Diablo (video game)

Diablo is an action role-playing video game with dungeon crawl elements. The player moves and interacts with the environment primarily by way of a mouse. Items White-colored items are normal items, blue-colored items are magic items and gold-colored items are unique items. Any items that are not white in color must be identified to make use of their magical effects, although characters can use unidentified items as they would the base item. Magic items can have a maximum of 2 of these effects, but unique items can have as many as 6. Furthermore, Uniques can have special properties, or properties not found in the usual prefixes/suffixes for that item type; most uniques have a very rare chance of being dropped, although certain uniques are guaranteed quest rewards. Items wear down through use, and have fixed amounts of durability that decrease as they receive damage; when an item's durability reaches zero, it is destroyed. Players can return to the town and pay a fee to an NPC, Griswold the Blacksmith, to have the items restored, while the Warrior can repair objects in his possession at the cost of overall durability. Bows are the ranged weapon of the game, best used by rogues. Staves, while capable of physical attacks, are mainly used for the spell charges that they contain, as casting from a staff does not require the player to learn the spell or use mana. A staff's spell can only be cast a certain number of times before it requires a recharge, usually returning to town and paying an NPC, Adria the Witch, while the Sorcerer can recharge the staff which lowers the maximum number of spell charges. Swords are typically one-handed (though two-handed varieties also exist), while axes are all two-handed. Maces and clubs add a 50% damage bonus against the undead. Two-handed melee weapons allow the player to inflict more damage. Shields, when paired with single-handed weapons, allow attacks to be blocked. There are three classifications of armor: light, medium and heavy. Characters are also allowed to wear a helmet, two rings, and one amulet. Many higher-level weapons and armor can only be equipped if the player meets the minimum strength and/or dexterity requirements. ==Plot==

Setting The setting of Diablo includes the mortal realm which is the world of Man as well as the High Heavens and the Burning Hells. The labyrinth under the Cathedral descends from the dungeon/church, to the catacombs, followed by the caves, and finally Hell itself, each with a mixture of the undead, animals, and demons. King Leoric has been re-animated as the Skeleton King. Late in the game, the hero must defeat Archbishop Lazarus, and eventually Diablo himself. At the end of the game, the hero kills Diablo's mortal form. As told in the sequel Diablo II, canonically the warrior was the hero that defeated Diablo only to become possessed. The Rogue became Blood Raven while the Sorcerer became the False Summoner, both of them NPC enemies. Diablo III further retconned the story by establishing the nameless warrior as Prince Aidan, the eldest son of Leoric and older brother of Albrecht. ==Development==

in San Francisco Bay Area David Brevik met the brothers Erich and Max Schaefer while working at FM Waves, a clip art production company, and with a common interest in developing video games, co-founded Condor Games with the Schaefers in 1993. Though they initially worked on conversion contracts to port games to different consoles, Brevik had the ideas of creating Diablo from the start, a combination of Dungeons & Dragons and the roguelike genre, particularly Angband, its name based on his family's home near Mount Diablo near San Francisco. Brevik also wanted a "modern and cool" interface intended to bring the quick directness of console games as well as Doom (1993) to computer RPGs. One of Condor's first contracts was through Sunsoft to develop the Sega Genesis version of the fighting game Justice League Task Force. Brevik attended the 1994 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) to showcase the game and pitch his Diablo to other publishers. Bill Roper said that the team's "initial pitch, in a nutshell, was to take the excitement and randomness of games like Moria, Nethack, and Rogue, and bring them into the 1990s with fantastic graphics and sound". However, most publishers turned down the idea on the grounds that "RPGs are dead". Despite the contract, Condor Games lacked funds to fully complete development by the end of 1995, leading to debt to keep their employees paid. Brevik revealed in 2018 that he initially hated the ending because it was the cinematic department's idea and did not follow the story outline he provided them, but after a few days he calmed down and decided the ending was pretty good after all. Music The music of Diablo was composed by Matt Uelmen. The soundtrack consists of six tracks. It was released after 15 years, in 2011. Release Diablo normally requires the original CD to play, however also included on the disk is a shareware version of the software that could be played without the CD called Diablo Spawn. This version of the game allows access to the first two areas of the dungeon, and locks out two of the three playable classes and many of the NPC townsfolk. It is playable in both single- and multiplayer with those restrictions. The demo is also downloadable. Blizzard had planned to have Diablo in stores before the 1996 holiday season, but even with both Blizzard North and the Irvine studio working in crunch, the Blizzard executives recognized they would not make this deadline while still aiming to release a quality product. and was widely available by January 6, 1997, but had started shipping to retailers in December 1996, some which made the game available for sale that month. In 2019 Diablo was released digitally on GOG.com with minor enhancements. ==Reception==

Sales According to Max Schaefer, Blizzard's initial sales estimates for Diablo were modest. He remarked, "We were thinking that if everything went well, we would sell 100,000 copies." Following the game's positive press coverage before its release, estimates by the team were increased to roughly 500,000 copies, David Brevik later said. Pre-orders had surpassed 450,000 units globally by December 17, at which point the game was set to launch with a shipment of 500,000 units staggered across its initial days on shelves. Diablo debuted at #1 on PC Data's monthly computer game sales chart for January 1997. It held the position for another three months, before being displaced to #2 by X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter in May. Diablo remained in second place until September, when it dropped to fifth. It exited the top 10 that October. In the United States, the game was the highest-selling computer title of the first six months of 1997. Its worldwide sales surpassed 500,000 units by April, 750,000 by June and 1 million by late November. By the end of 1997, Diablo had sold 670,155 copies in the United States alone. It was declared the country's fourth-best-selling computer game of the year by PC Data. Schaefer attributed the game's success in part to its December 27 shipment date, and noted that "there weren't any other games released after Christmas, so we were the only game in town for a long time." Diablo took 13th place in the rankings for February 1998. It remained in the top 20 for another month, dropped out in April and reappeared in June. rising to #3 in August. The game's average sale price during the January–June period was $36; In August 1998, Diablo received a "Gold" sales award from the Verband der Unterhaltungssoftware Deutschland (VUD), indicating sales of at least 100,000 units across Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Diablos global sales reached almost 2 million units by September 1998. One year later, its sales in the United States alone had grown to 1.17 million copies, which made it the country's seventh-highest computer game seller since January 1993. This number rose to 1.3 million copies by March 2000. Remarking upon these sales, GameSpots writer Desslock hailed Diablo as an "undisputed commercial blockbuster". The game returned in 2000 to PC Data's annual top 20 for the United States, with 260,020 copies sold. Worldwide, Diablo broke 2 million sales by mid-2000 and reached 2.3 million by January of the next year. Ultimately, the game sold over 2.5 million units by mid-2001. According to GameSpot Japan, the game was a "big hit" among Japanese players. Critical reviews Diablo has received critical acclaim, with an average rating of 94/100 on Metacritic. Reviewers commonly cited the online multiplayer aspect as one of the strongest points of the game, with it being described as greatly extending its replay value. Computer Games Magazines Cindy Yans said that "weapons, armor and items are so numerous that you're always acquiring something new to try... not to mention the game's multiplayer universe"; she went on to say that "for anyone who enjoys a good multiplayer dungeon crawl, Diablo can't be beat". Yans finished her review, "Despite the rather pale storyline, [...] watered-down quests and a fair amount of necessary repetition, Diablo is a must for anyone interested in 'just plain fun.'" Ward stated: "Diablo is the best game to come out in the past year, and you should own a copy. Period." Steve Klett's review for PC Games, which was reprinted in sister magazine GamePro, commented that "Diablos definitely not your typical dungeon hackfest. ... In fact, its closest rivals are games like Gauntlet and Loaded on the PlayStation, but they really don't compare." Next Generation similarly remarked that Diablo is more of a modern incarnation of Gauntlet than an RPG, "but with enough changes and improvements to make it a completely new experience, and one of the best titles so far this year." However, IGNs Doug Perry was dissatisfied with the controls, saying they slow the game's pace. Perry also opined that the multiplayer should have used split screen or the PlayStation Link Cable rather than require the two player characters to stay on one screen, though he said the conversion improved on the PC version in some respects as well, such as the option to double the game's speed. Andy Butcher reviewed Diablo for Arcane magazine, rating it an 8 out of 10 overall, and stated that "you have a superb game. In terms of design it may be little more than a third-person perspective version of Doom with character development, but that doesn't stop Diablo from being great fun." Diablo won the overall "Game of the Year" awards of Computer Gaming World, GameSpot and Computer Game Entertainment for 1996, and was a runner-up for Computer Games Strategy Pluss award in this category. The editors of Computer Gaming World wrote, "For this year, Diablo is the game that everyone will remember." Akira Nishitani ranked it number 1 on his personal list of the greatest games of all time in 1997. In 2005 GameSpot chose Diablo as one of "The Greatest Games of All Time". It was placed at No. 20 on Game Informers "Top 100 RPGs Of All Time" list. ''Men's Journal'' published an article in April 2026, for the game's 30th anniversary, highlighting how it is "consistently ranks as one of the greatest games ever made and is widely regarded as the title that popularized ARPGs" thanks to its replayability and dark tone "resonating with fans" of the series. ==Expansions, ports, re-releases==

The expansion pack made for Diablo is Diablo: Hellfire, released in 1997. It was produced by Synergistic Software and published by Sierra Entertainment rather than an in-house Blizzard North development team. The multiplayer feature of the expansion pack was disabled with version 1.01. The added content included two additional dungeon segments located within a new side storyline, several unique items and magical item properties, spells, and a fourth class, the Monk. There are also two unfinished "test" classes (the Bard and Barbarian) and two quests which could be accessed through a configuration file modification. Blizzard sold exclusive worldwide rights to develop, publish, and distribute console versions of the game to Electronic Arts in 1996. In 1997, it was reported that Nintendo had struck a deal with Blizzard to publish Diablo on the Nintendo 64. However, this version never materialized. In 1998, a PlayStation version of Diablo was released, developed by Climax Studios and published by Electronic Arts. The game lacked online play, but featured a two-player cooperative mode. Notable differences to the PC version include new lighting effects, auto-aiming for range weapons and spells, and an option for increased game speed. Despite the original PC game being based around mouse control, it does not support the PlayStation Mouse. It features an option to learn the story through a narrator without having to find the books in the game. The European PAL version is translated and dubbed into French, German and Swedish in addition to the original English. The game was re-released alongside Hellfire in a 1998 bundle, called Diablo + Hellfire. 1998's ''Blizzard's Game of the Year Collection contained copies of Diablo, StarCraft and Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness. The Blizzard Anthology (2000) contained Diablo, StarCraft, StarCraft: Brood War and WarCraft II: Battle.net Edition. The Diablo Gift Pack (2000) contained Diablo and Diablo II, but no expansions. The Diablo: Battle Chest (2001) contained Diablo, Diablo II and Diablo IIs expansion, Lord of Destruction. Later releases of the Diablo: Battle Chest also have a strategy guide for Diablo II and Lord of Destruction, though subsequent releases do not include the original game, instead featuring Diablo II'', its expansion, and their respective strategy guides. For Diablos 20th anniversary, it was announced during BlizzCon 2016 that Diablo III would receive a free patch called The Darkening of Tristram that recreates the original game. The patch contains a 16-level dungeon, four main bosses from the 1997 version and special graphics filters and 8-directions limited movement like the original game. The test patch was released on November 11, 2016, on the Public Test Realm server. In March 2019, Diablo was made available for sale on GOG.com, which marked the first time Blizzard had released the game on a digital distribution platform. The release featured two versions of the game: the original 1996 version and a new DirectX-based version built in-house by GOG that features additional display and graphical options. ==References==