Diablo 2 (i.e. TWO) gets a new patch, 16 years after its release

[ktchong]

http://us.battle.net/en/forum/topic/20742864181

 

... if only other developers (ahem, ahem) are so committed to quality.  That is the reason why Blizzard has become the most successful developer and trusted name in the industry. 

Edited March 11, 2016 by ktchong

[Hiro Protagonist II]

Just fired up Diablo 2 and indeed it does update to the latest patch. Great stuff.

[the_dog_days]

Is it a patch or is Blizzard adding DRM?

[Hiro Protagonist II]

There's no DRM. It's a patch.

[Darkpriest]

Are they going to release some enhanced edi with updated graphics and resolutions? I mean... this dev post gives a lot of ideas...

[Hiro Protagonist II]

Here's the patch notes.

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Diablo II Version History
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Diablo II v1.14a Patch Notes

Specific Changes & Improvements
- No need to run in XP mode anymore, Windows 7, 8.1, and 10 compatibility complete
- Mac installer and compatibility for 10.10 and 10.11 has arrived
- First client run will migrate saved characters to avoid issues from Windows system
  admin changes

Known Issues
- Mac 10.9 and earlier are not supported

[Malcador]

Must have been a fun task

[redneckdevil]

Yes!!!!! I can Diablo 2 again !!!!

Can cross fingers and pray the Warcraft series get a patch like this one as well

[Nonek]

I recently took my Diablo CD from its case and the centre of the disc fell apart, I am incredibly bereft, hopefully Blizzard will start selling the game on GOG so that I might purchase a new edition of the first and second game. The mods really do beef up those old games. I'd ask for the online restrictions to be removed so that I might purchase the third game, but I realise that this is not going to happen.

[ktchong]

I recently took my Diablo CD from its case and the centre of the disc fell apart, I am incredibly bereft, hopefully Blizzard will start selling the game on GOG so that I might purchase a new edition of the first and second game. The mods really do beef up those old games. I'd ask for the online restrictions to be removed so that I might purchase the third game, but I realise that this is not going to happen.

 

You can register Diablo on Battle.net with your original product key, (which is on the CD,) which will allow you to download the game directly from the website.

 

Blizard sells all their games directly on Battle.net.  They do not even sell their games on Steam, so I doubt they will start selling their games on GOG.

Edited March 12, 2016 by ktchong

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Is Median XL out for this patched version yet?

[Bartimaeus]

Unfortunately, it also completely breaks the Glide API wrappers, which means even if I wanted to play, I wouldn't until that's fixed. I don't enjoy sub-30 frame rates, and I don't enjoy the 10-15 second game freezes after killing bosses when you're using the awful Direct2D/Direct3D APIs.

 

Not that I'm really in the market to play Diablo 2 again at all or anything, but it is rather important for that to be fixed if I did want to play.

Edited March 12, 2016 by Bartimaeus

[Lexx]

How is widescreen support? Without that, I really wouldn't play the game again.

[Bartimaeus]

Nope. The only two resolutions options (the better of which is 800x600) are still just the same.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

I recently took my Diablo CD from its case and the centre of the disc fell apart, I am incredibly bereft, hopefully Blizzard will start selling the game on GOG so that I might purchase a new edition of the first and second game. The mods really do beef up those old games. I'd ask for the online restrictions to be removed so that I might purchase the third game, but I realise that this is not going to happen.

 

Diablo 1 will work on Windows 7 but you'll need to do some tweaking to get it to work. I googled and compiled a set of instructions from different websites and this is how I did it. I know you don't have the CD, but for those who do, I've included the first step.

 

Installing Diablo on Windows 7

 

1. Place CD in DVD Drive.

- Should install straight away.

- Single Player will work despite being version 1.0

- Multiplayer does not work with version 1.0

 

2. Update with Patch 1.09

- Will not work if you double click on the patch. Gives an error.

- Must right click on patch and select Properties and then Compatibility. Tick Windows XP SP2. Run as administrator.

- Multiplayer will now work and can connect to Battlenet only.

- Colour problem now occurs

 

3. Registry fix. Download the Registry fix from Blizzard. (This is supposed to fix the colour problem but for some people it doesn't. Step 4 will definitely fix the problem and it's what I use)

http://ftp.blizzard.com/pub/diablo/d109_x64.reg

 

4. Fixing Colour Problem / Create Batch file to disable Windows explorer.

- Open notepad and paste in:

 

@echo off

taskkill /f /IM explorer.exe

start /wait Diablo.exe

pause

start C:\Windows\explorer.exe

exit

 

i. Choose all files -> save as WIN7FIX.bat

ii. copy WIN7FIX.bat in the Diablo directory (where diablo.exe is)

iii. RUN this bat file. DONE!

 

 

5. IPX Wrapper for creating IPX Multiplayer games (This will enable you to create a local multiplayer game in order to play Normal, Nightmare and Hell on your own computer)

Download IPX Wrapper from:

http://www.solemnwarning.net/ipxwrapper/

Copy ipxwrapper.dll, mswsock.dll, and wsock32.dll - copy them to your C:\Diablo directory

 

 

Hellfire

I also managed to get Hellfire to work as well. The 1.01 patch that you download will not work. You have to download the manual files that's been extracted from the exe from the internet.

 

1. Download manual patch files and copy in your Hellfire directory.

 

2. You then create a bat file similar to Step 4 above with Diablo.

 

Copy paste the following in Notepad

 

@echo off

taskkill /f /IM explorer.exe

start /wait Hellfire.exe

pause

start C:\Windows\explorer.exe

exit

 

i. Choose all files -> save as WIN7FIX.bat

ii. copy WIN7FIX.bat in the Hellfire directory (where hellfire.exe is)

iii. RUN this bat file. DONE!

 

[Nonek]

Much appreciated Ktchong and Hiro Protahonist II.