Menu and Status Bar Redesign
Over time Diablo II´s menu and status bar has changed, as you can see by clicking the following links:
Screenshot #33
Screenshot #42
Screenshot #60
But never in all of the various builds has the menu and status bar changed as much as in yesterday´s Screenshot of the Week (click here to view it). The bar in this shot seems to have undergone some serious comestic and visual redesign. It´s easy to see when you compare the way it looks to those previous screenshots.
The Stamina and Experience Bars
One of the first things that draws the attention are the redesigned Stamina and Experience gauges. In 
previous screenshots the Stamina bar was short and large while the Experience bar was long and very thin. With this new design, the Stamina bar and experience bar are the same length, although the Stamina bar retains its width. In case you didn´t know, the Stamina bar tells a player how much Stamina he or she has remaining. Whenever the Stamina bar runs low, at which its color turns red, then movement and attack rate is slow and running is impossible. The thinner bar above the Stamina bar is the Experience bar, a visual way of telling the play how far he or she is from leveling up. Exact numbers can be gathered from the character info screen.
The Quick Access Inventory Bar
The quick access inventory bar, where potions and scrolls are stored for quick use when the player is 
under fire, has undergone few changes since the addition of the Stamina and Experience bars. Basically, each item stored in the Quick Access Inventory is hotkeyed with a number, which activates the item stored in that slow when it is pressed. The default number of items that can go in the Quick Access Inventory is four, but this number can be increased by equipping the different belts. I have seen up to twelve slots be available in the Quick Access Inventory, but it is not known what the present maz is. This bar expands upwards when the cursor is moved over it.
The Life and Mana Globes
Anyone who has ever played a game of Diablo knows what the Life and Mana globes are. Simply
put, the Life globe keeps track of your remaining life while the Mana globe tells you how much mana you have left. Both Life and Mana will regenerate in Diablo II, Mana will do this faster than life. This is because the designers of Diablo felt as though the game was dampened by the sheer and unrealistic number of potions required to be successful, regardless of your class choice. As you can see, the way the Life and Mana globes look has changed a great deal as Diablo II has developed. I had thought that the design for all of these things was stable and final already because they had used the former template for awhile.
Overall Effect
But the quickest way to see what I mean is to compare the two bars yourself:
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Skill of the Week |
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Iron Maiden|
Counter courtesy of |
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Visit the Official Diablo II Site |
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