Diablo II: Resurrected

Diablo II: Resurrected

Its happening guys, FINALLY! (if you are a Blizzard/Diablo fan, you know what those CAPS mean)

*i.imgur.com/TdugguW.png

Evil Has Survived
Diablo II: Resurrected breathes new life into Blizzard Entertainment’s acclaimed ARPG and its expansion, Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, from beginning to end. Return to fight for Sanctuary and discover the fate of the mysterious Dark Wanderer rebuilt in all-new 3D graphics, brand-new cinematics, remastered audio… and the same classic Diablo II gameplay you remember.

What's in the remaster:

Resurrected Graphics - UHD 4K and refresh rates like 144Hz
Re-recorded and remastered 7.1 surround sound
Cross-platform progression
Shared stash with increased space (no more mules required to transfer gear)
Revamped worldwide ladder seasons (no more regional ladders I guess)

You can flip back and forth to the old graphics at will, and underneath its new 3D engine it still runs on the the old game's code. (That means the beloved community exploits, AI, pathing etc. may continue to work but try at your own risk)

Returning to Hell on PC / Switch / PS5 | PS4 / Xbox Series X|S in 2021!

Few Pre-Alpha Screenshots

Hero Selection

*i.imgur.com/hlnDZHh.jpg

Act 2 (Hero Selection)

*i.imgur.com/EvaOe98.jpg

Burial Grounds

*i.imgur.com/sgjPBV1.jpg

Tyrael

*i.imgur.com/bGKaayp.jpg

Main Screen (Hero Selection)

*i.imgur.com/Nqjbe12.jpg

Cube with Inventory

*i.imgur.com/DIZVUKJ.jpg

Tristram!

*i.imgur.com/3k5g2Yc.jpg

Act 1 (Hero Selection)

*i.imgur.com/gtYV5Ra.jpg

The Cathedral

*i.imgur.com/4scGHdQ.jpg

Mr. "Stay Awhile and Listen"

*i.imgur.com/TkFiolF.jpg

Duriel Fight

*i.imgur.com/1m6pJ1X.jpg

Andariel <3

*i.imgur.com/mnSPLJD.jpg

Smith

*i.imgur.com/gQ0Evqo.jpg

Official site - Diablo® II: Resurrected
Pre-purchase here - *us.shop.battle.net/en-us/product/diablo_ii_resurrected
Tech Alpha Opt-in here.

The Prime Evil Collection (D2+D3 complete) includes the Mephisto pet, fearsome wings, Hatred’s Grasp, for Diablo III as exclusives.

*i.imgur.com/Q1LUzpq.png

Oh man. About freaking time.

oh shit this looks good. Do we have local/online co-op in this?

TheSloth said:
oh shit this looks good. Do we have local/online co-op in this?

It won't be Diablo without it.

Oh sweet! Must get this then!

Desmond David said:
Wow. Those are a lot of charms. I have Diablo 2 and LoD in my Battle dot net library. I used to play PvE but haven't done in a long time.

We all should team up and play once D2:R arrives with new characters.
I believe there won't be a possibility of using the existing D2 characters because in D2 we have more number of realms (regions), uses old Bnet 1.0, no account-license linking concept etc. D2:R will be on current Bnet platform so the max it would have is 3 regions or none at all. So, we will have to start things from scratch most likely.

Does India still come under Americas region in Battle dot net?

Desmond David said:
Does India still come under Americas region in Battle dot net?

Yeah, that hasn't changed as far as I remember.

Diablo 2: Resurrected Deep Dive Panel

They are back!

*i.imgur.com/TANXgI8.png *i.imgur.com/yQ2gaxu.png *i.imgur.com/9eVBboj.png *i.imgur.com/MrKcKVr.png *i.imgur.com/eaF1rx4.png *i.imgur.com/rK1kSsY.png *i.imgur.com/Gu1p13K.png

OP updated with in-game high res screenshots.

necromancer looks lit.. cant wait to play this game again

Graphics look good. Looks like the backgrounds are 2d, just that the 3d models are overlayed on it.

007 said:
They are back!

*i.imgur.com/TANXgI8.png *i.imgur.com/yQ2gaxu.png *i.imgur.com/9eVBboj.png *i.imgur.com/MrKcKVr.png *i.imgur.com/eaF1rx4.png *i.imgur.com/rK1kSsY.png *i.imgur.com/Gu1p13K.png

Holy shit...now this is awesome.

007 said:
Diablo 2: Resurrected Deep Dive Panel

For those who want the TL;DR of this video:

Great attention to detail was given in remodeling all of the 2D assets to 3D. A kind of archaeological expedition of an old video game literally happened every single day in finding old artworks, concept art, references, documentation left by Blizzard North (original developers of D2). For example, something like a few white pixels in a particular room in D2 was actually a bunch of garlic hanging intended by the original creators but limited due to technology at those times. Current developers were able to understand that vision by cross referencing with other artwork and designed the art in D2:R accordingly.
No character expiration in D2:R unlike D2 which is 90 days of inactivity.
No regions or realms in D2:R - one global region to connect all players!
Offline play is available after authenticating your game copy as legit.
Ladder resets are going to be more frequent. Currently D2 does a ladder reset every 6 months which is long.
Ladder history will be retained, something like, you will know your character was at level 91 at the end of season 1/ladder 1.
There is a personal stash and shared stash (among characters).
Expanding a PC-first game (meant to be played with KB/M) to consoles and controller support was very challenging. Mouse click targeted skills like Teleport, Sorcerer's Telekinesis, Necro's Iron Golem etc. are implemented slightly different in console versions now.
They didn't delve much into the security aspects of online play such as - botting/duping/maphacks etc. when asked. They will leverage the capabilities of latest Bnet features for security it seems.
You will hear experience new environmental background effects like rain, forest tree sounds etc. but all of the original core sound effects are left intact.
Auto-gold pick is a feature you can toggle on/off. This is mainly implemented to keep up with current gen games as well as console players.
Each unique item is remastered and it will also reflect on the character appearance in detail when worn!
The core of the game, items, balances etc. are left untouched to be true to the original. You can even create a non-expansion character without LoD stuff if you are a true loyalist to the original classic.

(just listed what I could remember after the video, pardon any mistakes)

007 said:
Offline play is available after authenticating your game copy as legit.

Looks like I made a good decision to buy the game then.

007 said:
There is a personal stash and shared stash (among characters).

Then how did players transfer items between characters before?

007 said:
Auto-gold pick is a feature you can toggle on/off. This is mainly implemented to keep up with current gen games as well as console players.

This is a good thing IMO. Picking up scraps of gold is really annoying. I used to just leave them sometimes.

I hope they retain the same OST as well but provide remastered version of it.

Edit:

This is my favourite soundtrack:

It makes really good use of drums with Indian raga.

Desmond David said:
Then how did players transfer items between characters before?

Lots of weird / non-guaranteed stuff we currently do to transfer items.

Seek help of a friend to come online and join your game, trade it to him. Go out of game, come back with your desired character and take it back from him. This is the most safest way to do it right now assuming he is your known friend and doesn't run away with it. Believe me people have done the worst to me on some rare drops.
Create a game with password, so only you know the password to join. Now wait in the game for few minutes so that it becomes "perm" which means - even after all the characters leave the game, the game resides in the Blizzard servers for some X seconds without getting deleted instantly. Now drop the items on the town floor. Exit immediately and without losing much seconds, bring your other character inside the pass-protected game and pick the items up. The risk here - you need to be quick AF, internet stable, IP should not get temporary blacklisting for switching between characters quickly (yes this is a online protection feature and happens quite often, even today it happened to me) and hopefully you made the game perm before exiting. If any of the above happens, when you come back with other character and enter game_name/pass, you will see the worst "Game does not exist" and your dropped items are lost forever. Happened many times for me.
Use a secondary set of D2 license keys. Install D2 with those keys on another PC/laptop/VM and run a second instance of D2 in parallel. Create an alternate account, create characters and bring your own secondary character to the main game to trade items safely.
You will find a lot of games online by the name "Mule-01, Mule Parking, Muling, Park Mule" etc. These are basically some guy going AFK and leaving his character in a public game idle for a long time. People randomly join, go to some unique location in any part of the D2 world, drop their items. Come back in with desired character and pick up from that location. The risk here is - we don't know for sure if the guy is really idling or he is monitoring who all are joining (though he may look idle in town) and asking his associate to follow you up and steal your items when you drop and leave the scene..or he may just leave the game and if you are not fast enough, the game may get deleted from the server along with your loot.

Interesting?

All these nasty methods are now irrelevant thanks to shared stash.

Never played online so I've never had to do this

I have played a lot of single player PvE though.

Diablo Q&A Panel (D2:R, D4, Immortal)

D2:R Takeaway:

All 27 minutes of original D2 cinematics have been remade shot by shot and it has come out really well.
There is no cross-play across platforms at this point, only cross-progression.
There is no couch co-op (aka split screen co-op)
Players will still collide with each other in the Maggot Lair (no changes)
D2:R will be based on the current live 1.14 version of D2
Trading will be the same with extra features like linking the item in chat, compare stats etc. (similar to D3)
No new runewords will be introduced at this point.

aww man! I was expecting local co-op!

007 said:
All 27 minutes of original D2 cinematics have been remade shot by shot and it has come out really well.

The cinematics are missing from the Battle dot net version of the game. I am glad they will be bringing it back.

007 said:
There is no cross-play across platforms at this point, only cross-progression.

No one every cross plays with PC because hacks.

007 said:
Players will still collide with each other in the Maggot Lair (no changes)

That will be annoying, the paths are already very narrow, plus the lighting beetles could kill the whole team.

TheSloth said:
aww man! I was expecting local co-op!

I doubt they will add it because of global item management.

Seeing this makes me want Larian to make a divine divinity remaster..

Larian is currently busy with Baldur's gate 3 IIRC.

5 Minutes of New Gameplay Footage

007 said:
5 Minutes of New Gameplay Footage

The attention to detail in great. You can hear the sound of the chainmail armor as the character moves.

Played a bit of Diablo II back in the day but we have way too many remasters these days.

Sent via Tapatalk

Good thing IMO. It keeps classic games relevant

*me.ign.com/en/pc/182379/news/diabl...-let-you-import-original-diablo-ii-save-files

If anyone wants to try it out - Diablo 2: Resurrected singleplayer test runs this weekend

Desmond David said:
If anyone wants to try it out - Diablo 2: Resurrected singleplayer test runs this weekend

I think not everyone will get the invite. Random selection from the people who opted.

If you register, at least you will have a chance to get an invite.

thetechfreak said:
Played a bit of Diablo II back in the day but we have way too many remasters these days.

Sent via Tapatalk

Same, played for few weeks then left Don't know how good is this version.

Sent from my RMX2185 using Tapatalk

thetechfreak said:
Played a bit of Diablo II back in the day but we have way too many remasters these days.

Sent via Tapatalk

Remasters are a good thing IMO. It makes sure that old games remain relevant. And classic games like Diablo deserve remasters.

Desmond David said:
If you register, at least you will have a chance to get an invite.

Welp, I didn't get one atleast.

The Dark Lord giveth, and the Dark Lord taketh away.
The Diablo II: Resurrected Technical Alpha is now closed. But the Dark Wanderer shall rise again, mightier than ever.
See you soon, mortals.

In case anyone got a chance to play, post your feedback.

I doubt anybody here got in. They gave out a very limited number of invites.

Get ready for resurrection on September 23rd!

Holy shit get hyp peeps.

https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/comments/p26wsc

Welp. No LAN multiplayer it seems.

Desmond said:
https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/comments/p26wsc

Welp. No LAN multiplayer it seems.

Is LAN play a thing these days? The last time I played something over LAN was during early 2000s - CS:CZ, CS:Source and Quake 3.

Act 1, 2 Cinematics Reveal:

Side-by-side comparison with original D2:

007 said:
Is LAN play a thing these days? The last time I played something over LAN was during early 2000s - CS:CZ, CS:Source and Quake 3.

Yeah, but the point is that they removed it after promising to add it. Besides they never really elaborated on what sort of security issues they are trying to avoid. It's most likely they just want to do this to avoid piracy or to lock people into their servers. I hope they don't axe single player mode though.

007 said:
Act 1, 2 Cinematics Reveal:

Side-by-side comparison with original D2:

Wow. The graphics are impressive but I think the voice acting needs to be improved.

Desmond said:
Yeah, but the point is that they removed it after promising to add it. Besides they never really elaborated on what sort of security issues they are trying to avoid. It's most likely they just want to do this to avoid piracy or to lock people into their servers. I hope they don't axe single player mode though.

Yeah, the remaster will obviously share the same Battle.net platform/DRM as other Blizzard games so to allow local LAN play might have been challenging. I'm curious to know how the SP game session/saves are going to be handled. D3 has an always-online requirement for solo play.

Diablo 3 technically does not run on your machine, even the single player mode is a multiplayer mode since your game session is active on the server so you cannot really play single player offline.

Diablo 2 however plays like any standard single player game, you can play alone offline or offline multiplayer over LAN. You only need Battle.net to play on the internet.

007 said:
I'm curious to know how the SP game session/saves are going to be handled.

I am guessing there will be some sort of syncing mechanism implemented with a limited number of character slots.

Watch any D2:R Twitch stream with drops enabled for 2.5 hours and get early access to open beta:

*scontent.fybz2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/236507391_10158157451076641_574746734052468492_n.jpg?_nc_cat=1&ccb=1-4&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=OrJSC22RQu0AX-RaykS&_nc_ht=scontent.fybz2-1.fna&oh=c00c965986a38370243312888f918beb&oe=613CDB29
*scontent.fybz2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/236426038_10158157451031641_2184971957778621161_n.jpg?_nc_cat=1&ccb=1-4&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=C3Vb3qvksvsAX9yjQwc&_nc_ht=scontent.fybz2-1.fna&oh=143bd53b3aef925c627f6baeb5cc5c80&oe=613D3EA7

Beta is live.

Got the beta access. :thumbs:

Downloading now..

*i.imgur.com/Q4XqLXb.png

It shows 3 regions - Americas, Europe, Asia. So I guess D2 follows suit as other Blizzard games, progression and characters are region specific.

Oh shit congo. I forgot about the livestream and went to sleep.

007 said:
Got the beta access. Downloading now..

*i.imgur.com/Q4XqLXb.png

It shows 3 regions - Americas, Europe, Asia. So I guess D2 follows suit as other Blizzard games, progression and characters are region specific.

America's is for us like last time ?

Nerevarine said:
America's is for us like last time ?

I think so. I chose Americas and was able to play without lag. Some of my friends complained lag but it could be their internet as well.

So, is this also always online like Diablo 3?

Desmond said:
So, is this also always online like Diablo 3?

Beta test is online-only so it connects directly to Bnet (shown below) when you start the game and only allows to create online characters. But actual game will have local characters for solo play it seems.

*i.imgur.com/RmTYJeS.png

Open Beta this Weekend
Free for all to play, 5 classes available to play for the first 2 Acts, no level cap.

Open Beta is Live

*i.imgur.com/kqweWFi.jpg
*i.imgur.com/Pe0QmWC.jpg
*i.imgur.com/NCnacpH.jpg

true_lies said:
Open Beta is Live

Enjoy! Added you on Steam btw.

I noticed something weird. When I logged in a second time with the same character, the map was different. That is first time I logged in and created a character, the exit out of the Rogue encampment was to the left, then I quit and selected the same character the next day, the exit was from the top. Actually, the whole map had changed from what I had played the first time.

Is this something common when playing online? I don't know because I have never played online.

Desmond said:
I noticed something weird. When I logged in a second time with the same character, the map was different. That is first time I logged in and created a character, the exit out of the Rogue encampment was to the left, then I quit and selected the same character the next day, the exit was from the top. Actually, the whole map had changed from what I had played the first time.

Is this something common when playing online? I don't know because I have never played online.

This is normal and that is how it has always been for D2 online. Maps & monsters are randomly (to an extent) generated every time you create a new game. This is why we have maphacks for D2 which reveals the entire map and tells you the location of Uber Diablo (when doing Anni runs) and shortest route to waypoints when doing regular boss runs.

*i.imgur.com/Ic8sXn2.png

All ladder specific items/runewords can be unlocked in SP and NL mode. Good to know the door to more content on top of vanilla D2 exists! :doublethumb:

03 02 01 more day to go!

*i.imgur.com/yKiugD6.png

Pre-load is now available for the game before launch date. About 27GB in size.

Global launch schedule:

*bnetcmsus-a.akamaihd.net/cms/page_media/cl/CLMBSUNVYC4G1631911637971.jpg

Live Action Launch Trailer ft. Simu Liu

You bought?

Desmond said:
You bought?

Yep, bought last week. Took the Prime Evil collection upgrade (extra $10 on top of D2R standalone) to get the D3 cosmetics. I have all the wings given out in D3 so far, so didn't want to miss this one.

Nice. I'll probably get it later if I think I will have enough time to play.

Desmond said:
Nice. I'll probably get it later if I think I will have enough time to play.

Ok. What's your BattleTag in Bnet? Will add you for now.

Next launch trailer ft. M'Baku.. Is Blizzard venturing into MCU or what.. :razz:

007 said:
Ok. What's your BattleTag in Bnet? Will add you for now.

SargentD#1224

Desmond said:
SargentD#1224

Thanks. Sent you request (from DeViL).

Absolute mess on Day 1 with server issues! Was able to play hardly 2 hours in whole day. Cannot create new games, cannot join the lobby, 2 emergency server restarts of 1 hour each has happened today. Now I'm expecting they'll probably do another maintenance shortly coz I got disconnected about 30 minutes ago and haven't been able to create a game again.

What's the point of alpha, beta stress tests?! I mean they knew the numbers they sold through pre-orders and how many concurrent players they can expect at peak. Should've added capacity accordingly. Same f**k up happened at D3 launch. Looks like these companies don't learn from mistakes. Not just Blizzard, most of them have disastrous releases on Day 1.

Welp. Perhaps the stress test was not comprehensive enough.

007 said:
Thanks. Sent you request (from DeViL).

Yeah, I saw it when playing Hearthstone on my mobile. I think I rejected thinking it was one of the last guys I played against. Send me again or ping your tag with number and I'll send you an invite.

Desmond said:
Welp. Perhaps the stress test was not comprehensive enough.

Yeah, I saw it when playing Hearthstone on my mobile. I think I rejected thinking it was one of the last guys I played against. Send me again or ping your tag with number and I'll send you an invite.

DeViL#6644

Been playing since launch almost everyday. Started with a hammerdin build and now doing 50-100 boss runs a day since last week to hunt endgame gear. Able to single handedly manage solo hell or upto 3-4 people in game at this point.

Servers are still not stable yet. Random outages like twice a week. Not looking good for Blizzard at all. Yesterday there was a 5+ hour outage with item/progress losses (server rollback). No one was able to login. With this, I wonder how they can even start ladder season 1.
Market prices and economy is crazy all time high - a high rune sells for about $110-130 in the aftermarket if you find one.
Drop rates for SoJ seem to have been increased a bit. Many are able to find one. I haven't found one yet for myself though.

$40 seems a bit steep for me right now. Is there someplace I can get this for cheap?

Desmond said:
$40 seems a bit steep for me right now. Is there someplace I can get this for cheap?

By Blizzard standards, you may have to wait for a year for a discount since the game is just 20 days old.

"Fan" made

Desmond said:
$40 seems a bit steep for me right now. Is there someplace I can get this for cheap?

First official sale of the game.

*us.shop.battle.net/en-us/product/diablo_ii_resurrected

*i.ibb.co/H4tB0wN/6446-C506-4-E63-4846-9376-F6-E90-D2-ED8-AC.jpg

Sometimes the dungeon exit is in some nook that you won't find even after crossing it several times.

Someone made a model of the Sorceress.. worth checking out

Oh, so it's this guy's model for the sorceress that's being used?

Desmond said:
Oh, so it's this guy's model for the sorceress that's being used?

Yes, he's a freelance character artist and he has worked with Blizzard for the remake. Check out his YT channel, models are close to real-life.

Have you guys seen this series:

Desmond said:
Have you guys seen this series:

Nope.. first one was funny. Will check out the rest.