In the year 2000…Day 4 with Diablo 2!

It’s day 4 of Blizzard Entertainments website stunt!  Each day Blizzard is releasing a new splash page highlighting one of their games as they count down, or up, to their new title being announced on Seoul, South Korea on the 19th.  So far I have recounted my fond memories of Warcraft I/II and StarCraft.  Now it’s time to move into the year 2000 with Diablo 2.  I hope you’ll “Stay awhile and listen”.

Quite possibly one of the most anticipated titles of the millennium, Diablo 2 soared into households everywhere.  This was the continuation to the most epic and overplayed adventure RPG of the known world.  So of course I absolutely had to have a copy.  By this time my brother and I had really become gamers and we each had our own PC and thus our own copy of Diablo 2.  I remember trying to decide which character I would pick because now there were five to choose from!  I picked a Barbarian and Graev went with the Druid.

The game looked amazing!  Most noticeably Act II with the desert landscapes was just amazing.  From bug tunnels and horadric cubes to jungles with little scary goblins, Diablo 2 seemed to possess everything an adventurer wanted.  It wasn’t long before we had beaten the story of the game and began our level and “gear grind”.  Graev stopped playing around the time it became a grind because he’s more into the story and flow of a RPG whereas I can be happy for a while doing anything.  Since we created our characters on the secure servers of Bnet we were able to take them and play with others.

With the expansion they added a whole new act for players to lose themselves in.  This was the snowy area most notably known for housing Baal, Lord of Destruction.    Something I’ll never forget is the countless hours spent doing “Baal runs”.  A group of adventurers would rush to Baal and see who could grab the most loot when he died.  Good times.

I think I spent a good two years playing D2 on and off.  It was a great game and it surprises me that people are still playing it religiously.  Day 5 tomorrow looks to be a great day when I recount my love for Warcraft 3.