Product Description

• Interactive environments such as siege towers and fortified battlements
• Thousands of new weapons, armor, and magical items, including class--specific quest items
• New recipes for the Horadric Cube
• Increased stash size
• Note: This product requires the full version of Diablo II

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1182 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: ACTIVISION
• Released on: 2002-09-27
• Rating: To Be Announced
• Platforms: Mac, Windows XP, Mac OS X, Windows

Amazon.co.uk Review
Not content to merely add on additional levels, the Diablo II: Lord of Destruction expansion pack improves the entire Diablo II game experience and concludes the story. The expansion has been described as both an "add-in" and an "add-on", and it truly is a must-have for Diablo II players.

The add-on is the new act, which tells the story of Baal's destructive trek through the Barbarian Highlands. You must stop him before he corrupts the magical Worldstone and opens Hell. The add-in is all the improvements to the core game. The most obvious improvement is with graphics. Lord of Destruction lets gamers ratchet up Diablo II's graphics resolution to 800 x 600. This means both prettier graphics and the ability to see more of the battlefield at once, which effectively increases the range of spells and missile weapons.

The graphics boost is nice, but hardcore players will really appreciate the gameplay enhancements. It's hard to pick the single best element from a long list of substantial improvements that includes a larger character stash, more socketable items, more unique items, new classes of weapons and new Horadric Cube recipes.

Entirely new features include the ability to craft unique magic items, runes (which function like gems but can be combined to form powerful runeword combinations), totems (which add ability, combat or resistance bonuses but take up space in inventory) and hireling inventory (hand down your old equipment to your hireling). All these improvements are applied to both the new act and the four acts in Diablo II.

Even experienced Diablo II players get to appreciate the improvements to acts 1-4 because the two new character classes (Assassin and Druid) must complete all four acts in Diablo II before they can be used in the expansion. The Assassin is a stealthy warrior and wizard slayer who uses martial arts, traps and mental discipline to defeat Hell's minions. The conclusion to one of the best-loved and most-played games of all time is satisfying and well worth the hours of sleepless nights and the blurry-eyed mornings. --Mike Fehlauer

Customer Reviews

The perfect expansion
This is a vast a well thought out expansion pack for Diablo II. It mainly aimed at online players, as there is only one addition act.

The major new features are two new characters, the assassin and druid. There are also hundreds of new items, and several new sets. The major additions in items are Jewels, runes and charms. Jewels and rune act in a similar why to gems in Diablo II, in that you insert them into socketed items to give the item magical powers. Charms give you bonus powers just by carrying them around in your backpack (but not your stash.)

The only other major change is the increase in the stash size.

Players should note that there is no interaction between Diablo II games and Diablo II: Lord of Destruction games. You can convert Diablo II characters into Diablo II: LOD characters, but once this is done it can not be undone. A must buy addition for any Diablo II player that regularly plays multiplayer, and at only £9 theres no excuse!

A must have for all Diablo players
This Expansion is a must have for all Diablo II lovers from beginners to elites, and involves so many new features. New Monsters, more stash size (which i liked ALOT), A second weapon inventory, more magical, rare and unique items and a whole new act set in the barbarian highlands, where you must defeat Baal, Lord of destruction and save the worldstone. You can also edit your own mercenaries.This Expansion set just turns the whole world of Diablo into an even more mystic and fantastic adventure game. I recommend this game to anyone, and if you are new to Diablo II then I recommend you get the original Diablo II and the expansion pack as a pair.

A compelling, addictive game
Just a bit of background, I'm a well educated professional working in senior management for an internet company.

I have to start in such a fashion to allow what I'm about to say to be tempered in the correct fashion.

I pulled this out of the hat as a present in a "Christmas lucky dip" in 2001 and it sat on my shelf unused for 6 months ready to give some unsuspecting individual an unwanted gift.

However, I thought I'd open it to see what it was, and for the next 12 months marvelled at the expansiveness of the gameplay, the richness of the variability in the game, the attention to details in the characters and their powers, the huge variety of power-up capabilities that were available and the true-to-life market economy generated by an on-line game.

I should say the graphics are showing their age just a touch now.

It is certainly not everybody's cup of tea, but it's an honest opinion. I still like going back to it and get hooked again from time-to-time, especially with a new free update recently released.

Beware, dangerously compelling and addictive.