I’m not going to pull out some nonsense argument about who this game was made for. I’m just going to let Blizzard/VV tell you themselves:
Eurogamer interview with executive producer Rod Fergusson and principal designer Rob Gallerani - 19 February 2021
“There are certain things players are like, oh, why is this a mechanic, right? And those are the ones that are very easy for us to say, well, we have to keep that because that’s core to D2. So things like a very small inventory, stamina management, potion management, tomes for your scrolls - those are things in other games just become button presses. But that’s something that’s core to the game, core to the loop.” -Rob Gallerani
“When it comes to things that could even be perceived as bugs, these are things like, if you stand in this one spot during this one boss fight, the boss can’t get to you. It’s like, okay, well, yes, that’s a bug. I seriously doubt that was what the original creators intended. But it’s become such a well-known thing that people can do that we’re like, okay, we should keep it.” -Rob Gallerani
“Or even translations, when they were translated to French originally, they were not really a real translation. They just put the word le in front of it. It’s like, okay, well, it’s probably a poor translation, but at this point for 20 years that magic item in France is known as that thing. So we don’t change that.” -Rob Gallerani
“Yes! Even even down to balances, right? So obviously the game has been rebalanced over the years, so if you haven’t played it for 20 years it will be changed, but as of live Diablo 2 right now, that’s the balance we’re going with. So if you liked your hammer paladin, your hammer paladin still is pretty awesome.” -Rob Gallerani
“We’re really focused on having an authentic experience. You can still connect locally through TCP/IP if you want to! That was there in D2. It’ll be there in D2R. We’ve really focused on making sure that if there’s something about the core experience you loved, we’re bringing that over.” -Rod Fergusson
BlizzCon 2021 Deep Dive Panel with streamer MrLlamaSC, lead designer Andre Abrahamian, lead designer Rob Gallerani, lead artist Chris Amaral - 19 February 2021
“I kind of look at it a little bit like StarCraft: Brood War, which also had a remaster, and how it’s like-- a lot of the pathing bugs, and the duds from the reavers, and all of these things in the game that were kind of awful are what make the game beautiful and what make the game super balanced-- and if you were to go and remake it and remove some of those ‘issues,’ it would change how the whole entire game plays. So I felt like with Diablo II, that’s kind of the same idea, right. You gotta keep some of those difficult details because then it ends up creating, you know, the overall experience that we all know and love.” -MrLlamaSC
“At its core, we want it to still be the same. So, right away, things like the balance, the monsters, spawn rates, item drops, and things like that are the same. What we’re doing is trying to take any of the rough edges you see-- compatibility issues, resolution issues, and obviously the art, improving the art as well-- all these kinds of things you come to know from a remaster but still maintaining very much what the game is.” -Andre Abrahamian
“When it comes to the features we added, this is probably the biggest area where we scrutinize so much-- is this addition straying too much? You know, does it still create the same gameplay experience and other things like that. Things like a shared stash-- we know people use mule characters, right, and so adding a shared stash we felt was the right choice.” -Rob Gallerani
“…let’s make sure we’re not taking something away from this remaster.” -Andre Abrahamian
GameSpot interview with executive producer Rod Fergusson - 16 June 2021
“Our key word was authenticity-- how do we keep the experience authentic.” -Rod Fergusson
IGN interview with executive producer Rod Fergusson - 17 June 2021
“We wanted to make sure that the game was authentic to the original. So this is a remaster, not a remake.” -Rod Fergusson
“What should you leave the same for authentic reasons and what should you change…[]…those are decisions that we as a team are making hoping like ‘Okay, let’s not mess it up.’ Like you have this amazing experience; that’s the joy of doing a remaster; you know it’s fun; you know it’s an amazing game; so don’t screw it up as you try to modernize it and make it feel contemporary with modern visuals.” -Rod Fergusson
“Diablo II sort of set a bar and helped established what is the action roleplaying genre. Right? So you don’t want to mess with that. And that’s even when we looked at the balance and people were saying like ‘Hey, if you’re going to remaster the game, why don’t you change the balance of the classes or the balance of the skills?’ and it just felt like we have to be careful because then it’s not that same experience.” -Rod Fergusson
“One of the things about a game from 21 years ago is that there’s a lot more discovery and a lot more things that weren’t explained to you. So when you get a quest in Diablo II, you gotta go find it. Okay it says ‘Go to the monastery’ and you’re like ‘I don’t even know where the monastery is, so I’m going to go out and start adventuring and start moving through the maps until I discover the monastery,’ where as a modern game would put a little arrow on your map and say ‘Go here, that’s the monastery’ and that felt like ‘Sure, that’s a convenience and a quality of life improvement for some players’ but it kind of takes away the essence.” -Rod Fergusson
“Same thing with sort of inventory tetris, you know, the inventory space in D2 is very small and people are like ‘What about a charm bag, we can put all our charms somewhere else, and what if we increase inventory size’ and all these sorts of things. But you realize is that actually that constraint around your tiny inventory is a big part of what makes the game work in terms of some of the things you have to think about or what you’re picking up or what you’re not. That ‘tetris’ is kind of a big part of the experience of playing. For a while we had an auto-sort button and as soon as it went in you immediately realize that ‘No, that doesn’t work at all’ and it takes away some part of what’s core to playing the game.” -Rod Fergusson
Diablo II: Resurrected official website
“Classic gameplay-- the same Diablo II you know and love, preserved.”
They’ve already broken some promises. It’s up to us-- the passionate “purists,” their target audience-- to let them know we can tolerate minor changes within reason, but we will NOT tolerate unnecessary changes-- especially those that fundamentally and detrimentally change the design/direction/dynamic of the D2 experience.
This forum is full of people who come from different games and mentalities who seek to change our game to be more like theirs. It would be wrong for us to allow ourselves to be disenfranchised. It is up to us to apply pressure and hold Blizzard accountable to their promises.
To the casuals: You are welcome to stay to enjoy our game, but please do not expect Blizzard to cater to you. If you do not enjoy D2 as it currently is, then D2R is not for you.
D2R is for those who love D2 as it currently is and just wanting modern support, and for those who have never played but wish to experience an authentic D2 adventure.