Modder is remaking Diablo II as a StarCraft II mod

[Cal Jeffrey]

The StarCraft remaster just dropped three days ago, and I’ve been playing it. I have to say, it looks great and really brings back the memories of why the game was so awesome in the first place. Of course, it also raises the question, where is a Diablo II remaster?

While everyone pines for a reboot of Diablo II on the Blizzard message boards, one fan has taken it upon himself to remake the classic game using nothing more than the StarCraft II modding tools. When I first heard about this, I had my doubts. I mean, how can an RTS engine be used to create an action-RPG game? But after watching 12 minutes of gameplay (below), I was convinced.

The mod is called “Diablo: The Curse of Tristram,” and modder Etienne Godbout (Egod) is responsible for the recreation, which is not quite Diablo II, but close. He describes it as "a Multiplayer Hack and Slash RPG mods [sic] for Stacraft2 Bnet 2.0."

He has been working on it by himself for over three years now, and has setup an Indiegogo account to help fund the project. Blizzard has ignored this so far. However, should the company's apparent plans to remaster Diablo II get closer to fruition, it may decide to pull Egod’s plug.

While the game developer has not officially announced a Diablo II remaster, there is plenty of evidence that it is planning, if not already working on one. Forbes says, “Blizzard is almost certainly remastering Diablo II,” and points to a company job listing from way back in November 2015 as evidence of this.

The listing was for a Senior Software Engineer, Classic Games and read:

“Compelling stories. Intense multiplayer. Endless replayability. Qualities that made StarCraft, Warcraft III, and Diablo II the titans of their day. Evolving operating systems, hardware, and online services have made them more difficult to be experienced by their loyal followers or reaching a new generation. We’re restoring them to glory, and we need your engineering talents, your passion, and your ability to get tough jobs done.”

Considering what Godbout has been able to accomplish by himself with StarCraft II’s map/modding tools in three years, Blizzard should be able to release a remake for Diablo II much quicker using the Diablo III engine or a variant. However, until the developer decides to announce something, The Curse Of Tristram is the only thing that comes close to a Diablo II remaster. A beta of the mod should be out before the end of the month barring any problems with release.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/70622-modder-hes-remaking-diablo-ii-starcraft-ii-mod.html

 

[MaXtor]

I must have played over 2 thousand hours of the original. I'll definitely be checking this out!

edit: looks like the indiegogo is no longer active. But you can still donate to his paypal, the link is on this page: https://www.sc2mapster.com/projects/tristram

 

[psycros]

Blizzard will wait till this guy is practically finished and then shut him down. Even if they never release a remastered Diablo II they won't let anyone else do it either.

Also, I'm not sure why this being a SCR mod is so surprising. Diablo, Starcraft and Warcraft have always shared a ton of code.

 

[MaXtor]

You could very well be right, but I'm a risk taker.

 

[Darth Shiv]

Yeah this is playing with fire. He's going to burn a lot of time for not much gain on this - Blizz is almost certainly going to issue a cease and desist.

 

[Lionvibez]

This will get pulled as soon as its gets big enough. This will be like that other guy that spent 4 years on that WOW mod just to get a letter in the mail!