Diablo2

[StunGunz]

If any of you were waiting for, or thinking of buying Diablo2 any time soon I suggest you wait. It seems Blizzard was both unprepared for the number of players (considering there were close to 1 million presold), and irresponsible enough to have decided to use Exodus servers making it next to impossible to play. Its just as fun and exiting as the origional, but not being to complete any of the quests because the server craps out every 10-20 min takes away from the enjoyment. So for those who are waiting , wait a little bit more, your not missing anything ,yet.

[Tiretool]

Thanks for the update StunGunz. Could you share your source for this info? I'm sure it would be an interesting read.
I heard something about this issue about 4 months ago in a gaming mag. They were beta testing and trying out the server and swore that the online gaming servers would be awesome... seems they might have jumped the gun eh?

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tiretool@pcmech.com

[hackercarlos]

Thanks for the info StunGunz

[Prader Willi]

I've read two reviews of Diablo II that say it is an awesome game-- but that the online gaming at Battlenet is unstable.

See: http://firingsquad.gamers.com/games/diablo2/
this review provided the following con:

Cons
Battle.lag sucks. The one area where I can proudly say and always be believed that my character isn't hacked, cheated or otherwise modified, and it's a pain in the ass to play there. Battle.net was TOTALLY unready for primetime, despite similar disasters occurring with EverQuest and Ultima Online. The stress test was there for a reason, wasn't it Blizzard?

Also, the new PCgamer reviewed Diablo II-- gave it a 94 rating but also found Battle.net to be pretty bad.

[StunGunz]

As for the actual number of presold, that number was one I got second hand, and should be treated as such. However I was unfortunate enough to have purchased it when it came out, and have been unable to start a game on their server that lasted more than five minutes. The Exodus server that Blizzard has chosen happens to be the same company from which Verent/Sony moved its Everquest, Tanarus, and other online games from, due to their inability or unwillingness to address problems which affected the games. As for battle.Net I have no idea what their problems are, but from what some have explained to me, they're a part of the problem too. Too bad to, because Diablo2 is as good if not better than the first...If only I could play.

[Xayd]

Yeah, I jumped on battle.net last night to hit the support room with a bug for an old Warcraft version, and it hasn't changed much over the years. If anything has gotten worse.

I liked Diablo as a game, I just can't tolerate Diablo people. I'm sitting there in one of the public rooms and some jackass 12 year old is flooding for a good two or three minutes, and people just ignore that type of stuff.

Not to mention the fact that as soon as I log on my firewall lights up with port scans and telnet attempts.

Blizzard makes great games, but they haven't learned much from, or don't care to correct their previous mistakes.

Xayd

[PCNUBY]

Why don't ppl just go on open b.net? You can still have a good time online over there....and there isnt a lot of hacking going around...yet. and single player is just as fun to play.

[wedor]

Blizzard themselves posted the number, 1.5 million presold. I was a stress tester, the test started out choppy but by the end was quite smooth. I have played games for hours, but haven't bothered lately, there are too many people clogging up the system presently. That and I am not a big MP player I prefer solo play or play MP with people I know. It is not necessary to use bnet for MP, you can play MP using the TCP/IP area in the game, if one player has a large amount of RAM they can host the game and 4 others can join. I have played a bit of MP with my son in this fashion.

[StunGunz]

When you were part of the stress test Blizzard performed, was it true they set up parameters so as to give themselves the false impression that everything was "go"?

[wedor]

How so?

[Linus]

Hi,

I want to confess. I set up a home network specifically to play diablo. However, I do not feel guilty neither do I regret a single cent. Thinking of adding more RAM on my 96MB machines as soon as prices go down. I was on a RAM budget you see. But i seem to stall for a few seconds whenever i go to a new place. For all DiabloII fans, some advice. If you can;t wait for battle.net, buy a hub, some network cards and get a couple of friends, and there, you got an army to fight. It is really worth it. http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif

[G]

Hi all,

I was wandering through the messages and most of them about B.net are disturbingly wright. I did not play Diablo (cause here in Holland everthing was sold) but my experience with B.net does count.

What Linus said about the local LAN is the best way. I played unnumerous hours on B.net with Starcraft. When mostly I won a game my computer was being HACKED. Unfortunetly not without missing some important files (win.com, starcraft.exe etc.)Then I installed a firewall and added a portscanfilter, Problem with this that is slowed my connenction and even more it slowed down my whole system. So playing was not in for it anymore. This is my experience with B.net.
SO BE CAREFULL!

Regards,

Gijs

[Spiffman]

Diablo2 on battle.net is terrible. It is a frantic nightmare upon itself. Everything that i used to think of battle.net from my days in the Professional Gaming League (AMD sponsored) for StarCraft, all of those impressions were smashed. Luckily I don't have much desire to play on the "Realm Servers" anyway. Its not possible with a medium-range system anyway. Hardly is on single player. That is my biggest complaint. I'm on a nice AMDK6-2/400 system with a RIVA TNT 2 32MB. Not a bad setup. Plays some games very very well. Diablo2 gives me 10 frames per second though. This is terrible considering had I bought a Voodoo Banshee 16MB, I could run glide and get 60fps. Now I'm looking for a cheap banshee just so this game will be playable at all! Once I get the new thunderbird that I just bought off of these very forums (or rather, my cousin, Floppyman got it for me), hopefully it will run a lot better (got a new board, new power supply, new everything). If it doesn't, I'll be waiting for a patch to fix it. For now I'll stick with HL, CS, UT, and Q3Ademo.

Thanks a lot Blizzard (angry voice).

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Spiƒƒ
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[Tiretool]

You just made my mind up about buying D2. I believe I'll be waiting.

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Life: Sexually transmitted, always fatal.

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tiretool@pcmech.com

[wedor]

I haven't been to bnet recently, when I was a stress tester it started out bad but then improved. After the game came out it was really bad again. I don't really play alot of MP in general except for a few friends and relatives. My lag has been bad( never used to be)lately. I am having DSL installed tomorrow and will probably re-install Win98 about the same time, then I'll try the on-line part again, but more than likely not through bnet. With sufficient RAM you can host your own small(4 player) games on-line without bnet, so with a faster connection I'm going to give it a try again. I had trouble earlier but I think it lies within my own system not the game.

[theENiGMA]

I've never actually used battlenet, but I play Diablo II twice a week at a LAN party that my friends and I have. That game is absolutely cool! I much prefer playing over a LAN to playing over a modem anyway. You can here the other people in your party. I do find the lagg whenever you enter a new area annoying, but it makes sense. The computer is doing an awful lot of stuff, controlling all the monsters and such. It took us forever to get into Tal Rasha's tomb, because we would go in, and die in two seconds or so from the summoner standing at the door. We don't find out we've died until eight seconds later when the lagg ends of course. Oh well!
-KEiTH


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Well, I'm off to go look for myself. If I should get back before I return, tell myself to wait for me.

[Linus]

Hi,

Concerning the lag while playing diablo2 on LAN. I managed to alleviate that problem. On my cel675(75mhz) I reverted back to 66 fsb and o/c the RAM to 2/3.

On my cel500, I had to increase the RAM to 160 (64+64+32) Take away all unnecesary programs, and not make it a host.

On my friends P3, he added more RAm and o/c it too to 2/3. He also cleared his registry and resource needing programs.

It still freezed, but it wasn't that bad. Hopefully you have at least 128 MB of good ram.

Most of my diablo2 friends compliained mostly of RAM problems. Got a friend who brings his pentium2-300, still manages to play with us with 256MB ram without any problems.

[StunGunz]

My suggestion that Blizzard doctored the stress test came from the statements of three individuals I know through other games, who were also a part of the stress test. They said more than a few features were locked out, and the number of players at any time was regulated soemhow. I am unsure of the validity of these complaints, but each of these people have been on countless other beta tests, and at the time I had no reason not to trust their statements. Plus you add in a new parent company looking to make their stock holders happy, and voila! you have the nightmare that is Blizzards D2... I love Diablo, and so I'll keep trying, but from now on I am sure I'll wait until Blizzard games hit the 5$ bin before I'll try another one.

[wedor]

You are right about the limits on some parts. Player number was limited to 4 and some of the graphics were disabled like armor graphics. I don't think this was done to give them a false sense of security but rather to limit the size of the needed download, it was 100 megs, more goodies would have unnecessarily bloated it. Also only a limited number of skills were available( the first ones on each page). Again I think this was due more to size problems than "manipulation". I find your decision to put off buying Blizzard products because of this situation a bit bizzare, I for one do not buy into the coporate "conspiracy" theories and don't think they maliciously or intentionally did anything wrong. I personally don't intend to "punish" them for miscalculations and at worst wishful thinking by hoping everything was going to work out. I can't believe for a second that they really don't care about bnet. And I can't believe anyone suggesting that it would not be in their best interest to have it working properly. Why would they leave it broken? what would that help? I had heard( from my own reliable sources) that some of the trouble lie in the fact that the were using unfamiliar servers and technology.

[theENiGMA]

Besides, they always put the updates for any bugs on their website. It's not like you can't get the fixes. They were very quick to fix some minor problems with D2. Waiting to buy it later won't really make it work any better then.
-KEiTH


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Well, I'm off to go look for myself. If I should get back before I return, tell myself to wait for me.