Difference between revisions of "User:Cipher"

Latest revision as of 21:25, 15 November 2020

Welcome to Cipher's User Page[edit]

I reinstalled Diablo II in 2020 on Windows 10 Pro build 1909. You can install it on any version of Windows 10. Retro games are a blast! I really miss Diablo, Diablo Hellfire (Sierra), Diablo II, Diablo II Lord of Destruction, and even Diablo 3 a bit. It's time for me to get back into the classics. I have the fondest memories of pulling all-nighters to play Diablo, burning my retinas while staring at a 21" Radius CRT and hearing the head seek noises on hard disk drives.

Installing D2/D2 LOD on Windows 10[edit]

1. Game Client: Download the Diablo II (D2) and Diablo II: Lord of Destruction (D2 LOD) installers by logging into your Blizzard account.Create an account if you don't have one. And if you don't have any software keys registered in your account, then redeem the code for games by finding your original software license key on the old D2 CDs and entering them into the Redeem a Code page in the Blizzard Shop
2. D2 Downloader: Run the regular D2 executable first to download the installer files locally. Exit the installer when it's automatically launched after the download.
3. D2 LOD Downloader: If you have the D2 LOD expansion, run that executable to download the installer files. As before, exit that installer after it's automatically launched.
4. Safe Mode: Boot into safe mode with networking. I can't stress the importance of this step, as modern antivirus and other software and drivers installed on Windows 10 will prevent the D2/D2 LOD installers from functioning. The easiest way to get the installers to run is to boot into safe mode with networking. In Windows 10, click on the Start Menu, then click on Power, and hold Shift down while clicking on Restart. Then select Troubleshoot > Advanced options > Startup Settings > Restart. When Windows reboots, choose option 5 which is "Safe Mode with Networking". Note that if you use a pin number to login to your computer, this will not work in Safe Mode. Instead, login with the local Administrator account. If you need help with that process, here's a good guide.
5. Install: Run the installer for D2 first. If you have D2 LOD, run that installer next. No need to launch the games, as we're just installing them. If you like, take this opportunity to copy the shortcuts created on the Administrator's desktop (the desktop you see) over to your own user's desktop.
6. Reboot: Restart the system and login with your regular account.
7. Set Compatibility Options: Go to the folder where you installed D2/D2 LOD and locate the two executables "Diablo II.exe" and "Game.exe". For each executable, right click on them and choose Properties. Under the Compatibility tab, check the "Run this program in compatibility mode for:" box and select "Windows XP (Service Pack 3)". Then check the "Run this program as an administrator" box. Click on OK to apply your changes and close this window.
8. Configure Shortcut: Before you launch D2/D2 LOD you'll want to edit the shortcut for it on your desktop. On modern monitors I'd highly recommend you always run in Window mode. Not all monitors perform well at, let alone support, low resolutions of 800x600 and 640x480. To do this, right click on the shortcut and choose "Properties", then add the -w parameter after the text in Target box. Example: "D:\Diablo II\Diablo II.exe" -w
9. Run D2/D2 LOD: Run the game for the first time and enjoy! To make the game larger on your presumably larger resolution monitor, maximize the game window to make the game bigger. It will automatically scale, but in the 4:3 aspect ratio.
10. (Recommended) Improve Performance: D2 works just fine on modern Direct3D video cards, however it's not as visually smooth and as aesthetically appealing as running in 3DFX Glide mode (ie: the old Voodoo video cards). But you can change that. Years ago, a wonderful person known as Sven Labusch created a wrapper to run D2 in 3DFX Glide mode on a video card that supports OpenGL, which is pretty much almost any modern day video card. All you need to do is:
    1. Download Glide3-to-OpenGL-Wrapper
    2. Unzip it to your D2 install location
    3. Edit your D2 shortcut to include the parameter -3dfx
    4. Launch D2 and enjoy both the performance and visual improvement.
    5. If you want to change the wrapper's settings, including running in Window mode, then close D2 and run the "glide-init.exe" executable. Make sure you click on the "English/Deutsch" button first if you prefer English. Settings I like to use:
       • settings: window-mode
       • settings: captured mouse (use alt-tab to switch to desktop)
       • settings: vertical synchronization
       • settings: fps-limit (set it just above your monitor's refresh rate)
       • settings: static size (Choose the largest resolution that fits well as a window on your primary monitor. Only non-glide can maximize the window, as no options in glide help me maximize properly. Perhaps you'll have different results?)
       • settings: centered
       • settings: remember position
       • renderer: largest texture-memory (eg: 108 MB)
       • renderer: largest buffer-to-texture-size (eg: 4096x4096)
       • renderer: 32 bit rendering
       • renderer: texture for videos
       • renderer: bilinear filtering
       • renderer: shader-gamma
11. (Optional) Improve Your D2 Experience: You'll want to research all of the fun things you can do with D2/D2 LOD. It's such a well known game that has been around almost two decades, which gives fans, modders, and 3rd party developers plenty of time to create some fun tools and cheats. I'll expand this section later. If you'd like to search for this yourself: Hero Editor v1.04for character editing, AutoHotkeyto remap your keys and do some cool things to make D2 much more enjoyable (I run my own custom script), Hex Workshop for editing your save game files directly (although Hero Editor is faster), MPQ Editorto extract the MPQ files that contain D2 assets such as sounds, music, XP tables, etc, and will also let you make changes. For example, I'd changed all of the Assassin's kick sound effects to something less annoying, such as the standard D2 kick sounds. Others enjoy muting or changing the Amazon's shouts to make them less shrill. You could even throw in your own music too. I also wrote my own PowerShell script to backup and restore my D2 save game files, which are stored in "%USERPROFILE%\Saved Games\Diablo II".
12. (Optional) Try Path of Diablo: Path of Diablois a 3rd party endeavor to add online ladders similar to Path of Exile to D2 LOD along with a growing community. There are also quality of life improvements (eg: huge stash and inventory), and potentially soon it may see better upscaling for HD and 4k resolutions.