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DIABLO 2: EXPANSION - LORD OF DESTRUCTION
The party's just started - play Baal...
By WILL BARKER
"Nay, cannot be -- my last breath cometh *cough*. What about the
Lord of Destruction? Thou canst stop the walking dead.... *cough* To believe
so is folly....
"And, stricken
-- twas nought chance the Great Bard could be saved... Adieu, mon frere..."
Indeed, there was
a bit of a scene at the 7-11 store when my good pal William Shakespeare
dropped like a sack of potatoes into an extra large raspberry and licorice
slurpee.
The effect was rather
distressing.
After the paramedic
arrived, we used the Great Bard's body as a makeshift couch and completely
forgot about the world's greatest playwright's dying words.
Instead we had more
pressing matters to attend, though things got a bit smelly after a few
hours gametime...
The
expansion to Diablo 2 was loaded up on my laptop - the one thing Shakespeare
couldn't obtain before dying. Poetic justice at it's finest! I never did
like his insultingly bitter humour anyway... And what's with that neolithic
haircut?
But the Bard did
see something of significance in his death throes - Baal. While Diablo
was finally defeated in Diablo 2, Baal continues the dark crusade to unlock
the doors to hell itself. The Lord of Destruction has managed to reclaim
the soulstone from the weak-willed Marius and is now heading for Mount
Arreat where the the Worldstone resides - the one item Baal needs to initiate
an unholy armageddon.
 The expansion
pack to Diablo 2 arrived with very little fanfare, but I'm laying my cards
on the table right now - this game is infinitely better than the original.
While that's not to say Diablo 2 was a bad game, it's just that the original
game, when compared to the expansion, pales somewhat.
Speaking of which,
let's start with the new items. There are now a whole slew of character
specific items, like the spiked toilet-brush +2. On top of this there
are now elite items, which are better than all the unique
and exceptional items, of which there are new variants, too. There
are new item sets, weapons, armour, rings and so on. Plus, now you can
socket magical weapons, which includes all of the above super-specials.
Your stash is now
bigger and, for the slow, this means you can store more. You can now equip
two different weapons combinations, which is quite handy. For instance,
you may be shooting icy arrows at a bunch of swamp-dwellers when all of
sudden they're outnumbering and surrounding you. In this case, you just
cast molten boulder and watch them bleed to death. Mua... muahahah! Oh,
wrong train of thought...
Blizzard saw fit
to include two new characters, the Assassin, who is crap and comes with
sucky specials, and the Druid who rocks the house with a plethora of well-thought
out skills. Granted, the Assassin does have a few neat tricks up her bloomers,
like her nasty shadow discipline finishing moves and all her cosmic
judo kicks.
However, her trap
spells suck and, while the desciptions tout them as uber-powerful, they're
actually about as helpful as a punch in the face on a cold, windy day.
 The Druid worships
Mother Nature and, as such, can use the elements to his advantage. He
can cast fire, ice and wind spells, such as molten boulder, tornado and
ice blast. He is adept in the arcane arts of lycanthropy,
too. This enables him
to transform into a wolf and, later on, a bear.
The Druid is also
friends with animals, like Dr. Doolittle. He can summon crows, wolves,
bears and even deadly creeper vines that suck the lifeforce from unsuspecting
souls, arr-arrr!
Other new features
comprise the inclusion of jewels, which can be socketed, only they imbue
more powers than gems, like faster run/walk, +20 attack rating, 2-5
fire damage, for instance.
Runes act the same
way as jewels, in that you can socket them into armour and weapons and
they have more properties than the lowly gems. Moreover, if you insert
matching runes, they will give you even more power. Charms are also new
to the expansion and they only have be kept in your inventory for you
to gain bonuses. Not bad, eh?
But wait, there's
more! Now hirelings (the people you hire i.e. rogues) are much
more important. Why? Because they also go up in levels, can be equipped
by the player and can even be resurrected. For example, when first starting
out in the expansion, after choosing the Druid, I equipped my rogue with
a bow of poison. How could I afford this at the start of the game with
no money? I lied, but the example was okay, right?
 As far as the
new environments are concerned, be prepared to be awed by the snowy highlands.
But more than that, it's devilishly difficult, so you'd best pack ye olde
shotgun of redemp-shun.
If you start a new
adventure you'll have to play through the entire game, then beat Diablo,
to access the new levels.
However, if you
got a pre-saved character whose beaten Diablo you can just import them
to the expansion. The new level contains six new quests and a bunch of
new monsters and end bosses. The difficulty has obviously been ramped
up, but this is a good thing for gun players like me who find it hard
to lose (he loses at connect four - Ed).
One of the biggest
criticisms leveled at Blizzard were the graphics, or lack thereof. They're
nice, but very dated and there was a public outcry for an increased screen
resolution. 640x480 is so 1995...
Now you can jack
up the rez to 800x600 and while it may sound like a small increase, it
makes a world of difference to the game. The new spell effects, especially
the Druid's armageddon and tornado, add much-needed eye-candy to the 2D-based
game as well.
At the end of the
day, this expansion makes Diablo 2 a more complete game. Realistically,
the lazy programmers at Blizzard should have put these features into the
original, seeing as it only took four years to make. But releasing
them now, with two new characters and the huge act five, is a boon to
all gamers. If you've got Diablo 2, you should think long and hard about
picking this up. It's the icing+2 on a very tasty cake.
ORIGINALITY 70%
SOUND/GRAPHICS 75%
PLAYABILITY 90%
ADDICTION 95%
ENJOYMENT 90%
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