September's News

  • A Transcript of C|Net's Diablo II coverage... (9/29)

A full transcript, complete with commentary, was released by Flux of the Unofficial Diablo II Site. It is a nice read with lots of juicy details. We would like to see a couple pics from the show, as they demonstrated the sorceress in action with a couple spells.

I have recently checked out the newest site sponsored by the Diablo 2 Graveyard, called Diablo II Darkness. Scorch, your site is excellently done (I especially like the use of quotes) and has some of the most unique content out there. If we here at ShadowSpiral ever get headway on new monsters, you'll be sure to know. Your site has been entered into our Community Section.

  • Happy 1000th Hit!!! (9/27)

We here at ShadowSpiral Diablo 2 are celebrating our 1000th since we opened last month. We just wanted to extend our thanks to the numerous other Diablo 2-related sites, and to all the users who chose ShadowSpiral Diablo 2 as their source for the newest Diablo 2 information.

  • Diablo II Novel in the works. (9/25)

Jeff Schmidt of Planet Review is in the process of writing a Diablo II novel. So far, from what I've read it looks to be awesome. Keep up with his work by pointing your browser here.

David Brevek will be on the Sci-Fi's C|Net Central, in a small interview in which he discusses Diablo II. There was mention of Interplay's Baldur's Gate in it as well. For a program listing, check C|Net.com.

  • Diablo 1.07 Patch Available. (9/23)

Blizzard has just released patch version 1.07 for Diablo. Below is a list of what the patch contains in the way of fixes/changes:

Serious bugs (crashes or freezes)

    Fixed crashes associated with being attacked or killed by a Black Death (Zombie class). This includes the crash upon resurrecting after being killed by a Black Death.

    Fixed the freeze upon touching a Hidden Shrine while equipped with only indestructible items.

Medium bugs (affecting gameplay)

    Prevented players from becoming stuck inside a wall when Town Portalling down into a dungeon.

    Fixed bug that made some Hell difficulty monsters too easy to hit. Beware.

    Fixed the Mana Shield bugs that could make a player invulnerable and/or invisible to other players.

    Fixed the bug that prevented Rogues from properly disarming traps on levels 13 through 15.

    Fixed bug that rarely transformed unique items (like the Optic Amulet) into some other (usually mundane) item when saving the game and then starting a new game.

    Prevented repeated castings (128 or more) of Mana Shield from disabling the casting of any more spells.

    Fixed bugs that prevented items with the suffixes Thieves, Speed/Haste, Balance/Stability/Harmony, and

    Piercing/Bashing/ Puncturing from working properly.

    Fixed the bug that caused Mana Shield to become less effective with increasing spell level.

    Fixed the bug that caused excessive damage when a Mana Shield expired due to an attack.

    Prevented bows with fire-hit damage from interfering with the behavior of Gargoyle class monsters.

    Allowed right-clicking (casting/drinking) belt items in positions 5 through 8, while the Spellbook is open.

    Fixed the bug that froze Lazarus (and made him invulnerable to arrows and spells) after player had entered his lair, then left (or died), and finally returned.

Minor bugs (graphics or sound)

    When in effect, the Mana Shield graphic appears to all players.

    The casting of a Nova spell is now visible to all nearby players.

    Fixed the bug that caused shields to disappear when worn after wielding two-handed weapons.

    Adria's books appear white now only if a player can read them.

    Equipped shields always appear properly to all players.

    Nightmare and Hell difficulty monsters now display the correct number of hit-points (HP).

    In single player, the sound is no longer shut off by loading a saved game while Diablo is in his death throes.

    You may now change the name of a character to an existing Battle.net account.

    Fixed the incorrect display of special Battle.net chatroom icons.

    Fixed the incorrect display of German text in the German version.

    Fixed renaming character to existing character bug.

As you can see, Blizzard's new Diablo patch makes some heavy changes that I hope will breathe new life into this old, reliable standby. I wish they could kill the cheating though, but I am by no means complaining about what they have done. Check out the official word here.

  • Whoa! Something we missed... (9/22)

I apologize, but we here at ShadowSpiral Diablo 2 seem to have missed something. Recently, another one of the Diablo 2 Designer Diaries went up, this one with Phil Shenk and Matt Householder. It's on Gamespot, so click the above link to check it out. Also, the signup for the Brood War beta test ended today... good luck to all those who entered!

  • A Couple Blizzard Updates... (9/21)

Here are a couple updates from the folks at Blizzard:

    Warcraft II Platinum has been pushed back into next year. This Windows 95 update to Warcraft II will be available the first half of the year and will include free Battle.net support, two all-new scenarios for the Orcs and Humans and new cinematics. The game will retail for about $35 with a significant rebate to current Warcraft II owners.

    The release of the Macintosh version of StarCraft is slated for release before the holidays. A Macintosh version of StarCraft: Brood War will be available early next year.

    StarCraft: Brood War is on schedule to release this holiday season. Tuesday, we will hold our open enrollment for our Brood War Battle.net beta. The form will be posted on Tuesday morning on www.blizzard.com, and testers will be chosen at random. The beta test is scheduled to take place sometime in October. Please Note: The official URL to the Brood War Beta signup, which will be put up at 9:00 AM PST (12 noon EST) tomorrow, is http://www.blizzard.com/scripts/bwb.dll.

    StarCraft ACTION FIGURES are now available!
  • Kali NPC contest at an end. (9/19)

The NPC contest sponsored by Kali, The Blizzard Games Consortium, and the Diablo 2 Graveyard is over. They wish to thank all the people who sent in enties to the contest. Winners will be notified next week.

  • Brood War Beta: Signup Announced. (9/18)

Blizzard recently announced their Brood War Beta signup will begin on Sept. 22, starting at 9:00am (PST). If you want to know more about the beta, click here.

  • GameSpotUK's Diablo 2 ECTS Coverage. (9/14)

GameSpotUK has recently put up their coverage of Diablo 2, complete with some of the 3dfx screenshots (heard the quality was poor, however). Click here to check it out. As an aside, pictures of both the Sorceress and Paladin should be available anytime soon.

  • GameSpot's Diablo II Designer Diary Updated. (9/14)

GameSpot's Diablo II Designer Diary has recently been updated with new interviews of Phil Shenk and Matt Householder. No new info has been released quite yet, though.

  • PlanetQuake Diablo II Impressions. (9/13)

PlanetQuake has posted it's reaction to Diablo II at ECTS. Here is that post:

    "The other big isometric RPG on show at ECTS was, of course, Diablo II. I must admit I never got past the first couple of rooms of the demo of the original Diablo, so I'm hardly the world's authority on the game, but here's my impressions of Diablo II for what they're worth... The map showing was a large outdoors area of grassland, trees and mountains. The graphics were impressive, and certainly a big improvement on what I remember of the original. Unfortunately all those trees got in the way, and enemies often vanished amongst them out of sight. All they had to do was stand next to a tree and they might as well have been invisible. Repeatedly I saw the demonstrator waving his mouse over a bunch of trees trying to find whatever was shooting him. Also I've recently read a lot of stuff about the game being able to use 3D acceleration, transparency effects and so on, but the Diablo II I saw had none of these, or at least if it did it wasn't at all noticeable. On the bright side the sprites looked pretty good, and there were some nice touches like the way that if you picked up a new helmet, the helmet on your character's sprite's head would change to match the one he was wearing. I don't know if that's a new feature since Diablo I, but the demonstrator certainly seemed to think it was a big deal and spent several minutes swapping stuff around his inventory (which looks ridiculously easy to use by the way) just to show off the way the sprite changed every time he switched weapons or armour. The interface was a simple point and click affair, and looks easy to use. The game was running very smoothly at a pretty high resolution, and the action was fast and furious making this a true hack and slash fest. Weapons and armour were varied - swords, spears, bows, horned helmets, leather skull caps, shields, kitchen sinks... All in all it looks pretty good, but then I only saw a tiny fraction of the game. Most importantly I didn't see any indoors areas, towns or dungeons. No doubt the game has these in abundance, but whenever I went past the Sierra stand the guy was still frolicking around in the meadows and forests."
  • The Top Ten of August. (9/13)

The top ten games for the last week of august were as follows:

1. Diablo (Cendant Software)
2. StarCraft (Cendant Software)
3. Deer Hunter (GT Interactive)
4. Unreal (GT Interactive)
5. Cabela's Big Game Hunter (Activision)
6. Rocky Mountain Trophy Hunter (GT Interactive)
7. Myst (Learning Company)
8. Titanic: Adventure Out of Time (Cyberflix)
9. Flight Simulator 98 (Microsoft)
10.WarCraft Battle Chest (Cendant Software)

As you can see, Blizzard dominated the list having Diablo at #1, StarCraft at #2, and even the WarCraft Battle Chest closing at the #10 spot. It thoroughly suprised us to see Diablo ahead of StarCraft, but then, Diablo is one of the greatest despite what has happened to it on Battle.Net.

  • Official Diablo 2 3dfx Press Release. (9/10)

While not quite recent news, Blizzard has posted the Official Press Release on their new Press section. Click here to read the press release.

  • All Apologies... (9/9)

I am aware that ShadowSpiral Diablo 2 hasn't changed for the past couple days, and I am quite sorry. The Site database I use recently became corrupted (for unknown reasons), and I'm having to completely redo the site. Please have patience, all the sections we used to have, and more, will soon be up and running soon. As for the news, I've caught up on it and have posted everything that's happened this busy week. Thanks for your visit.

  • Blizzard's 3dfx Press Release... (9/9)

Though about the days belated, Blizzard has finally made an official press release concerning 3dfx in Diablo 2. Anyone interested in this new development should read the release, it's really very interesting.

  • Blizzard Site Re-vamp. (9/8)

Blizzard's Press Room has had a makeover. This spells a slow re-vamp for the entire Blizzard Site, probably due to the inclusion of the new members of their webteam.

  • Gamespot Diablo 2 Pics. (9/8)

Gamespot UK has released several Diablo 2 screenshots. Click here to view them, but there is no thumbnail gallery, so you will have to view them one at a time.

  • Diablo 2 Pics from ECTS. (9/6)

We have gathered a few pics taken at the ECTS show, and they are here: ECTS pic 1, pic 2, pic 3, pic 4, pic 5, pic 6, pic 7, pic 8, and pic 9. Pay special attention to the monsters in the pic, as it is the first time we've ever seen them in game resolution.

  • Diablo 2 ECTS info. (9/6)

Belgarion, co-webmaster of the Graveyard, describes his impression of Diablo 2 at the ECTS show in London, England:

    "When trading items at a shop, the right side of the screen will be as in Diablo I, but instead of having a separate screen come up for buying and selling items everyting could be done in one layout with the goods that the store has to sell coming up on the left hand side looking just as your own inventory does, then all you have to do is click on the buy or sell icons that are placed at the bottom of the screen and then click on the item you want to buy or sell, I know that might not sound sense and I`m known to mumble but trust me its a lot easier to use."

He also talks about his impression of the new classes shown, the Sorceress and Paladin, as well as the 3dfx effects.

We have recently learned that Diablo 2 will in fact support 3dfx. It will increase the frame rate, as well as add colored lighting and better zoom effects. Diablo 2 will not require 3dfx to run, as it is still a 2D engine.

  • Design your own Diablo 2 NPC. (9/6)

The Blizzard Games Consortium, The Diablo II Graveyard, and Kali, Inc. bring you the Design your own NPC contest. To enter, describe an NPC that you would like to see implemented in Diablo II - including personality, looks, and relevance to the game/storyline - in 600 - 1000 words, and mail your entry to npc-kali@blizzardgames.com with a subject line of "NPC Contest Submission." You must include your Real Name, Home Mailing Address, and valid Email address.

Fifteen winners judged on creativity, originality, imagination and feasibility by the BGC and Graveyard staff will receive free Kali® Registrations and Software. The top three winners will receive Kali® T-Shirts delivered to their homes; the first place winner will have their submission forwarded to Bill Roper at Blizzard, Inc.!

The contest ends on Friday, September 18th, so be sure to get your submissions in early! For more info, click here.

  • Diablo 2 Webmaster Chat... (9/4)

The Diablo 2 Webmaster chat was held almost two days ago, and we have just recently acquired the info that they were able to glean from Blizzard. The Unnofficial Diablo II Site released a full list of the chat, as well as some commentary. Their chat-log can be viewed here.

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Skill of the Week

Iron Maiden
Harkening back to an inquisitional torture, the Iron Maiden curse causes all damage an enemy does to you to be returned to that enemy as well.  Part of the Necromancer´s Curses, it is a powerful addition to his arsenal.

Counter courtesy of
TheCounter.com


 
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