way: easy way of playing, no complex roleplaying statistics to be mindful about (just simple four character attributes here), and the interface… The interface is so simple and at the same time effective (8 potion slots, all spells are one click away) that many other games shamelessly copied this in the years after. The greatest criticism pointed out towards Diablo could be – there is no real roleplaying. Diablo is not hardcore RPG (nor does it pretend to), so don’t compare it to the likes. Diablo is a simple hack’n’slash, and great at it and that’s all.

Another great thing Blizzard programmers implemented are random dungeons. So every time you start new game, the dungeons and monsters in them get randomly reorganized so you’ll never know what lurks behind the wall. But not only dungeons – some quest are also randomized to increase the uncertainty and replayability of the game; sure those important ones always stay in (like Griswold’s edge or Lazarus) but lots of other smaller ones may or may not appear. What was great for me – all weapons, armors, helmets, shields, rings and amulets have randomly calculated characteristics (if they are magical of course), which is great and gives indefinite numbers of possible combinations. Naturally, there is also quite a number of unique items which can be found a lot harder (based on quality level and monster level calculations), but some of them are certainly worth of it.

Magic… spells are standard and common to most every RPG there is, but they work perfect nonetheless. From the simple charged bolt or town portal spell to the feared fireball and extremely helpful golem and stone curse spell - all spells are very well balanced especially for online playing, and graphically very beautiful to look at. Well, design of almost everything in the game shows great effort and imagination of Blizzard programmers. The graphics (considering the year 1997) was groundbreaking at that time, and Diablo, although outdated, even today looks good. Sound and music also meet the high demands – voice casting is very good, and sounds of monster are very life-like; while music is masterpiece in its own way: town theme is beautifully haunting and disturbing at the same time, and more ominous scores featured in the dungeons are also captivating. AI – although virtually non-existent for today’s standards, still offered great diversity of monsters and behaviors (we all hated those vanishing advocates or long distance running succubus) that the final effect was “wow this is great”. Technically, it was a superior game in every sense.

Gameplay is very addictive, and when you start to play it you get hooked on it very fast. I’ve heard people say it is too easy, well true, the game is easy when you play it in single player because you only have normal mode of playing, but it gets very, very challenging in multiplayer where you also have nightmare and, especially, hell difficulty. And the truth is that Diablo has so called limited replayability (as does any other game I guess); you will cross it once, maybe two or three times more and of course it gets bored then, especially if you continue to play with the same character that becomes god-like on high levels. But here is the wrong angle to the whole approach: most people think of it only in terms of a singleplayer game, while I look at it mostly as a multiplayer game. Only does the greatness and addictive gameplay of Diablo truly shine when you are playing it over Battlenet.

I have a lot of experience about that since I have played Diablo about a year and a half over Battlenet (and I’ve also crossed the singleplayer game several times with all characters) and I can say it is remarkable experience. I was in a diablo clan for a long time, formed a lot of friendships, and generally had a lot of fun. In multiplayer you can play together, enter duels, finding rare stuffs (like Royal Circlet or King Sword of haste) or simply hang around. And this is what has made Diablo such a great game – its community. Three weeks after Battlenet was operational and working – about 117000 game accounts were made. And that number says it all. There just isn’t any comparable feeling like when you are a warrior fighting in hell backed up by rogue’s bow, and by sorcerer’s healing while he is stone cursing your enemies. Teamplay has its brilliant moments and for co-op playing Diablo was really a revolution at that time. And I really must agree – the multiplayer had its dark sides but I will explain that when we (finally) proceed to the bad sides.

The Bad
Something most apparently bad about Diablo that everyone notices is that it is downright linear game. In every sense of the word. So you enter first dungeon and you go down level by level, solving some quests along the way, until you finally finish the game. Straight and narrow, no side stuff and that’s it. But as I’ve noticed that people like to compare Diablo to Nox and Revenant (truth to be told both games got out significantly later), I will do the same since I’ve finish them both: they are just as linear as Diablo – more contents, more quests true – but linear nonetheless, you go from point A to point B. And that’s OK since when you play it online, linearity looses its meaning.

For me the biggest problem in Diablo is that it is too short: if you play it constantly you can finish the game within two days without a problem. But again, playing it over Battlenet (as it was intended to), makes that fact also loose some weight. I always thought the Blizzard should have added more content into it (only one town to play in), but after I’ve played Diablo 2, where gamers wishes were fulfilled and the game is about four times bigger than its predecessor; I’m not to sure… Diablo 2 has lost some of the coherence that original Diablo possessed, but still it would be nice to see more larger surroundings.

I would hardly agree with claims that Diablo is a one-pass only game. Far from it. It was actually one of the first games (I’m not 100% sure about this so correct me if I’m wrong) that offered fully functional MODs for the game. MODs are something gaining popularity in recent years (almost every “important” title has one), but back then it was something very rare. And there were some great MODs (like middle earth mod for Diablo) where everything from statistics to weapons, armors and monsters in the game was changed, adding new spice and longevity to the game. Not to mention playing over Battlenet which is a world for itself.

As far as the game appearances, I must admit some of the graphics were just to dark (you often found yourself wearing light radius increasing equipment on purpose, or tempering with gamma of your monitor), and there are too many gray tones in the game. Some NPC’s are useless, as are some spells (like Flash) but these are just a minor things.

There were some great bugs not visible in singleplayer game, but rather painfully apparent in the multiplayer. Players would abuse well known bug of duping items, and there were also people who would use macro cheats for incredible strong characters or the infamous town-kill spell. PK-ing is certainly a problem of almost every online game. All of that would certainly take a lot of fun from the online gaming but the game still survived. If you had friends whom you trusted, you could play in a closed session (protected by password) and still enjoy the game. And from my experience there were a lot of player who were “pure” (didn’t cheat whatsoever), who were actually fighting PK’s and makro users, and that polarization made people bind even more. Biggest problem for me was that only four players can play at the same time, but then again it was the beginning of Battlenet and looking at it today, I’m glad it now grew to encompass such enormous worlds like in the World of Warcraft. Speaking of that, I’ve heard that some people say Diablo cannot be compared to the experience of some other online RPG’s like Everquest or Asheron’s Call. That’s true – it cannot. Firstly it’s not a MMORPG, and secondly, the Battlenet for Diablo is entirely free unlike the previous mentioned, the only cost you have to pay is dictated by your internet provider.

One of the most obvious problems that could be found both in single and multiplayer game was character building. Sadly, for some people, it all came down to building your character’s statistics, getting the best items, pursuing all your spells to magic level 15… I think about that more and more recently and it’s not just Diablo; powergaming has become a serious problem in almost every online game there is, and I’ve played a few by now to see. Such is the way of human competitiveness I guess… but still this is nothing that can diminish the qualities of a good game.

Granted, Diablo took some elements from previous roleplays like Rogue or much acclaimed Nethack. Originality as I’ve already pointed out is something that Diablo lacks, but then again evolution in the right direction can sometimes cause revolution like Diablo surely has done.

I could probably write like a dozen pages or more about Diablo, but that would be torture not a review so I’ll cut it short. I already went overboard with the length, so I tank all readers for patience. In the end I can only say that I have tried to be objective as much as I could, but it’s hard to be objective with something that you like, and if I’ve failed utterly – then at least some comfort would be if the people manage to read this review and just think about it. For me – that is success also.

If you ask me what is the greatest RPG of all time - without a second thought I would say Daggerfall. This game offered such an unbelievable freedom and the scope of the game combined with complex roleplaying that by far deserves that title for me. But if you ask me what RPG I’ve played the most – than the answer would be only one – Diablo. And there you have it.

The Bottom Line
As tastes differ – you can like this game or not. The choice is yours. But none can deny the fact that Blizzard made a small revolution by reinventing by that time very hermetic roleplaying genre, and presenting it to the masses. Diablo offered addictive gameplay, great action, innovative technical solutions (fantastic graphics and user friendly interface) but most important of all – made extremely positive push forward in the field of online gaming (it became one of the most played online games ever). Although not a perfect game (what is anyway?), Diablo became a legend among many players, and this is no small accomplishment. And for that –hats down for Blizzard.