Rating: 
Summary: Fun, Can Be Very Addictive Though
Review: Overall Diablo II is a very fun, immersing game. What it lacks in terms of a story is made up by the fantastic gameplay, great sound effects, and above average graphics. I believe that, if you are going to get the most out of this game, you should play it online. Not only because of the other people that you can interact with, but also because you can level up much faster; assuming you have someone to help you through the game. I guess I should first explain how you go about "beating" this game. The first time you play through the game is known as "normal" difficulty. After you complete this, you also have to beat the game in "nightmare" and "hell" difficulties. Naturally, these are much harder than normal; and thus they require your character to be a higher level to have a chance. Nevertheless, there is a way around this. You can get a high level character to "rush" your low level character through the entire game; thus avoiding the tedious and time consuming procedure for leveling up. After you are rushed through the three difficulty levels, then the best way to level up is to join "cows games". Basically, the designers created a "secret level" where you, well, fight bipedal cows with what look like pole-axes. Naturally, the advantage to doing this is that you level up very quickly, as the cows, when killed, give out enormous numbers of experience points. Thus, you can turn your low level character into a fairly high level one much quicker than if you went through all the difficulty levels yourself, killing everything and gaining experience points the "right" way. Naturally, nightmare and hell difficulties also have some "other" features that make them harder than normal. First, in nightmare, your resistances drop to -20. In Hell, they drop to -50. Resistances are just the defense that your character has against the elements. Each one is ranked separately; so therefore you could have a resistance of 75 in fire but only 25 in Lightning. At the beginning of the game you have no resistances at all -- you have to find armor or other things that give these resistances to you. Also, you may not raise your resistances above 75 unless you have items that let you add points to your "maximum resist". Speaking of items, they are the most important thing in determining how powerful your character is. I've had characters that would be awesome (meaning they had the right skills and stat points) but they turned out awfully because of my lack of good items. Therefore, trading with other players to get what you want is very important. This is accomplished by one player going up to the other (in a town area, where no fighting can happen) and clicking on them. Then it will give them a message asking if they want to trade, and if they do then a screen will come up where you can both place items in. When you're done putting your stuff down, then you press the little check mark (accept) button, and when you both press it, the trade will go through. This system is great, since there is no way someone can cheat you out of something (unless of course you don't know what you're trading for, or what you have is worth; then they can obviously rip you off, but it will never be because of the trading system). The best part about this game, though, is the character development. Literally every time you play the game your character could be a little different, depending on the way you allocate skill points, of course. Basically, skill points enable you to pick what spells you want to develop. Since you won't get enough skill points to develop every spell you want to, you may have to pick which "core" spells you want to develop. This is why it is important to find out what spells are good before actually building up your character. Although you'd think that all spells should be equally good, well, they're not. For example, the level 30 Paladin skill (meaning you can't get it until your character is at level 30) Fist of the Heavens is just horrible. It does barely any damage to the harder enemies in the game, and it only attacks one enemy at a time. Trust me, in hell difficulty you need spells that affect more than one enemy at a time. Also, in order to get to the level 30 skills, you may need to put points into a prerequisite skill (or skills). This is where the strategy of the game comes in -- you need to know not only what skills are worth investing points into, but also if they're worth spending all the prerequisite points just to get them. The one fault with this game is that there is a lot of slowdown (lag) if you choose to play online. Granted, this is true with any online game, but because you can have up to 8 people in a game at one time (and you usually do, especially if you're playing Hell cows) then the game tends to lag. This wouldn't be too bad, except for the fact that, if you die in Hell difficulty (and nightmare too) you lose experience. Given that it takes more than three hours to level up when you get past level 80, losing experience can be a major annoyance. I once had all my 45 minutes worth of experience erased because I got too close to a cow and then the game lagged. Frankly, here I'm not blaming the lag, I'm blaming the game designers for putting that stupid feature in the game. Other than that, though, this game is wonderful. It can be VERY addictive, however, so watch out. Still, if you have the time to spend on it, this game can be a very rewarding and fun experience. There's just no words to describe the satisfaction that you feel once you get your character up to the highest level that you've ever acheived, and that's really what this game is about; leveling up. That may not sound that great, but after awhile the concept grows on you, and you get drawn into the great world of Diablo II.
Rating: 
Summary: Limited Replay Value
Review: Diablo 2 is a good game, but it lacks replay value. (a) The levels are *not* randomly generated, despite what the game claims. They're mildly rearranged, but this doesn't hide the fact that you're in, say, the Cold Plains or the Blood Moor. The quests are always the same from game to game. The areas are the same. The sequence of events is always the same. (b) Unless you're playing, say, a Barbarian, you'll find yourself fighting through the same areas many times in order to get the experience you need to move forward. This gets boring. (c) The game isn't open-ended. There is no campaign editor, as in games like Half Life, Quake, Starcraft, etc. You are stuck with the pre-defined areas to play in, and you are dependent on Blizzard releasing an "expansion" if you want more/new areas. (d) Although this is primarily a "shooter" type game, you can only wield one weapon at a time. This effectively makes characters like the Amazon a joke, and almost elminates strategic weapons usage like switching from a ranged weapon to a close combat weapon. In general, while this game does have a lot of positive qualities (it's a typical Blizzard game, with a friendly UI, good art, good music), it also leaves much to be desired.
Rating:
Summary: Great, incredibly addictive
Review: You will not be able to stop playing this game. I swear! I still go back and run through it, just to try out a new character, or to try another tactic somewhere, or test out the skills in new ways. The only thing that took some getting used to was the saving system, since it puts you back in town.
Rating:
Summary: Great Sequel... a few misses...
Review: First, let me tell you what I like in a RPG computer game. I like a game that takes very little time to get going. I like games that follow the premise of AD&D, but not the exact structure. I prefer hack-n-slash to complicated spellslinging and it has to have growth in experience and items/armor. So how did Diablo II do? Very well. It lets me be the hack-n-slash monster that I want to be. I found that as I moved up in experience, I was able to incorporate the appropriate upgrade in weapons and armor. The monsters were tougher overall, the gameplay has improved and the sound and graphics are awesome. Also, the emphasis on gold is gone. There's plenty of it and you're able to sell tons of items, so you won't starve from lack of funds. But... You can't save you're game and return to that exact point. They claim they wanted add an element of dread to the game and not allow you to keep saving/returning until you defeated whatever you were up against. Good idea, bad implementation. It basically means that even if you just want to quit playing for the night, you will have to start over on that chapter and re-fight the same monsters again to get to the same point. But its not a show stopper, just incredibly inconvenient. Also, the game is just too linear for my tastes. I liked Diablo I where you had quests but you basically were there to clear out all the dungeon nasties at the same time. But again, its such a great game that I got over it. Bottom line: If you like the first Diablo, you'll like the second. If you like RPG's in general you'll like it. If you like more of a strategy game, you will not.
Rating: 
Summary: Devilishly delicious
Review: What a pleasure to play a game that is stable, fast (even on my relatively slow computer), well-balanced, and just plain fun. The graphics appear a bit dated at first, but become more detailed and beautiful in each area. In so many role-playing games, exploration becomes a chore because everything looks and feels the same. Not so in Diablo II, which becomes more interesting and varied as the game progresses. Although Diablo II is still more an action game than an RPG, the new skill system and the increasingly clever quests make the game feel almost as rich as a full-bodied RPG. Because each character type has different skills and approaches to combat, and there are five character types, the game is very replayable. Combat is fast and easy to control. Left and right mouse clicks can be configured to perform any combat action or cast any spell. And even when the screen is crammed with nasty beasties, combat response is smooth and fast (I have a PII 400). At first I didn't like the fact that I can't save and reload games when I want to, but this does make game play more intense and realistic. It makes sense that death should have some consequences, and at least you can retrieve your items. Diablo II is a great game. I usually stick to RPG and strategy games, but this action/RPG ranks among the best games I've played. Thanks to Blizzard for taking the times to do things right.
Rating:
Summary: Best Game Ever
Review: This Game is the best not gorey or that bloody but very fun and addictive.
Rating:
Summary: Extremely addictive...'nuff said.
Review: If you think PC games are all show and no go these days, then think again. Diablo II brings to the table addictive, almost old-school type gameplay (it even reminded me of Zelda at times), rich sound effects, an involving storyline and adequate enough visuals to complement them, that it will keep you hooked for hours on end. I haven't played the first Diablo, so Diablo II was my introduction to the series. In Diablo II you get to choose from five character classes which are barbarian, sorceress, amazon, paladin and necromancer. Each class is unique and has its strengths and weak points. For example the barbarian is great at close-up combat but is poor in the magic department and the sorceress is almost completely magic-dependant whereas paladin has equal amounts of both. This game is divided into "acts," which are sub-divided to various missions. You start off at a rogue encampment in act I, and then move onto the desert town of "Lut Gholein" in act II (which is as far as I went before being deprived of my copy due to the addiction). I had a little trouble conquering the "arcane sanctuary" with paladin. Aside from doing what you are told by townsfolk, you can also buy and trade weopons, armour, head-wear, belts and numerous other items, which proves to be half the fun of the game. You can store some of your gear in your private "stash" found in each town, as well as keep a fair amount with you during your missions. To make things less nerve-cracking, the game makes use of "waypoints," so that when a new area is discovered and if its waypoint is found, even if you die you can warp right there again. Also, if you die once and "save and exit" the game your corpse will be in the town in the next game, so all the weopons and items can be recollected. It's a very wise decision to make during the harder, more remote missions. The visuals, though not upto current standards, are quite adequate. They don't need much improving at all. The sound effects and voices are quite crisp too. Also, prepare for all the gore you crave for, whether it be bashing up a "quillrat," a "sabercat" or one of the game's many bosses. There are various skills to be learnt which are unique to each character, as well as various shrines that refill life, magic, increase your combat skills or improve protection temporarily (plus a few more). Diablo II is a very big, very involving and very addictive game with a lot of tasks to perform and a vast amount of weopons and rare items to be found, so anyone is going to have his/her hands full. And I am rating it five stars by playing it only halfway through! That's saying a lot.
Rating:
Summary: Definately a fun game, worth the buy. More eerie than scary
Review: Although this game had SO MANY delays in its release, and the fact that those delays made several of the earlier parts of the game show the fact that they were designed a few years ago (graphically), this game is definately one of the more fun games recently released (at the time of this revue). I've always felt that the controls of a game shouldn't be too confusing, and both Diablo and Diablo II are certainly very simple in their overall gameplay: see enemy; kill enemy. The controls for this sequel are both fine tuned yet still easy to master, one hand on the mouse and one near your item buttons. The graphics are a bit lacking, the only reason it doesn't get a five star rating in my opinion. Both the creaters of the Diablo games definately show their roots from D&D in this, the items have great names and abilities, the monsters are creative and challenging. Outright it isn't to be considered a scary game. The music and noises definately add an eerie mood but I was never actually scared/shocked/surprised as you can be in games that are primarily based on fright (the Resident Evil series for example). This one should definately be in your collection, and its worth the Gigabyte of hard disc space a full installation will take up.
Rating:
Summary: Greatest Game
Review: This really is the greatest game!! Even though it starts out slow it will speed up and get very challenging and fun! It also has a great story and characters. Thne there is the multiplayer.
First of all its easy to use and the PvP system is great! Getting the most powerfull weapon and the highest lvl ear(a trophy you get after killing a player) is half the challenge. Then other half is beating the game. It has three differet difficulty levels (you cant acces "nightmare" untill you beat normall and so on). The botomn line is this is the greatest game and iif you like RPGs you should buy it!!
Rating:
Summary: Absolutely addictive!
Review: Warning: if you buy this game, you will need to set aside some serious time away from your loved ones because Diablo2 sucks you in and doesn't let go. This is one of those games where you tell yourself "Ok...5 more minutes and I gotta get going." then you look up at the clock and an hour went past. I think Blizzard includes some sort of time warp with the game. :) Ok...enough rambling, now to the game. The graphics, while a bit dated by today's standards, are still fun to watch. The magic-based effects are done extremely well and adds nicely to gaming experience. But as with most (all?) Blizzard games, the gameplay is what stands out. Like the first Diablo, Diablo2 doesn't put on any ears of what it is offering. Pure, unadulterated hack and smash. The levels are engrossing, the controls are intuitive (even for the 1st timer), the voice overs for the many characters you meet really bring you into the Diablo2 world. This game was well worth the wait.
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