Many of us are enjoying the recent release of Diablo III but some of us still love to play Diablo II Lord of Destruction, and with Windows 8, that can be a little problematic.
Diablo II Lord of Destruction is an outstanding game that became an instant classic when it was released on June 29th in North America. Even over a decade later, Diablo fans still play Diablo II LOD on Battle.net and in single player mode. However, the operating systems we use have changed quite dramatically over the years and with each new version usually comes a new set of problems for gamers who enjoy playing classic titles.
If you have attempted to play Diablo II LOD on Windows 8 you will notice many issues, including some serious lag. Here are a few steps you can take to make sure your Diablo II LOD experience in Windows 8 is just as good, if not better, than it was back in 2001.
This quick “how to” assumes that you have already installed and patched the latest version of Diablo II LOD on your system. If you need patch information you can obtain it through Blizzard’s official patch site.
Before launching the game, right click on the game’s shortcut and select “Properties”, then select the “Compatibility” tab.
Once on the Compatibility tab, select the following options:
- Check “Run this program in compatibility mode for” and set the value to “Windows XP SP 2/3”
- Check “Reduced Color Mode” and set to “16-bit (65536) Color”
- Check “Disable display scaling on high DPI settings”
- Optional “Run this program as administrator”
Once you dial in these settings click Apply and then OK.
The next step is crucial if you want to reduce or eliminate all of the glitching and lagging that is known to plague Diablo II LOD on Windows 8.
Obtain an 3DFX Glide Wrapper, this is a little application that will allow you to use the Glide interface with Diablo II LOD. I have found that GLIDE3-to-OpenGL Wrapper by Sven Labusch seems to work the best out of any I have tried so far.
Download the files from Sven’s site and read the “ReadMe.txt” file. This will contain the most current instructions for installing and setting up the wrapper. Be sure to re-run the video test after the wrapper is installed and set it to use Glide.
** Note: You Will Also Need to apply compatibility settings to run the Diablo II Video Test (D2VidTst.exe) * *
That’s it! Hopefully you will be successful in your attempts to get Diablo running smooth. Just follow the directions closely and have fun!
Thanks very much for the tip. Also had trouble playing the game in W8. Awesome!!!
Can’t get the video test to run after installing the wrapper. No idea why but it never runs the video test after initial installation. Have tried everything I can think of.
You can make sure the wrapper is working by running “glide-init” and performing a test. You should see good frame rates. You may also have to run the Diablo II Video Test (D2VidTst.exe) in compatibility mode as well, I used Windows XP SP3.
run the testvid file as an administrator when you right click on it
Did all this most of the time D2Launch.dll error 193. When i use -3dfx as a command it just wont load anything or give any error.
Works fine now…. one day I spent all day working on it and now it runs like butter with only Compatibility mode windows XP.
thank you very much for the info. me and my friend have tested this. he’s using win 7 ultimate and im using win 8 and before the game lagged for both of us and he had some color issues (no matter what compatibility settings we tried) and now it runs flawlessly for us both. thanks again!
when you get to the GLide page do not click on the download link on the right. That is a yahoo installer and it will screw up your explore with add ons and loop glitches
Still doesnt run… did all the actions mentioned, but still having compatibility issues: “This program has compatibility issues”. Dont know what to do else..
ok maybe im an idiot but im going to the readme and it says to run the glide-init file either in windows directly or the game… how do i do that.. i just sem to be opening the same laggy diablo and i see no options to run anything in “glide”? any ideas?
They are referring to the “glide-init.exe” file that was in zip file you downloaded, you open it, change the language to English and run the test. Then close it, and then run the Diablo II Video test, which is in the Diablo II game directory, and select the glide option under video modes.
i figured it out.. didnt know how to move the files physically into diablos files.. just dragged from window to window then my vid tester gave me glide as an option.. btw game works great now
I just want to say “THANK YOU” for spending the time on this update and for all the very helpful comments made by others. I was able to follow these instructions and have this up and running in under an hour. Game experience just went up through the roof. Awesome job!
dude thanks so much, you are a life-saver, this is the only thing that worked, you should be sanctified or something!
you are godlike! been struggling for weeks with this issue. if theres a d2 hall of fame somwhere on the net, you should most definatley be recognized for your awesomeness! thank you so much
Great site! I have struggled w/win8 and d2.. don’t be discouraged I had to install and uninstall d2 several times before I got it figured out. The answers are in the 2 blue links described above. Even if you get LOD working on win8 it’s useless w/out glide3 wrapper. My advice take your time, be patient and follow the directions CAREFULLY and you will be playing LOD as if it were made for win8. My struggle is over. Many thanks to everyone involved with this project.
Thank you SO much. This worked perfectly for my windows 8 machine. On to demon killin’.
Yes!
The wrapper glide3x worked for me. Thank you!
So I’ve downloaded the files, read the ReadMe, moved the glide3x.dll/glide-init files in to my Diablo 2 file. I’ve ran the test for glide-init and the Diablo 2 Video Test but the option to choose glide as my video mode doesn’t pop up. Any help on this please?
So I’ve got everything installed. and its just that it cycles though ever character lowercase and uppercase in the upper left of my screen every time it has to load something.
mine does it 2
Thank you !
Unlike what was said in the Glide readme, it works with APU (shared memory system).
Note that I have an C-50 overclocked to 1.33 GHz 🙂 with 4GB of DDR3. And it runs like… HELL !
THANK YOU !!!!!!!!!!!
you saved my life 😛
Thank you so much!!! I was desperate to play D2 on win8 but you made a miracle! 🙂
You. Are. A. God. Damn. Genius!
I’ve done everything but I seem to have a different problem. I get an error saying there needs to be a diablo ii expansion disk in the drive to play the game…. It is in the drive but for some reason its not detecting the disk. Why & how do I fix it?
Thank you, worked perfectly! Follow all instructions very carefully and you will be playing in no time. It’s Working great on Windows 8, with compatibility set to Windows XP SP3.
Work great thanks much….Now I have to find a fix for D1.
Had trouble, but they’re gone now. The GLIDE-wrapper did the job. Thanks, man!
It worked, however, I am still getting color problems – weird colored lines on top half of the screen. Does anyone else have that issue?
Here’s a screenshot of what it looks like when I use the wrapper:
http://i.imgur.com/hmQlb6n.jpg
Nevermind, I fixed it by using a different wrapper – nGlide
Works perfectly!! Thank you very much 😀
Thank you for the guide, Richard. I searched the battle.net forums but had trouble getting D2 and the D2 Video Test to work properly. Your suggestions about Win 8 compatibility helped out tremendously. Thanks!
I followed the directions but i cannot connect to battle.net. Single player works fine though. Also the sound on my laptop is now extremely quiet. I have to turn the volume up to 100 just to be usable. Before I never went past 20 on the volume control.
I think I followed things right, but not sure. I only copied the glide3x.dll into the Diablo 2 folder, but am I supposed to put the glide-init into the folder too?
Nevermind, I figured out my own problems.
Sidenote… Are there (and if there are can you guide me through the steps?) any ways to play in full screen? I tried to make a few changes here and there but there is always black on the sides of my screen when I play.
Thank you so much! Works perfectly!
Nice – It works like a charm. Thank you 🙂
Thank you so much for this, it worked! Lovely finally to play the game without lags!
I made a necro on single player and got him to 15 or so and just couldn’t handle the fps drops… I followed these steps and they work great… however my ladder characters weren’t expired as they should be… and my new necro isn’t on the single player… oh well. Great fix, thank you.
Fixed horrid lagging on my Win 8 laptop. Thanks!
Thanks a ton! Time for a revival of one of my favorite games!
HOLY SHIT!! I fucking love you, guys. I tried everything in this shit, and nothing helps… But when I found your website… *———————* Can I call you of my God? Please.
You’re a genious! Thank’s a mill for this! <3
Awesome! I’m really glad you mentioned the 3dfx glide. Many other posts don’t cover that part. I too have a guide to this, but i also have a guide for people on a Mac running OS X 10.7. I hope it can help! https://plus.google.com/100335403924507855513/posts/HFpud41zsM1
Thank’s for guide, 3dfx glide solved my problem with fps lag on Windows 8.1
thanks for this man 🙂
ty so much that was really helpfull,thanks alot 🙂
Game now works beautifully! Thank you so much! I Love you!
Works perfectly now, my only complaint is that it reset the game, so that it completely cleared all of my single player characters. Just be sure to make a back-up of your characters before doing it.
Awesome, worked right away! Thanks for the post! If you have one to make my Command and Conquer 95 and Red Alert work on Win 8 we can be best friends.
This works perfectly, took me less than 10 minutes.
First time I read on internet and find out a Guide that doesnt give me : Virus. WORKS really well Tyvm
I shat me pants mate
Thanks, It worked for me, at first i had a blinking screen, but after i run it compatibility XP service pack 2, now it runs smooth.