I don't mind gambling from time to time, but I will always go with the sure bet if given an opportunity. And now that I have played the recently released Diablo II from Blizzard, I don't feel that I'm going out on a limb when I say that Diablo II will be the best-selling, most talked-about video game for the year 2000.
Diablo II is the sequel to the award-winning Diablo. The release of Diablo II was probably the most anticipated by dedicated gamers in a long time. Whenever the topic of my gaming column came up, people would always ask about Diablo II--had I seen it yet, did I have a beta, when was it coming out? Having not played the first Diablo, I was probably too nonchalant about the whole thing. I now understand their zeal.
Diablo II is like animated Dungeons and Dragons. You choose a character class--Amazon, Paladin, Barbarian, Sorceress, or Necromancer--and give the character attributes. Each character has potentially special capabilities, like magic or fight ing ability. Your character's campaign is to battle Diablo and his forces of the dark.
The campaign is made up of four acts. Each act has quests, which must be completed before you can go to the next act. As you progress through your campaign, the odds go against you and the quests become more difficult.
You will be blown away by the cinematic qualities of Diablo II. The introductory and between-act videos are like movie trailers. When the videos tell the story of Diablo, you will be amazed by the graphics. If you are not moved by them (either as exceptional works of art or as a statement of where gaming is going), then you simply should not be playing.
Diablo II is already a force on the Internet. Blizzard's gaming servers, known as BattleNet, are suffering from overload. Blizzard has finally captured true multiplayer experiences by allowing users to play their games over a variety of networks.
And although that sounds like any other game, they have knocked down the final barrier. While most games allow you to play special multiplayer missions, Diablo II actually allows you to complete the main acts/quests as a team in multiplayer mode. The game automatically adjusts its level of difficulty based on the quantity and quality of the gamers.
The cherry on top is that Blizzard has accomplished this with minimal PC requirements. Diablo II is now available for both Macintosh and Windows PCs. With the exception of hard-drive space, of which Diablo II requires about 1GB for multiplayer mode, its other requirements are average. For both platforms' requirements, see Blizzard's Diablo II page.
Diablo II is game-of-the-year material, even considering that it got a late start on its competition, having been released late June. Plan on hearing a lot more about Diablo II from hardcore gamers as the year goes on.
