Cheating in the Diablo Series
Date: 07/26/00
Author: The
Acolyte
| Cheating in video and computer games has
existed since these sources of entertainment were first being produced.
Every single genre of electronic games is populated by software that has
had some sort of cheat codes or another way to getting the best items, a
huge amount of a game's monetary unit, invincibility, and etceteras.
However, sometimes the cheat codes provided by the developers of these
games are not enough to satisfy some players. While console gamers cannot cheat without using cheat codes or an external piece of hardware such as GameShark or Goldfinger, computer games can be hacked in other ways and often are. Many gamers with programming experience can easily create a simple utility that will access whatever statistics a player has, and that program can be used to change the statistics to benefit the player in ways that the game itself does not allow. We refer to these programs as "hacks" and "trainers." |
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Soon after the first Diablo was released and gamers began to populate
Battle.Net for a multi-player experience of the game, several trainers
were created and released across the Internet. The main reason why
Diablo was hacked so much is most likely the fact that the game,
strangely enough, actually did not include any cheat codes at
all. Starting out, many players decided to just check out what they
could do with these trainers, for fun, and just to explore Diablo to its
full potential. Unfortunately, this did not last long. The developers of
these hacking programs kept searching for new ways to control the game
environment, much more than simply changing your character's statistics. Eventually, Battle.Net became so populated with people using these programs that the majority of legitimate gamers either disappeared or had their experience ruined for them from other players using the trainers. These hacks were often used to edit the statistics of the characters of other players, which was very simply done. Two of the most notorious options were becoming completely invisible to other players, and also being able to use spells and attack other players while in the normally safe town of Tristram. For a completely secure experience, gamers had to play in single-player mode, or they were in danger of this. Unfortunately, the multi-player experience for many players was completely ruined, and because of this, a large amount of gamers just gave up on Diablo. |
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Diablo II and Hacking Programs
Open Characters First of all, Open characters are similar to the system of characters in the first Diablo. The statistics and skill point distribution of your character in the game, as well as inventory and stash contents are stored on your computer, and are vulnerable to hacking since this information is stored on your hard drive. Other information, such as the waypoints you have and even what Act you are in and what quests you have completed are stored in the same way. However, the difference with the Open characters system and the system of characters in Diablo I is that you can play both single-player and multi-player with the same character. You are able to play online on Open Battle.Net, but you can also create or join a TCP-IP game. |
Realm Characters The second and completely new type of character is Realm characters. The statistics of Realm characters are stored on groups of Battle.net servers entitled "Realms," which are completely separate from your hard drive. Currently, there are four Realms across the world—one for the West coast of the US, one for the East coast of the US, one for Europe, and one for Asia. Because of this innovation, Blizzard Entertainment has almost completely insured that your character's statistics cannot be changed by another person (via a trainer), and saves you from having to play with an illegitimate character. The only way your characters could be hacked is by somehow hacking into the Battle.net servers, but this would be very difficult, and of course, illegal.Read on, as this brings us to the debate of Open characters versus Realm characters... |
