6 ms·

If anyone is looking to play a modern version of Diablo 2, the spiritual successor is probably more a game called Path of Exile (rather than Diablo 3 or this).

If anyone is looking to play a modern version of Diablo 2, the spiritual successor is probably more a game called Path of Exile (rather than Diablo 3 or this). The developers managed to capture the aesthetic while improving the game in the direction of what gave the original game its replay-ability. Their development cycle of new content every 3 or 4 months with a league reset is unique and keeps things fresh. They're additionally not too monetized. It's a good company with probably more of a future than a Diablo 2 remaster.

phone8675309 6y ago
If you want something in the vein of Diablo 2 but with a different aesthetic (and not always online) then try Torchlight 2.
- bloodorange 6y ago
  While Torchlight and Torchlight 2 have a lot of "quality of life" improvements and are decent games in general, I've found that they lack the replay value which Diablo 2 (with LOD) has. I can't exactly say why but this is how it felt to me.
  - eru 6y ago
    You might have been older when you played Torchlight 2 than when you played Diablo 2?
    - bloodorange 6y ago
      I'm afraid, to me, that doesn't seem like sufficient explanation. Now, given a choice, even with outdated graphics, I'd rather play Diablo 2 than play Torchlight 2.
      - eru 6y ago
        Games seem more magic when we are younger.
- minimaxir 6y ago
  Torchlight requires mods to be playable. The recent rereleases of Torchlight 2 for console (even with some QoL additions) that did not support mods were...not good.
  - m463 6y ago
    what? that's ridiculous. I've played torchlight 1 & 2, on both mac and pc. They were both high quality and very well done. There was no evident shortcomings that required mods to fix
    - minimaxir 6y ago
      More skill/loot balance than the general presentation.
rubyskills 6y ago
Btw, I think you can play a diablo 1 remaster inside of diablo 3. I think you can only do this at the beginning of a season reset though.
- lholden 6y ago
  I didn't know that, cool!
  - soneil 6y ago
    "the darkening of Tristram" is what you want to google for. It's every January. I'm not sure I'd call it a remaster, but it's novel.
TT3351 6y ago
Grim Dawn is another alternative, without much of PoE's online functionality
- lholden 6y ago
  I really enjoy Grim Dawn. I'm sad that the game is finally "finished" and will no longer be getting update patches. The developer gave the game a good 4 years of post release content though!
  - wh4t3v3r 6y ago
    What do you mean? The game is being updated. Last update was in January this year...
- dylanz 6y ago
  Grim Dawn is absolutely amazing. I tried playing PoE but it felt so fake. Grim Dawn is raw and dark, the dual class system is awesome, and that’s exactly what I was looking for.
Const-me 6y ago
I wonder how it’s free? I know two business models for free things, pay to win micro-transactions like EA and selling out user’s data like FB, and I’m not a fan of either of them.
- throwaway13337 6y ago
  I am with you. Subscription services align customer and developer interests best. That said, the second best modern model is probably theirs. They sell stash tab space (item storage) and cosmetic items only. They do not play psychological games that many free to play games do. I imagine that when their revenue starts to slip, they may go down the more dubious road as is the normal pattern. But for now, it has my approval.
  - hertzrat 6y ago
    I haven’t played hots in years now, but there were loot boxes last I saw. The system also encourages you to spend in game gold to get better loot box contents, but you need that gold to avoid paying real money for new heroes. Those new heroes were usually overpowered on release, or at least, nobody knew how to counter them, so they were great for peoples mmr. I wish it had just been pay to play with optional costumes for sale.
    - Tenoke 6y ago
      I played hots and it wasn't bad at all. New heroes would be first ban pick in ranked when overpowered anyway, and they usually stayed like that a couple of weeks until they were balanced. I'm completely fine with that monetization since you still can't beat better players with money and you can still do everything without spending a penny. You at most get a tiny MMR inflation for a week or two if you buy every new hero on release (which wasnt even that often) and that was nowhere near enough to jump a higher league. Hell, given that it still didn't make them enough money maybe it was too little monetization..
  - Const-me 6y ago
    Interesting. I’ll give it a shot once I reach lvl60 in wow classic.
vlahmot 6y ago
The downside to that development cycle is that there is an overwhelming number of league mechanics, particularly for new players.
Espionage724 6y ago
I've heard Path of Exile suggested plenty of times, and personally I just couldn't get into it. Notably back when Diablo III was still fresh, lots of people suggested PoE. To me, D3 felt more of an arcade-like game that I can quickly jump into and have fun, whereas PoE is more of an efficiency and numbers game. Like it's fun, but I just don't have that sense of being "powerful". I gradually progressed up until Act 5 in PoE (before they added Acts beyond that) and never really felt like I was all that powerful. There were some challenges here and there, but most things just died in some boring manner. However with Diablo II as I recall, that's pretty much the same ordeal up until a certain point. I may re-visit PoE at some point this year before D2:R to see if or how things have changed.
- enraged_camel 6y ago
  PoE is good, but there are three things that annoy me about it. First, the non-traditional currency system. There's no gold; instead you have different types of "orbs" of varying rarity. Vendors have different exchange rates for some of them, but the system is generally difficult to grok, especially for a newcomer. To make matters even more confusing, orbs themselves are useful, e.g. they can enhance item stats, upgrade items to higher quality, etc. and you need to be careful to not accidentally continue using orbs yourself when you'd be much better off trading them. Which brings me to trade. There's no centralized auction house - instead you need to rely on a third-party website where items are listed by other players. The process of listing them is done via an in-game API I think - but then once you find an item you want, you need to whisper that player, then go meet them at their hideout and manually do a trade. Just an absolutely atrocious system overall. The third one is the zoom level. The game feels like it plays at 800p, or maybe 1024p, and there's no way to zoom out further. Unacceptable for a game that is two decades more recent than Diablo 2, imo.
  - washadjeffmad 6y ago
    They also didn't have colorblind-friendly options for the longest time. I used to joke GGG was so hardcore even their accessibility feature had a difficulty level.
- 6y ago
Shadonototro 6y ago
Path of Exile is the best ARPG ever made, i don't game that much anymore, but when i feel the need to play a game, it's PoE, every 3 months they release an new "league" where they reset the economy and add bunch of new content! It's just a great game, ton of theorycrafting and items to collect, give it a try!(
prepend 6y ago
This would be a fun game if it wasn’t Free to Play. I wish they would just charge $50 and not optimize for whales and engagement. Diablo 1 and 2 did this and made tons of money.
regularemployee 6y ago
Having been hooked on Diablo 2 in high school, I made the terrible decision of playing Path of Exile (POE) last year during thanks giving break (cuz we had 5 days off, I thought hey maybe I can play POE for a few days). Since then, I have been playing POE non stop. I'd wake up at 3am and play until 8pm. I'd drink alot of water before going to bed so I can wake up early to play. I stopped caring about work, I just played the game. To complete my work tasks, I hacked together my tasks in 30 mins before the end of the sprint with some of the shittiest code I've ever written. Somewhere along this journey I decided that the only way I can stop my addiction is to completely finish it. I spent around 12k buying stuff for the game. The way it works is... you play to find and collect "currency" in the game. But instead of spending the time, I buy in game "currency" from other players. Its frowned upon and getting caught will get you banned, but part of me secretly wished my account would get banned so I could quit. I never got banned, so I got bolder and eventually I was spending $800 / day. This week, I finally feel like I have finished the game. It finally got boring after building my character to the point where I could breeze through everything in the game. I was finally able to work this week and correct the bugs I introduced and get back to focusing on work. I have yet to digest what happened in the last 3-4 months. Its crazy how addictive these games can be.
- Jayschwa 6y ago
  This reminds me of an anecdote I once read or heard about a person curing their World of Warcraft addiction. The person used an unofficial server with cheats to instantly get the best gear, then proceeded to one-shot the toughest boss. After that, playing normally felt pointless to them.
  - regularemployee 6y ago
    "The person used an unofficial server with cheats to instantly get the best gear" > Smart, unfortunately I didn't think of this. I feel like if I did, maybe I wouldn't have spent so much time on this game. My addiction to the game really took a toll an people around me who cares / loves me. I feel bad, but really there was nothing I could do except finish. I'm wondering if there is a certain personality / mindset that is susceptible to gaming addiction.
nathias 6y ago
Agree 100%, but even PoE doesn't really capture what was for me the best part of d2 (hardcore + the chance to go hostile at any point), they did announce some cut-throat leagues in the beginning but I don't think anything has happened with that ...
rvba 6y ago
Path of Exile does not have any decent PvP (while PvP in D2 was popular endgame option). Path of Exile is also a very anti social game where most players play alone.

phone8675309 6y ago

If you want something in the vein of Diablo 2 but with a different aesthetic (and not always online) then try Torchlight 2.

bloodorange 6y ago
While Torchlight and Torchlight 2 have a lot of "quality of life" improvements and are decent games in general, I've found that they lack the replay value which Diablo 2 (with LOD) has. I can't exactly say why but this is how it felt to me.
- eru 6y ago
  You might have been older when you played Torchlight 2 than when you played Diablo 2?
  - bloodorange 6y ago
    I'm afraid, to me, that doesn't seem like sufficient explanation. Now, given a choice, even with outdated graphics, I'd rather play Diablo 2 than play Torchlight 2.
    - eru 6y ago
      Games seem more magic when we are younger.
minimaxir 6y ago
Torchlight requires mods to be playable. The recent rereleases of Torchlight 2 for console (even with some QoL additions) that did not support mods were...not good.
- m463 6y ago
  what? that's ridiculous. I've played torchlight 1 & 2, on both mac and pc. They were both high quality and very well done. There was no evident shortcomings that required mods to fix
  - minimaxir 6y ago
    More skill/loot balance than the general presentation.

rubyskills 6y ago

Btw, I think you can play a diablo 1 remaster inside of diablo 3. I think you can only do this at the beginning of a season reset though.

lholden 6y ago
I didn't know that, cool!
- soneil 6y ago
  "the darkening of Tristram" is what you want to google for. It's every January. I'm not sure I'd call it a remaster, but it's novel.

TT3351 6y ago

Grim Dawn is another alternative, without much of PoE's online functionality

lholden 6y ago
I really enjoy Grim Dawn. I'm sad that the game is finally "finished" and will no longer be getting update patches. The developer gave the game a good 4 years of post release content though!
- wh4t3v3r 6y ago
  What do you mean? The game is being updated. Last update was in January this year...
dylanz 6y ago
Grim Dawn is absolutely amazing. I tried playing PoE but it felt so fake. Grim Dawn is raw and dark, the dual class system is awesome, and that’s exactly what I was looking for.

Const-me 6y ago

I wonder how it’s free? I know two business models for free things, pay to win micro-transactions like EA and selling out user’s data like FB, and I’m not a fan of either of them.

throwaway13337 6y ago
I am with you. Subscription services align customer and developer interests best. That said, the second best modern model is probably theirs. They sell stash tab space (item storage) and cosmetic items only. They do not play psychological games that many free to play games do. I imagine that when their revenue starts to slip, they may go down the more dubious road as is the normal pattern. But for now, it has my approval.
- hertzrat 6y ago
  I haven’t played hots in years now, but there were loot boxes last I saw. The system also encourages you to spend in game gold to get better loot box contents, but you need that gold to avoid paying real money for new heroes. Those new heroes were usually overpowered on release, or at least, nobody knew how to counter them, so they were great for peoples mmr. I wish it had just been pay to play with optional costumes for sale.
  - Tenoke 6y ago
    I played hots and it wasn't bad at all. New heroes would be first ban pick in ranked when overpowered anyway, and they usually stayed like that a couple of weeks until they were balanced. I'm completely fine with that monetization since you still can't beat better players with money and you can still do everything without spending a penny. You at most get a tiny MMR inflation for a week or two if you buy every new hero on release (which wasnt even that often) and that was nowhere near enough to jump a higher league. Hell, given that it still didn't make them enough money maybe it was too little monetization..
- Const-me 6y ago
  Interesting. I’ll give it a shot once I reach lvl60 in wow classic.

vlahmot 6y ago

The downside to that development cycle is that there is an overwhelming number of league mechanics, particularly for new players.

Espionage724 6y ago

I've heard Path of Exile suggested plenty of times, and personally I just couldn't get into it. Notably back when Diablo III was still fresh, lots of people suggested PoE. To me, D3 felt more of an arcade-like game that I can quickly jump into and have fun, whereas PoE is more of an efficiency and numbers game. Like it's fun, but I just don't have that sense of being "powerful". I gradually progressed up until Act 5 in PoE (before they added Acts beyond that) and never really felt like I was all that powerful. There were some challenges here and there, but most things just died in some boring manner. However with Diablo II as I recall, that's pretty much the same ordeal up until a certain point. I may re-visit PoE at some point this year before D2:R to see if or how things have changed.

enraged_camel 6y ago
PoE is good, but there are three things that annoy me about it. First, the non-traditional currency system. There's no gold; instead you have different types of "orbs" of varying rarity. Vendors have different exchange rates for some of them, but the system is generally difficult to grok, especially for a newcomer. To make matters even more confusing, orbs themselves are useful, e.g. they can enhance item stats, upgrade items to higher quality, etc. and you need to be careful to not accidentally continue using orbs yourself when you'd be much better off trading them. Which brings me to trade. There's no centralized auction house - instead you need to rely on a third-party website where items are listed by other players. The process of listing them is done via an in-game API I think - but then once you find an item you want, you need to whisper that player, then go meet them at their hideout and manually do a trade. Just an absolutely atrocious system overall. The third one is the zoom level. The game feels like it plays at 800p, or maybe 1024p, and there's no way to zoom out further. Unacceptable for a game that is two decades more recent than Diablo 2, imo.
- washadjeffmad 6y ago
  They also didn't have colorblind-friendly options for the longest time. I used to joke GGG was so hardcore even their accessibility feature had a difficulty level.
6y ago

Shadonototro 6y ago

Path of Exile is the best ARPG ever made, i don't game that much anymore, but when i feel the need to play a game, it's PoE, every 3 months they release an new "league" where they reset the economy and add bunch of new content! It's just a great game, ton of theorycrafting and items to collect, give it a try!(

prepend 6y ago

This would be a fun game if it wasn’t Free to Play. I wish they would just charge $50 and not optimize for whales and engagement. Diablo 1 and 2 did this and made tons of money.

regularemployee 6y ago

Having been hooked on Diablo 2 in high school, I made the terrible decision of playing Path of Exile (POE) last year during thanks giving break (cuz we had 5 days off, I thought hey maybe I can play POE for a few days). Since then, I have been playing POE non stop. I'd wake up at 3am and play until 8pm. I'd drink alot of water before going to bed so I can wake up early to play. I stopped caring about work, I just played the game. To complete my work tasks, I hacked together my tasks in 30 mins before the end of the sprint with some of the shittiest code I've ever written. Somewhere along this journey I decided that the only way I can stop my addiction is to completely finish it. I spent around 12k buying stuff for the game. The way it works is... you play to find and collect "currency" in the game. But instead of spending the time, I buy in game "currency" from other players. Its frowned upon and getting caught will get you banned, but part of me secretly wished my account would get banned so I could quit. I never got banned, so I got bolder and eventually I was spending $800 / day. This week, I finally feel like I have finished the game. It finally got boring after building my character to the point where I could breeze through everything in the game. I was finally able to work this week and correct the bugs I introduced and get back to focusing on work. I have yet to digest what happened in the last 3-4 months. Its crazy how addictive these games can be.

Jayschwa 6y ago
This reminds me of an anecdote I once read or heard about a person curing their World of Warcraft addiction. The person used an unofficial server with cheats to instantly get the best gear, then proceeded to one-shot the toughest boss. After that, playing normally felt pointless to them.
- regularemployee 6y ago
  "The person used an unofficial server with cheats to instantly get the best gear" > Smart, unfortunately I didn't think of this. I feel like if I did, maybe I wouldn't have spent so much time on this game. My addiction to the game really took a toll an people around me who cares / loves me. I feel bad, but really there was nothing I could do except finish. I'm wondering if there is a certain personality / mindset that is susceptible to gaming addiction.

nathias 6y ago

Agree 100%, but even PoE doesn't really capture what was for me the best part of d2 (hardcore + the chance to go hostile at any point), they did announce some cut-throat leagues in the beginning but I don't think anything has happened with that ...

rvba 6y ago

Path of Exile does not have any decent PvP (while PvP in D2 was popular endgame option). Path of Exile is also a very anti social game where most players play alone.