Diablo II
Multiplayer
Latest patch is currently version 1.13d.
Patching to version 1.12a is recommended for the use of the high resolution patch, however official Battle.net play will not be available, as that requires the latest patch.
Run game without CD
As of patch 1.12, the game officially supports running with no CD. Some newer copies of the game are set up to run with no CD by default.
For older copies of the game, you will need to do the following:
- Perform a "full" installation (not a minimal install) of Diablo II (and Lord of Destruction if applicable).
- Install patch 1.12 or later.
- Copy any .MPQ files from your Diablo II (and LoD, if applicable) discs to your Diablo II install directory. Ignore any files that already exist. For most users, you will only need to copy "D2Music.mpq" from the Play disc (LoD owners should also copy "D2xMusic.mpq" from the LoD disc).
- If you have a Mac, rename "D2Music.mpq" to "Diablo II Music". (If you have LoD, also rename "D2xMusic.mpq" to "Diablo II Expansion Music". Note that the Mac version is not compatible with OSX 10.7 Lion or later.)
Alternatively, if you register your CD keys on the Battle.net website, you can download disc-free installers, even if you have lost the discs themselves.
Note that, although there is no limit to how many computers you can install the game to, only one computer can be logged in to Battle.net with a given CD key at a time.
Command-line arguments
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
| -w | Runs the game in windowed mode (also fixes slow start on Vista/7) |
| -ns | No Sound |
| -skiptobnet | Connects to closed Battle.net on start |
| -nofixaspect | (windowed mode only) Disables the 4:3 ratio lock otherwise enforced when maximizing the game window. |
In-game commands
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| /fps | Shows diagnostic information such as FPS, memory usage and latency |
| /nopickup | Disables picking up of items unless ALT (show items) is held |
| /soundchaosdebug | Fills out the available amount of sound channels with all sounds found in Diablo 2 |
| /players X | where X is 1 to 8, changes the "player count" (to increase difficulty and experience gain) to the set amount (single player and local network play only) |
High resolution support
Unfortunately there is no official high-resolution support for Diablo 2 - 800x600 is the highest available, but you can stretch this using windowed mode, with a fixed ratio (see the Command-line arguments section on how to disable that).
However, there is a utility (3rd party launcher) provides a menu to launch the game at any resolution (above the default 640 x 480). Only works with the outdated patch, version 1.12a.
Windows: Graphical Glitches and/or slowdowns in full screen mode, even a newer PC
Run the Video Test again, skip it if you haven't changed graphics card since last time, and select the DirectDraw renderer instead. Unfortunately you will lose the perspective option, but it's an overall increase in FPS and smoothness - not to mention the experience bar is not offset like it is with Direct3D. Alternatively you can get a Glide wrapper for Diablo 2 - these usually translate the Glide calls into more common calls such as OpenGL or Direct3D, in a more efficient manner than the integrated Direct3D renderer would, resulting in a good-looking and graphics accelerated game.
Better performance with Glide wrapper
Diablo II supports three different rendering modes: DirectDraw, Direct3D and Glide. DirectDraw offers the worst performance, and does not support perspective effects. Direct3D offers better performance but causes color issues on many newer machines. Glide offers the best performance of them all, no color issues, and improved ground textures to boot, but is not natively compatible with non-3DFX graphics cards. However, there are many "Glide wrappers" that emulate Glide in OpenGL. The most popular of these is Sven's Glide Wrapper, which was specifically designed for this game; other general-purpose Glide wrappers that work with multiple games are also available.
- Download the latest version of Sven's Glide Wrapper, and extract it to your Diablo II install directory.
- Run glide-init.exe. Click the "Deutsch-English" button to switch the menu language to English.
- Click the "Query OpenGL-infos" button. A video test should run.
- Click "Renderer", then set "texture-memory" to the recommended value.
- Click "Test". A video test should run. Assuming it runs correctly, you can exit now.
- Run D2VidTst.exe. Several video tests should run; afterwards, it should prompt you to choose between the three graphics modes. Select "Glide".
- Launch Diablo II. Note that the Glide wrapper sets the gamma to maximum by default; you may wish to go into the options menu and set it to a more reasonable value.
Additional useful Sven's Glide Wrapper settings
- Settings - window-mode: The readme file itself recommends not to use this; use the "-w" command-line parameter instead. This is because of a bug where the mouse jumps around the screen if you open the inventory via the keyboard. However, some window-mode-specific settings may only work if you have this setting enabled.
- Settings - captured mouse: if you are running in a window, or in fullscreen with a second monitor attached, this will lock the mouse cursor to the game screen. If you are running in fullscreen on your only monitor, this will have no effect.
- Settings - keep aspect ratio: turn this on if you have a widescreen monitor, and are running in a window or have "Desktop Resolution" on, to force the game to display in 4:3 letterbox rather than stretched.
- Settings - window extras: turning this on will allow you to resize the window in windowed mode.
- Settings - refreshrate: if you are running in fullscreen mode and are having problems, try setting this to the refresh rate of your monitor.
- Settings - desktopresolution: in fullscreen mode, this makes it so that, instead of changing the output resolution of your graphics card, the game is scaled up to that resolution. This can decrease performance, so it's recommended to turn this on if and only if your monitor has trouble displaying 640x480 and/or 800x600 resolutions (some TFT monitors have this problem), or if you want to use bilinear filtering.
- Renderer - 32 bit rendering: turn this on if and only if your graphics card has trouble rendering 16-bit color.
- Renderer - bilinear filtering: if "Settings - desktopresolution" is enabled, this can increase image quality at the expense of performance.
- Renderer - supersampling: if "Extensions - WGL_ARB_render_texture" is enabled, this can increase image quality at the expense of performance.
- Renderer - shader-gamma: in window mode, this will make the gamma setting only affect the Diablo II window. Also, try this setting if you are trying to take screenshots, but they come out lighter or darker than what is displayed on screen. However, this reduces performance.
- Renderer - keep desktop composition: under Windows Vista/7, this will stop the game from disabling Aero effects. This can decrease performance.
- Extensions - usually all of these should be enabled, except for the ones listed as unsupported. The main exception is "WGL_ARB_render_texture", which increases the image quality if "Desktop Resolution" is activated or if you are running in windowed mode and have changed the window size, at the expense of performance. If you are having problems, try disabling extensions.
Mouse lag/low FPS in single player
Diablo II caps the framerate at 25fps in single player mode; some users have reported that this causes mouse lag. Multiplayer mode does not have this cap. A workaround is to create a password-protected "Other Multiplayer" game; "Other Multiplayer" characters are shared with single-player mode. You need not be connected to the Internet or a LAN to do this, and nobody will be able to join your game unless you give them your IP address and password. However, unlike in single-player mode, the map will be randomly regenerated each time you play (though you can still transport between any waypoints you've visited).
Battle.net Verify Error
If you are unable to connect to Battle.net on Windows Vista or Windows 7, the problem is that the installation folder is a location which requires administrator access (i.e. the default install location, C:\Program Files\). To fix this, either run the game with administrator access (right click on link, click on "Run as administrator") or install the game to a non-protected folder (such as "My Documents").
Save files
Battle.net Realm characters are stored in the cloud and are tied to your Battle.net account; however, they are only accessible on the realm (server) on which they were created (US-East, US-West, etc). They are not playable in single-player, LAN, Open Battle.net, or direct-IP-connection online play. Realm characters expire after 90 days of inactivity; to reset the inactivity timer, you will need to perform basic activity, such as buying or selling an item or killing a monster. In addition, newly created Realm characters expire after 10 days unless they are played for at least 2 hours during those 10 days. "Open" (non-Realm) characters are used for single-player, LAN, Open Battle.net, and direct-IP-connection online play; they are not playable on the Battle.net Realms. They are stored locally in the "save" directory in your DII install directory. Note that there is no hack protection for Open characters.
Battle.net accounts
"Legacy" Battle.net accounts (for Diablo II, WarCraft II, WarCraft III and StarCraft) are not the same as Battle.net 2.0 accounts (for Diablo III, StarCraft II and World of WarCraft). Even if you have one of the latter, you will still need to create one of the former in order to play Diablo II on Battle.net. You can create the account in-game. Up to eight characters can be created per account, but there is no limit on the number of accounts you can have. You do not have to buy a separate copy of the game for each account. However, if you installed Diablo II on multiple computers using the same CD key, only one of those computers can be connected to Battle.net at one time.
Where to buy
All Blizzard games bought from retail contains serial keys that will activate the game on a Blizzard account. These can be used to download installers from their website.
Available digitally from Blizzard Store:
Mods
- Median XL 2012 - A total conversion mod for Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction that modifies the game by replacing character skills, improving items and monsters, and adding new uberquests. (1.13c compatible)
- PlugY - A mod that adds infinitive and shared storage along with other features.