Diablo 2 was one heck of a game but you can probably kiss your dreams of a remaster goodbye. During ExileCon 2019 [via GameSpot], the creators of the Diablo franchise took to the stage to share some tales about the games’ development – and an unfortunate incident that nearly changed the course of the franchise.
Creators Max Schaefer, Erich Schaefer, and David Brevik recounted a time which saw a tech incident nearly ruin the development of Diablo 2 – and it’s probably the reason we’ll never see it remastered.
According to the creators, the entire backup of the game’s source code and assets was lost during the final stages of development thanks to a file corruption.
Without having a back-up of the lost work it sounds like the team had one helluva scramble to resolve the issue. Thankfully, a reconstruction was built from the version of the game that developers had been playing at home, meaning the game could launch as we know it.
“[We] finally rebuilt a lot of it through what people had at their homes,” Schaefer told the audience. “I had a big chunk of it. Went home, pulled out the hard drive or whatever we did back then. Spent a few days reconstructing it, which ended up working fine, except that we lost all the history. We lost a lot of the assets, art assets.”
However, there’s still no root code or assets to build from, meaning that if Blizzard ever decided to reboot the game in the form of a remaster, it would be a pretty massive task.
Schaefer admitted: “It would make it very difficult for Blizzard to do a Diablo 2 remaster because all the assets we used are pretty much gone. They’d have to make them from scratch.”
Ah well. At least we have Diablo 4 to look forward to!
Did you know we’ve now opened up a new store? and make sure to sign up for our newsletter so you never miss out on deals, exclusives and more!
Featured Image Credit: Blizzard