Take up your arms and defeat Diablo for the nth time if you want to take advantage of Hellfire's features.

User Rating: 6.5 | Hellfire PC
Gameplay: 8
Graphics: 8
Sounds: 6
Value: 6
Story: 5

Note: The above stats are a representation of Hellfire and not Diablo hence the time spent is only in relation to the newer Hellfire quests.

There are not many games that can consumed a vast majority of my gaming time and really encapsulated me to another world to literally live and breathe it; Diablo was certainly one of them for its addictiveness and simplicity hence brought a new term ‘Action RPG’ to the table. Considering I bought the game close to the release time back in 97, I’ve played all the characters twice therefore defeated Diablo six times (that fella doesn't know when to quit…).

When reading the announcement that an expansion pack was on the horizon, my ‘fever’ drew to newer heights hence enhancing three of the six characters to be well prepared for the new challenges ahead. ‘Hellfire’ as it was dubbed promised new quests, locations and a new character. Well, I was still blinded with Diablo that I didn’t read the ‘fine print’ for Hellfire; it’s definitely an expansion pack alright however the catch is that you need to start the entire campaign all over again to take advantage of the newer materials. In addition your characters in Diablo can be brought over to Hellfire less the intact gear so whatever goodies you have will vanish if you choose to play the expansion pack.

By this stage I was truly getting tired of defeating Diablo for the nth time however the newer features are quite promising enough. The immediate one is that Hellfire spawns three levels of difficulty as apposed to just one in Diablo; this means that even though you transport your player from Diablo to Hellfire ‘naked’ you can opt to play in Nightmare or Hell mode if you wish so all is not totally lost; yet the characters who solely requires their superior equipment (a.k.a. the Warrior) will be the most difficult player to start off as with the Sorcerer’s spells and the Rogue’s range attacks really doesn’t need superior equipment to survive. Luckily for me, my Rogue was the most experienced character therefore grabbing a decent enough bow and already had a good range of spells made her more than capable to tackle the 'nightmare' mode immediately.

The Monk being the new kid on the block, is basically a warrior that requires practically no armour and uses melee or staff to attack. I felt that considering the staff weapons are not widely used in Diablo, the Monk somehow filled in the gap, or if you longing you can opt to melee your way throughout the dungeons. In addition to this, the Monk also can parry missiles and spells, always equip with the default ‘search’ spell and considering he’s quite a fast spell caster that only rivals to the Sorcerer you can say that the Monk could possibly be the most powerful character in the Hellfire’s roster.

The collection of spells in Diablo ranges up to level four yet in Hellfire they introduced level five. By all means this doesn’t mean that these are the almighty powerful spells, it’s just they are categorised as level five. Within level five the character can grab in addition six more spells being the Apocalypse, Ring of Fire, Immolation, Wall of Lightning, Reflect and lastly Warp. My personal favourite is the Warp spell as what it does it teleports the character to the closest exit point – a nice way for a quick escape and the casting time is considerably faster than the portal spell. The other spells are hybrids of the previous spells in Diablo (e.g. the Nova is very similar to Immolation meaning instead of lightning bolts projects in an arc expect small fireballs instead; wall of fire in Diablo – wall of lightning in Hellfire and so forth).

There are two new locations in Hellfire which will not be unlocked until your character is at a reasonable level (fifteen) or when you cleared the catacombs. Far north where the cows are is Lester the Farmer which opens up the ‘Hive’ quest which naturally encounters plenty of ‘hive’ type creatures and once defeated the boss opens another quest called ‘Grave Matters’. Of the two, Grave Matters is the most interesting and innovative as the crypt really feels diabolic. Eerie music and plenty of strange malevolence beings will pounce on your unsuspected character therefore the trip down the crypt is certainly a worthwhile experience.

Nothing has really change graphically and sound wise in Hellfire as all the textures and sounds are brought from Diablo therefore the installation will not be vast. Naturally though there are newer textures because of the two new locations however as an overall picture the ‘Hive’ quest is the only one that looks a little out-of-place as even though very detailed, some of the colour choices somehow make the levels look a little confusing as everything seems to be merged as one. Newer scores are added to both ‘The Hive’ and ‘The Crypt’ yet thankfully suits well for the surrounding environs and the voice acting even though tries hard to replicate the original, falls short as it tries too hard, bordering idiotic.

There’s one notable feature that made Diablo so tremendously famous yet was unusually opt out in Hellfire: there’s no multiplayer hence at no time can you play Hellfire using Battlenet. Maybe it was because that the majority of the development was made by Sierra and not Blizzard, it could be that Blizzard owns Battlenet and they didn’t want Sierra to be part of or dabble into it. Whatever the reason/s multiplayer is out-of-the-question.

And to carry on the ‘traditional’ incompleted quests, Hellfire has several that didn’t make into the game but modifying the text file will give you two extra playable characters being the Bard (graphically a rogue but able to use two weapons simultaneously) and the Barbarian (no mana but has a natural affinity to resistance and able to wield two handed weapons in one hand). There is also the missing quest called ‘Celia and Theodore’ (ties in with the Hive quest) and considering the (in) famous rumours about the ‘cow’ level, a tongue-in-cheek quest that replaces ‘Lester the Farmer’ to ‘Jersey's Jersey (a.k.a. Cow Quest)’. Not exactly what the players want however it’s more of a dedication than actually doing the ‘cow’ level.

Bearing in mind Hellfire is the only official expansion pack that Blizzard approved there are several hypocrisy about playing Hellfire. For starters, none of the newer quests will be further explained by the major players in Diablo; even Deckard Cain has nothing to say about the newly arrival of the Hive or the Crypt. Only Gillian has a few words to say about the Crypt when you produce a certain item. Secondly, the lore of Hellfire will not be carried across therefore it made me feel like playing Hellfire is not an expansion to Diablo but another game entirely and the exclusion of Battlenet makes me wonder whether Hellfire is just a cash cow reaping in the rewards of Diablo. Lastly, when you install Hellfire there are two additional ‘up-and-coming’ features; one is Lords of Magic and the other is none other than Half Life. In one way I feel ripped off that I need to play Diablo yet again to take advantage of the new features and yet felt satisfied of the new features added. All I can say is that Hellfire is an expansion pack that you’ll love to hate and hate to love.

PS: There’s a bug in Hellfire with sadly corrected itself after the 1.1 patch: The Monk can obtain the ‘Doppelganger’ staff which will include very powerful bonuses however there’s a good chance that monsters will duplicate itself when being hit. I remember when confronting Diablo, I had five Diablos attacking the Monk – naturally the Monk died…eventually!