Diablo 1 fails to start with DirectX error

Legacy Games Tech Support
22

I am able to get started but then it crashes while I am in the church 1st level and after that it freezes when I choose single player - I guess I can play it on GoG like I have before - WC1 and 2 play fine - 2 out of 3 is a great batting average but sucks at working software

23

Before You will run the diablo.exe first kill the explorer.exe from task manager

works on gog version and version from BN

24

I’ve tried all the above solutions and nothing so far.

25

Why is Blizzard selling games that don’t work directly from Battle.net? It’s ridiculous.

2 Likes
26

The classic games are very old. They were written for OSs, drivers, APIs, etc that are now depreciated.

As such, Bliz is selling the games “as is”. Meaning, they acknowledge that they will have compatibilty problems, which will get worse and worse as time and technology progresses. They task the community to resolve issues that arise from age.

The only exception I see is the issue with Diablo 1’s Battlenet gateway connectivity. That appears to be a bug and Bliz is aware of it.

27

By battlenet gateway conncectivity, do you mean launching the game from battlenet?

28

Not launching the game itself.

I’m referring to the ability to connect to the Battlenet servers when playing multiplayer. Bliz’s version can sometimes install with the wrong servers (aka gateways) which prevents some people from being able to connect.

29

Ah thank you for the clarification

30

When will the issue of Diablo 1’s DirectX 3.0 issue be resolved? Also when trying to load the game, it gives a black screen and won’t bring up the game’s single-player or multi-player.

31

I don’t know, unfortunately. I don’t even know if Bliz plans on fixing it.

The furthest I was involved was passing the issues to Bliz (gateways, crashes, black screens and UI corruption). After that, I’m no longer involved. What they do from there is completely up to them.

For crashes, black screens and UI corruption, players can download the files in “Patch #4” from this community member. Extract the files and place them in the installation folder of D1 and/or WC2.

FunkyFr3sh’s fixes

2 Likes
32

VERY WELL SAID MY FRIEND :slight_smile: I hope blizz push an update to fix all of this for us

33

What is the installation folder? C:\Program Files (x86)\Diablo ??

34

Yep.

If needed, they can be placed in the Hellfire folder as well.

35

Thank you. That info on the patch fixed the regular version’s single player and multi-player. Me and my clan can now hop on it. Do you know if they are making a D1R? Lol

1 Like
36

Here’s an easy fix.

Fair Assumption: You’re running Windows 11 (pro or home, doesn’t matter). This should work with older versions of Windows. Let’s be honest; at this point, you should update if you don’t have Windows 11.

  1. Open C:\Program Files (x86)\Diablo
  2. Right Click on Diablo.exe
  3. Choose Show More Options at the bottom of the list
  4. Choose the 5th option in the new list to Troubleshoot Compatibility
  5. Choose Yes in the troubleshooter, then None of the above
  6. When you get to this dialogue message: Do you want us to apply recommended compatibility settings for you? choose yes.
  7. Windows will automatically choose to run the game in Windows XP Service Pack 3 compatibility mode.
  8. Run diablo.exe to test to make sure the settings have been properly assigned and the game runs.
  9. Open C:\Program Files (x86)\Diablo Hellfire
  10. Repeat steps 2 - 8

After doing these steps, Diablo should work for you every time. This works with AMD and Intel CPUs as well as Radeon and nVidia GPUs. There’s no need to install anything else on your pc.

EDIT: This will make it so you can load Diablo from the desktop icon, diablo.exe directly and battle.net application without issue.

1 Like
37

Ive seen one or two posts about this. But None of this worked. I even tried the check boxes that limit colors and forces resolution. With how few posts there are restating this, its save to assume that its not the easy fixall a couple are cliaming it to be. Thus I and many others do need the fixes.

If compatibility mode was all that fixed it, the coders out there wouldn’t be making all these fixes available. Not to mention that the registry fix is absolutely necessary if people want to play online.

38

I’m at work right now, but I can make a video and show that this is works when I get out.

39

I don’t need a video on how to right click a file and set up compatibility. Nor will it show anything besides how it works FOR YOU. This has been suggested a couple times already and it doesn’t work for everyone. If it did, it would be reposted all over the place. So its not a easy fix as you call it.

Edit. Found one from almost a week ago.
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/blizzard/t/diablo-direct-draw-error/49189/36

And how its not a universal fix.
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/blizzard/t/warcraft-ii-battlenet-edition-not-launching-on-win11/49344

https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/blizzard/t/warcraft-ii-battlenet-edition/49219

40

Works fine for me just setting compatibility to Windows 98 on DIablo.exe, then launch from Battle.net launcher - I was getting the DirectX 3 error message before that.

41

Unfortunately, it didn’t work for me for either D1 or WC2. I tried a few of the other options in the compatibility tab, but they didn’t have any effect either.

I had to use a DDwrapper for both.