In 1997, Blizzard Entertainment released a point-and-click, procedurally generated, isometric roleplaying game. Its development dated back to 1995, when it would originally be pitched as a turn-based game. Over time, turn-based combat became real-time and the developers, Condor Games, would become Blizzard North.

That game was Diablo and after its January 1997 release, it would first spawn its own expansion pack. It would then be followed by two sequels with expansion packs and controversy to spare. It would be hailed as one of the greatest games of all time, and leave a legacy influencing an entire genre of games after it.

I’m one of those people who has never played it, though I have played its sequels to the bone. Diablo II is the first game I ever completed. I was two years old when Diablo came out and I simply missed the boat. Once I wanted to play it, attempts to do so were hampered by availability as technology has marched on, disk drives have marched away, and Diablo only became digitally available via GOG in mid-2019. It’s time I got around to playing it, especially with Diablo IV somewhere on the horizon.

The GOG version comes bundled with the Hellfire expansion pack, released the same year as the base game, but developed by Sierra Entertainment. You can opt to play without it, but I chose to play it with Hellfire, with an eye on working my way through the full experience. The first thing you notice on booting up the game with the expansion pack running is that it removes the Diablo title entirely from the main menu. The game is exclusively referred to as Hellfire instead, which may be jarring for some who were expecting it to feel more noticeably expansion pack-y, and less complete rebrand-y.

The re-branding felt… odd, to say the least. To give Hellfire credit, apart from that, it’s actually pretty difficult to discern base game material from expansion pack material. Everything is well integrated, nearly seamless, and there were very few moments where I felt that it was obvious something had been added after the fact. 

A necessary disclaimer is that playing through Hellfire prevents you from playing online, the changes implemented not transferring to Battle.net. This suits me just fine, as in visiting Diablo for the first time, I wanted to do so entirely alone.

Diablo or Hellfire, you play as a lone hero in the town of Tristram. After picking your class and difficulty setting, you’re dropped immediately into the game, where you slowly begin to make your way through multiple dungeon levels that all lead you towards entering Hell itself to confront Diablo, the Lord of Terror. Hellfire adds an entirely optional storyline surrounding a Sorcerer who unwittingly unleashed a demon on the town but managed to contain it, and you are tasked with venturing into that lair to vanquish it.

Certain quests are different or absent on each playthrough. Each map level is procedurally generated and large, rewarding exploration. These elements all lend themselves to a high amount of replayability. 

The classes available on starting a new game are Warrior, Rogue, Sorcerer, and Monk. In 2020, those classes are old-school and they may feel it, but I was surprised as I started playing the game by the variety that was afforded to me anyway. Selecting a Rogue didn’t lock me out from learning the spells I found in bookcases or using the spell scrolls looted from the levels.

After about an hour of playing the game, I made the decision that I would balance using a bow with casting spells, and with careful point allocation, as I leveled up this was easily achievable. It made things very fun and encouraged more thinking than I assumed my chosen class might.

The difficulty levels in Diablo are Normal, Nightmare, and Hell, and it seems prudent to note that Normal is not nice-speak for Easy. Whilst I didn’t find Normal to be particularly challenging, the game finds ways to corner you with mobs of enemies or by having the first boss strike you down if you make the mistake of wandering into his room at too low a level. It’s very much in the realm of punishing but fair and assisted by a very simple on-the-spot save system that makes recovering from deaths far less excruciating than it could be. 

No respawning back in town and having to run back to your body, you just reload that save from 5 minutes ago. Of course, this relies on remembering to save frequently in the first place, as there’s no autosave to be seen. I like to have an easy time of things, so this save/load functionality works well for me. It also serves to alleviate some of the frustrations that come from a game that, if it were a person, would be more than old enough to legally drink.

Those frustrations are mostly born from that age. The game is more than playable, but some mechanical and graphics issues can drag the game down. For some reason, my character can power-walk at a high speed around town, but when I head into the dungeons, she wanders at a much more staggering pace. I discovered that she moves faster when she’s walking diagonally, and so started spending an embarrassing amount of time trying to navigate areas diagonally before realizing that point-and-click movement just isn’t precise enough to do that consistently. Never mind.

The art style in Diablo is wonderful, dynamic, interesting, and overwhelmingly dark in a way that is gritty and atmospheric. If you’re playing on a large, recent monitor though, the graphics may suffer. The atmospheric design sometimes conflicts with the in-game map, a large transparent overlay that moves with your character. The map is a wonderful mechanic that aids exploration, but where it should be relatively un-intrusive, I found it obscuring the game underneath. It quickly became an on-off reference as I was playing, whereas I’m normally the kind of person who leaves the map up all the time.

With that said, spell animations in such an old game are gorgeous. I didn’t really expect a lot, but early on in the game I threw up a flame wall and I was shocked by the size and liveliness of it. It changed the very lighting in the room and gave off shadows. The enemies are interesting with a surprising amount of detail, and again, a sheer amount of life to them that I didn’t anticipate. There is plenty of charm to be uncovered in the art if you are willing to find it.

A combination of graphic and mechanical issues lies in trying to pick up loot. When I wandered across a Search spell, which highlights loot that you haven’t picked up yet, I was delighted and felt it made the perfect compromise between art style, graphical limitations, and letting me pick up treasure. When I was fact-checking and making notes to write this review, I found out that Search is a Hellfire add-on and I was aghast. I really can’t imagine playing the game without it. Even huge piles of coins have a habit of mingling in with the scenery or corpses or destruction and hiding behind static objects and walls.

I can’t say it would’ve looked better on a 90s monitor but I’m sure it was more fitting. The game was never designed to be stretched over such large screens, and despite the launcher having the option to play in windowed mode which I think would resolve most visual issues as it would appear closer to its intended size, I had problems getting this to work. A brief Google search suggests windowed mode appears to be unreliable for a lot of others, but I can’t claim this wasn’t user error.

The inventory is tiny and the loot doesn’t discriminate between classes or skill levels. If you’re a hoarder, you will be making multiple trips back to town and often. I usually play that way, but I enjoyed the challenge of trying to say no to that one random short sword that I might have been able to sell for a couple of coins. Items don’t stack, so every single potion you have takes up a slot, and your coins, which sit in your inventory, only stack up to 5000. The more money you have, the less space you have. With no town stash to speak of, the game forces you to make choices about the kind of loot you want to keep.

Still, I often found items outside of my level range, and when I was unwilling to leave or sell them, I decided to simply decorate the town floor with them. I’d come back for them later when I was able to use them. I’m not proud.

The issues I’ve mentioned weren’t really issues in 1997, but I’m playing in 2020. I’ve been spoiled by huge inventories and endless stash tabs, by games that encourage hoarding. I’ve been spoiled by the more fluid and precise movement of other games, of Diablo’s very own sequels.

It’s hard to go backward technologically, no matter how great a lot of older games are. Nostalgia can’t save you from being unable to tell if you’re missing an enemy with your arrows or if the game is just a little janky. These issues are also far from an experience-ruiner, relegated to the realm of mild annoyance more than anything.

Along with inventory management, health and mana management is key. Displayed in the HUD as red and blue globes respectively, they empty quickly, particularly at the lower levels, and are hard to keep topped up if you don’t want to stock your entire inventory with potions. A spell I found for healing presented its own problem: if I used it to heal myself, a considerable chunk of my mana would be gone. What is the right choice, other than trying not to get hit? The game tends not to reveal enemies until you’re in the room with them, which can make avoiding getting mobbed a lot harder than it sounds.

You also need to take care in figuring out how you manage… er… your management. Mobs will follow you, archers will shoot at you, and bringing up any menu, be it inventory or your character sheet or your spells, does not pause the game. Trying to self-manage on the fly can be punishing, but it’s a welcome mechanic, grounding you in the experience by forcing you to retreat to safe places.

The world in Diablo feels rich, in spite of or perhaps because of, the contained setting. Each of the townspeople serves a purpose, be it Cain identifying items, Adria supplying you with or buying magical items, or seeking healing from Pepin, and more. You can consult with each townsperson on the quests you uncover, and they will give you more. You can seek them out for gossip. It’s all fully voiced and whilst some of the voice acting may seem dated by today’s standards, it’s high in quality and each voice fits in perfectly with the world established. 

Sound plays a large part in ensuring that Diablo remains an extremely enjoyable experience. Enemies are noisy, loot is detectable, all without being overly repetitive or annoying. It’s a masterwork of sound design, particularly when it comes to the music. Never feeling out of place, it’s instead always calculated and mood-setting. In some ways, it’s subtle, even though it carries tremendous weight. After hours of crawling around in the dungeons, the deep booming music and the oppressive drums down there would almost become one with my brain. 

So when I open up a town portal and return to Tristram, the immediate switch to moody acoustic melodies is a welcome relief, and I begin to dread more hours down in the dark. Thanks to the game more than standing the test of time (barring a few technical limitations), I also look forward to those hours, to storming Hell itself, alone once more. If you’ve also never played this classic gaming experience, it’s well worth a try.

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Diablo + Hellfire

9.99

8.5

Score

8.5/10

Pros

• Re-Playable Gameplay
• Engaging Play-Style Options
• Beautiful Art
• Seamless Expansion pack
• Resource Management

Cons

• Dated Mechanics
• Frustrating Movement System