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If You Like… Diablo

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There shouldn’t be any arguments when I claim that the original Diablo was a masterpiece. Launched in the 90’s, it defined a new genre of dungeon crawling, successfully mixing traditional Rogue/Nethack elements with beautiful visuals, real-time combat, class selection, an innovative loot system, and haunting music. Let’s look at the series as a whole, and the genre it largely created.

IYL will be a short series of articles delving into various genres and looking at the best examples in each. I’ll follow a standard layout. I’ll start with a bit of history about the most famous game representing the genre. Next, I’ll cover a game that’s very similar to the original, then (hopefully!) any games that have surpassed it since, and finally any games that do things in a unique way, but still tipping their hat to the original. Then it’s over to you to tell me how wrong I am, in the comments!

There was something very special about the first Diablo. Arriving in 1997, the majority of households didn’t yet have internet connections and those that did were still on 28K or (if they were lucky!) 56K modems. ADSL was rare and fixed connections were pure fantasy. So for a game like Diablo to land with multiplayer baked in was unusual. Perhaps inspired by Doom which was 4 years old by then, Blizzard were targeting the LAN party crowd?

But I experienced it by dialling my ISP and playing with my best mate. It was fabulous. The village of Tristram felt alive as you stocked up on potions and sold your latest loot before delving into the dynamically generated dungeons and caves below the village to level up further. There was, simply, nothing else like it.

And the music!

Before we move on, it's worth mentioning that you can still play Diablo 1 today, thanks to the DevilutionX project. Just grab the original game from GOG, and follow the instructions on the project page over on Github.

While the original was a classic, eventually selling a very respectable 2.5 million copies, its sequel which arrived three years later was really just more of the same. Diablo II introduced five new player classes, updated visuals and enemies spread over four distinct Acts. Later expansions added two further classes, but the core gameplay remained virtually unchanged from the original. It was still a huge hit, selling 4 million copies within 18 months, and its lasting appeal saw Battle.Net still reporting 11 million players in 2010!

Fast forward to 2012 and Diablo III would land with several controversies. By then, Activision had bought Blizzard via its parent, Vivendi, and World of Warcraft was Activision Blizzard’s new darling. The focus on its subscription-led cash cow reflected poorly on Diablo as a whole. First, several expansions to Diablo II were delayed or abandoned due to that focus, and of course it had been over a decade since Diablo II first landed. Second, Diablo III arrived with an invasive DRM stipulating that even single player games required an always-on, high-speed internet connection which resulted in players in Europe suffering crippling lag in their single-player games. South Korea had it even worse after the Fair Trade Commission raided Blizzard’s offices there, resulting in Korean players being unable to play at all, despite owning the game.

You’d like to think that Activision Blizzard had therefore learned its lessons when it launched the mobile-focused Diablo Immortal last year, but of course that’s not the case. By now, the firm was famous for all the wrong reasons, whether that’s an appalling culture of development crunch, or 2016’s loot-box-gambling-arena-FPS, Overwatch. So while it was disappointing to see loot boxes in Diablo Immortal, it was hardly surprising. What was surprising was the sheer unbridled greed of how it was implemented. Several streamers ended up spending tens of thousands of their own money to demonstrate the appalling scale of that greed. In one case, YouTuber jtisallbusiness spent over $100K upgrading his character, only to find that the system couldn’t accommodate his power level, and so he wasn’t able to use that character anymore - the matchmaking failed to match him appropriately!

Anyway, Diablo IV is arriving next month and Activision Blizzard have apparently already announced that there will be no loot boxes. However, with the game garnering mixed reviews during its open beta, and criticism of its WoW-inspired visuals, I wonder if it’s only a matter of time before they’re patched back in.

A direct clone - Path of Exile [Steam]

Enough about the fall and fall of Diablo, because it’s October 2013 and there’s a new kid in town. That kid is called Path of Exile and not only is it a game focused on massive scaling and end game content, it’s also completely free. Yes, there’s a shop, and yes, you can spend hundreds of your finest dollars, but unlike Diablo, PoE’s paid content is largely cosmetic. Largely, because some upgrades do allow you to store more loot, but the gist of it is clear - no pay-to-win mechanics here.

Path Of Exile’s character development is boggling, but the core of your power level actually comes from your equipment. Much of PoE’s equipment features a varying level of sockets, each of a distinct colour. Gem drops of each colour bring differing effects or power scaling and can be “socketed” into your equipment to buff its skills, effects, or power level.

This means that even two otherwise identically levelled characters of the same class will often feature wildly differing utility and damage output, based on the capabilities they’ve chosen in their development tree, equipment, and socketed gems.

Another always-online game, PoE features various Hub areas which are also MMO-based. There, you can chat to others, trade with them, or even challenge them to a duel for some instant PvP action. That last is entirely optional however - I’ve never been challenged in the game, nor challenged anyone myself. PvE all the way for me! You can also party-up in these Hubs before attempting your next mission.

Path Of Exile has had a rocky life on Linux with pre-Proton wine builds being a bit hit or miss. Early Proton was sometimes shaky too. I’m happy to report that more recently, it’s absolutely flawless, as my 70 hours or so will attest.

My only gripe with PoE is that I’ve played Grim Dawn and as a result, the action is just a bit too zoomed in for my liking. This is a gripe also being aimed at Diablo 4 in its public alpha too - it can be sometimes frustrating to have an enemy off-screen firing at you, or worse, killing something off-screen with a long-range attack and never even seeing what it was!

I hate to say it, but Grim Dawn ruins quite a few other games in this genre simply through its excellence. Speaking of Grim Dawn…

Games that do it better - Grim Dawn [Steam, GOG]

I might have 70 hours in PoE, but I have nearly ten times that number in Grim Dawn. It’s one of my most played games, and there’s a reason for that. Several actually: lengthy, grim-fantasy story which really engages without getting in the way of the action, stunning full-3D graphics that can be rotated and zoomed to your exact specification, atmospheric music and sound design and a character system that is incredibly flexible, yet wonderfully balanced. Throw in tonnes of content, two superb DLC campaigns, an intuitive fast travel system, heaps of secrets and several end-game loot mechanics and you can see why this is often acclaimed as the king of the ARPG.

One thing to get out of the way right from the start - the maps in Grim Dawn and its many, many secrets are not dynamically generated. They benefit, therefore, from being beautiful and well designed. The drawback of course is that once you know the levels and secrets… you know them. They won’t change. There is some minor randomisation - some levels will close routes off to force you around a different way, or a dungeon is spawned in a different location - but the map itself hasn’t changed, just the obstacles on the map.

But you probably won’t mind until thousands of hours in - there’s just so much of it all. The content feels never ending. And then there’s two equally gigantic DLC expansions!

Then there’s the character customisation. Each of six classes (and a further 3 in the two DLCs) has its own tree of skills and effects. Each level grants points to distribute on the tree, either to grow along the bottom, reaching new abilities, or power up existing abilities you’ve already reached and unlocked. There are also three core character attributes to level up. Then there’s the gear, and the associated “socketing” of said gear with a massive array of gems which grant new effects and capabilities.

And then, when you hit level 10, about 20-30 minutes into the game… multi-class options become available. Yep, choose a second class to start progressing along with your first chosen class. This gives so many opportunities for synergies, it’s mind-boggling (in a good way). Starting as a Soldier, then multi-classed to Arcanist? Well done, now you’re a Battlemage. Strength AND magic? Yes please!

You want more customisation? Okay, how about an entire tree of constellations which you unlock by earning points for cleansing altars spread throughout the world (some of which are cleverly hidden). Unlock the whole constellation for bonus effects, or entirely new abilities. There are 82 of these, allowing for further synergies and strategy building.

Quality of life? Grim Dawn has it in spades. Nearly every screen can be opened independently of one another, map overlays, shift-clicking, view rotation, zooming, loot filtering, loot highlighting. Nearly every interface can be searched by keywords, or reorganised with the click of a button. The game just gets out of your way as much as possible to let you zone into the action.

How about crafting? Hundreds of blueprints across all power levels are available, and once learned, you just need those precious materials. Some of these materials will have you re-visiting certain areas to grind for what you need, but if crafting and grinding for materials isn’t your bag, there are plenty of alternative ways to earn powerful loot, such as the Crucible (DLC - 100 waves of monsters in an arena, with increasing rewards every 10 levels), or the Shattered Realm (DLC - a race to defeat a set number of monsters before the next realm closes, forcing you to return to base with whatever you looted on the way). These risk vs reward game modes are brilliant fun, and a welcome break from the campaign missions.

I’ll stop there, but given the core game is frequently under £5 and the bundle of the game plus all three DLC is frequently under £20, this game is absolute steal for the value it offers. If you like Diablo, this is what you should be playing.

Something a little different: Last Epoch [Steam]

I’ll keep this one short, because although it is different, it’s not that much different. Last Epoch takes a little bit of Diablo (the core genre), a little bit of Path of Exile (gear-focused builds) and a little bit of Grim Dawn (designed levels, beautiful 3D environments) and throws in a couple of interesting mechanics.

First, time travel! Each map has five or six “eras” or epochs that you can travel between as the story opens up. One great example of this (minor spoiler warning) sees you turned away from the locked door of a late era temple because you don’t have an imperial insignia. But by then, you’ve unlocked that era and can rift-gate to the earlier period, find an insignia then travel forwards in time to advance into the temple. It’s nicely done, and seeing the various cities and architecture change throughout the eras is fascinating.

Second, while there are five classes and a set number of skills, Last Epoch’s customisation comes from what they call skill specialisation. You choose which subset of skills you will specialise in, and doing so will grant points in a skill tree unique to that skill. Like the fireball? Specialise in it and you can advance in various ways - make it penetrate, give it larger explosion, fire three or even more at once, rapid fire them, or even turn it into a short-range flamethrower. How you choose your specialisation will determine how you play the game and the flexibility is very satisfying.

Loot specialisation is interesting too, with an always-available forge option, which allows you to add a variety of special effects to your gear, even mid-combat, which I definitely don’t recommend!

Last Epoch recently added multiplayer to what was previously a single-player experience and there are some rough edges as a result, but if you’re looking for something a little different, it’s definitely worth checking out.

And the rest

Wolcen [Steam]

Quite a slick looking ARPG with a nice story. Sadly, also quite a few bugs, particularly inventory slots suddenly becoming unavailable, stash not working, or gear not equipping. Some of the cut scenes are embarrassingly over-sexualised, but voice acting isn’t bad. This could have been a great ARPG, but there’s a general lack of inspiration overall - linear maps, no real quality of life in the interface, far less loot in general. One to consider when it’s on sale, perhaps. Note: was on GOG once upon a time, but was removed.

TitanQuest [Steam, GOG]

Can’t speak to this one, as I haven’t played it, but the Anniversary Edition gets good reviews on Steam, despite the visuals showing their age (despite only being a year older than Grim Dawn!). EDIT: I've had a few folk point out that the original game was actually released in 2006 - it was the Anniversary Edition that came out in 2016, so for a game well over 15 years old, it's actually looking pretty good!

Victor Vran [Steam, GOG]

A strong contender for “Something a little different”, because Victor Vran is more action than RPG. There’s no character progression as such, control is via gamepad, and customisation comes from whichever weapon you favour, and a series of “destiny cards” which grant a variety of buffs to help combat. Great graphics, satisfying (if occasionally grindy) combat and good voice acting, it’s definitely worth checking out.

Torchlight series [Steam, GOG]

It’s been a while since I played the first two, and I haven’t tried the third which gets poor reviews, nor the “Infinite” game that launched a few days ago. The first two games are definitely worth your time, however, although I did eventually become overwhelmed by the sheer amount of gear the game throws on the ground as you chew through the enemies. In fact, the devs introduced a mechanic whereby your pet will collect loot and return to town to sell it while you continue to accrue a never ending stream of gear!

Gatewalkers [Steam]

Launched at the start of the year, this showed promise, but was cut down by reviewers when it turned out there was no mouse-movement option. That option was quickly added, but the damage was done, and now it’s hard to know if this is worth a look. It’s still on my wishlist and I’ll give it a try someday, no doubt.

Albion Online [Steam]

A diablo-like? Well, kind of. I thought I’d mention it due to the isometric view, character movement and fighting mechanics, which are indeed quite diablo-like. But as an MMO, this is much more focused on gathering, crafting and guilds, so feel free to give this a pass if that’s not your bag.

And that’s it for this genre! Feel free to educate me on what I’ve missed in the comments. This is one of my favourite genres, so all suggestions are welcome!

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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About the author -
author picture
I'm Neil, an avid Linux user since 2006 and a Linux-only gamer since 2013. I used to contribute to GOL's Funding Crowd articles, but now contribute the odd article directly, most recently the Play It Now series, and the IYL articles.

I also occasionally dabble a bit in Python, I do Internet Security for a living and finally, I'm a big fan of Neil Degrasse Tyson. And not just because he has a cool first name.
See more from me
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50 comments
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slaapliedje May 23, 2023
Quoting: FSFmember
Quoting: slaapliedjeI am cruel to myself and play Diablo 1 on my Amiga!
I played it on PlayStation. Yeah I remember to this day how it was slowing down when there was too many effects/enemies on the same screen

Also Played with my friend (I had those back then... crazy idea ) and i was a mage. He was a warrior. Do you know what was constantly happening? :D yeah, he went on to smashing the skeletons with an axe and I fired a... surprise surprise... a Fireball that destroyed the skelly but also my warrior friend...
Naaah it wasn't a Schadenfreude or anything related I swear. haha the mage was simply so superior to the war class it was crazy AND the friendly fire couldn't be turned off - simply it was not posssible. Thus the co-op play was a test of friendship rather than an enjoyable experience, gotta admit
I think we all naturally like to remember the good, we feel nostalgia, but did you actually try to play some old games like diablo 1 recently? Boy they suck...

Current games are so much better!

Cheers
Ha, definitely made the game far more difficult from a strategic point of view. I mean if you're playing some RPG, generally speaking throwing something explosive into the midst of your friends and enemies, you don't turn off friendly fire either...
FSFmember May 23, 2023
Quoting: slaapliedjeHa, definitely made the game far more difficult from a strategic point of view. I mean if you're playing some RPG, generally speaking throwing something explosive into the midst of your friends and enemies, you don't turn off friendly fire either...
I see where you're coming from slaapliedje, but I won't buy it No let me explain. Off course I agree with you in general. But did you actually play Diablo 1 with a mage+warrior combo? You see, what you said is true for games like Divinity Original Sin 2 where you *can* influence your actions, your position on the map etc... In Diablo 1 on PlayStation, you simply pressed Fire button constantly and there was nowhere to go, because both players had to stay on the same screen (low real estate, nowhere to run. The game would NOT allow the other player to go off screen, so you had to keep close to each other) and it was hard to not off the warrior who was offing the same skellys. Sure, we managed, but the experience wasn't so much fun and that's why we play the games, aren't we? To have fun.

Cheers


Last edited by FSFmember on 23 May 2023 at 10:19 pm UTC
slaapliedje May 23, 2023
Quoting: FSFmember
Quoting: slaapliedjeHa, definitely made the game far more difficult from a strategic point of view. I mean if you're playing some RPG, generally speaking throwing something explosive into the midst of your friends and enemies, you don't turn off friendly fire either...
I see where you're coming from slaapliedje, but I won't buy it No let me explain. Off course I agree with you in general. But did you actually play Diablo 1 with a mage+warrior combo? You see, what you said is true for games like Divinity Original Sin 2 where you *can* influence your actions, your position on the map etc... In Diablo 1 on PlayStation, you simply pressed Fire button constantly and there was nowhere to go, because both players had to stay on the same screen (low real estate, nowhere to run) and it was hard to not off the warrior who was offing the same skellys. Sure, we managed, but the experience wasn't so much fun and that's why we play the games, aren't we? To have fun.

Cheers
Ha, no I can't say as I have ever played Diablo 1 on the PS1. I only played it on the PC back in the day, and only a few times multiplayer, but it was on LAN, and so we each had our own screens.

That's just a bad game design like that.

Divinity Original Sin; my brother and I played on Linux, and it took him a bit to understand that his flame spell would follow wherever he moved his cursor, so he learned to NOT have it go over our characters, as it'd kill us every damn time!
FSFmember May 23, 2023
Quoting: slaapliedjebut it was on LAN, and so we each had our own screens.
That would've been heaven! in Diablo!
Quoting: slaapliedjeThat's just a bad game design like that.
exaclty. But truth be told they were limited by the hardware on PlayStation off course... So they didn't have much choice, the game hardly ran as it were haha But yea I don't want to spam a lot I could talk all night
Quoting: slaapliedjeDivinity Original Sin; my brother and I played on Linux, and it took him a bit to understand that his flame spell would follow wherever he moved his cursor, so he learned to NOT have it go over our characters, as it'd kill us every damn time!
ahhaaha Yea but you see - How did you like the game? I think Divinity OS 2 to be one of the best if not the best RPG ever made. Maybe Baldurs Gate 3 will triumph that, we'll see. What are your thoughts though? as I only play that in Single Player.

Apologies I'm not sure if this is too much OT in which case MODS feel free to moderate myself

Cheers


Last edited by FSFmember on 23 May 2023 at 10:27 pm UTC
slaapliedje May 25, 2023
Quoting: FSFmemberahhaaha Yea but you see - How did you like the game? I think Divinity OS 2 to be one of the best if not the best RPG ever made. Maybe Baldurs Gate 3 will triumph that, we'll see. What are your thoughts though? as I only play that in Single Player.

Apologies I'm not sure if this is too much OT in which case MODS feel free to moderate myself

Cheers
We were waiting to beat the first one to try the second one; unfortunately we haven't beaten the first one yet. Been a long while since we were able to get together to play it, as you could play that locally on the same computer, and it acts weird online since we have to use steam remote play (my brother needs better internet).

I haven't bought the early version of BG3 yet... been waiting for the full release.

Probably the best RPG I've ever played is either Ultima IV or Alternate Reality (shame it was never finished).
FSFmember May 26, 2023
Quoting: slaapliedje
Quoting: FSFmemberahhaaha Yea but you see - How did you like the game? I think Divinity OS 2 to be one of the best if not the best RPG ever made. Maybe Baldurs Gate 3 will triumph that, we'll see. What are your thoughts though? as I only play that in Single Player.

Apologies I'm not sure if this is too much OT in which case MODS feel free to moderate myself

Cheers
We were waiting to beat the first one to try the second one; unfortunately we haven't beaten the first one yet.
I recommend skipping it and starting D:OS 2.
I think it's just so much better - never finished the first game either. Stopped in Act 1 actually. D:OS2 on the other hand... charmed.


Last edited by FSFmember on 26 May 2023 at 10:37 am UTC
slaapliedje May 26, 2023
Quoting: FSFmember
Quoting: slaapliedje
Quoting: FSFmemberahhaaha Yea but you see - How did you like the game? I think Divinity OS 2 to be one of the best if not the best RPG ever made. Maybe Baldurs Gate 3 will triumph that, we'll see. What are your thoughts though? as I only play that in Single Player.

Apologies I'm not sure if this is too much OT in which case MODS feel free to moderate myself

Cheers
We were waiting to beat the first one to try the second one; unfortunately we haven't beaten the first one yet.
I recommend skipping it and starting D:OS 2.
I think it's just so much better - never finished the first game either. Stopped in Act 1 actually. D:OS2 on the other hand... charmed.
Once we figured out how to not burn each other, the first one was very fun. We are quite far into it. Also, a little happier, that one got a native Linux port, whereas part 2 did not.
Iggi Nov 30, 2023
Quoting: CyrilDevilutionX is a gem, I keep hope for something similar for Diablo II, that would be huge!
The good news is that there are a few reimplementations already - just have a look at the list on https://osgameclones.com/diablo-ii/!

The bad news that none of them seems to be very far. If you still want to try: Riiablo probably is the farthest one (at least it was when I tried out all of them ~ one year ago, but my impression when looking at the project pages is that this hasn't changed)
Cyril Dec 2, 2023
Quoting: Iggi
Quoting: CyrilDevilutionX is a gem, I keep hope for something similar for Diablo II, that would be huge!
The good news is that there are a few reimplementations already - just have a look at the list on https://osgameclones.com/diablo-ii/!

The bad news that none of them seems to be very far. If you still want to try: Riiablo probably is the farthest one (at least it was when I tried out all of them ~ one year ago, but my impression when looking at the project pages is that this hasn't changed)

I know very well this site, but unfortunately none of these projects is really active...
Riiablo is the only one with recent commits (less than a year ago), but it's a pitty it's in Java though.
So playing Diablo II on Linux natively it's not for now...

But I keep hope, one day we'll have something great!
VCMI (for Heroes III) was in hiatus for years (nearly 6 years between the 0.99 and 1.0 release), and look at his activity now and how good the project is!
slaapliedje Dec 4, 2023
Quoting: Cyril
Quoting: Iggi
Quoting: CyrilDevilutionX is a gem, I keep hope for something similar for Diablo II, that would be huge!
The good news is that there are a few reimplementations already - just have a look at the list on https://osgameclones.com/diablo-ii/!

The bad news that none of them seems to be very far. If you still want to try: Riiablo probably is the farthest one (at least it was when I tried out all of them ~ one year ago, but my impression when looking at the project pages is that this hasn't changed)

I know very well this site, but unfortunately none of these projects is really active...
Riiablo is the only one with recent commits (less than a year ago), but it's a pitty it's in Java though.
So playing Diablo II on Linux natively it's not for now...

But I keep hope, one day we'll have something great!
VCMI (for Heroes III) was in hiatus for years (nearly 6 years between the 0.99 and 1.0 release), and look at his activity now and how good the project is!
I'm definitely hoping that one day I'll be able to play through Diablo 1 and 2 on my Vampire Amiga! DevilutionX works great on it.
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