
Freeablo – An open-source Diablo engine - bane
https://freeablo.org/
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marricks
For people hoping to just download and play be aware, it doesn't include art
files. Need to get those from original Diablo.

> freeablo is a modern cross platform reimplementation of the game engine used
> in Diablo 1. As it is just an engine, you will need the original data files
> to play the game.

> #Installation > Copy DIABDAT.MPQ and Diablo.exe from your diablo install
> into the folder with the freeablo executable. (NOTE: only version 1.09 of
> diablo is currently supported, so please patch to that version)

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ThePadawan
For anyone interested in contributing to open-source game engines, there is a
nicely curated list (by language and game genre) at
[http://osgameclones.com/](http://osgameclones.com/).

~~~
clarry
I've been thinking of making such a list (with all these filters!), but
thankfully someone beat me to it. One thing I'd like to see though would be
the extension to include open source game projects that aren't clones or
remakes.

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ekianjo
There's a lot of open source game projects that are not clones, but also a lot
of them are just unfinished, unmaintained, buggy or just crap as well.

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shmerl
Nice. Now we just need the game distributed DRM-free on GOG for the art
assets.

[https://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/diablo_i_diablo_ii_and_di...](https://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/diablo_i_diablo_ii_and_diablo_iii_expension_packs_and_soundtrack_and_maybe_some_wallpapersart)

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Waterluvian
The beauty of a project like this, is that you get plenty of experience and
fun building an engine, without being up the creek on art assets, game design,
etc.

Some of my favourite personal projects are where I wholesale rip off assets
from other games, used as placeholders for assets that will never arrive. My
creative space is then the underlying engineering and game systems.

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santaclaus
Too awesome! Someone should run this through emscripten and have Diablo in the
browser.

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dleslie
That would require distributing the art assets without a license.

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ygra
Or reading a 500 MiB file via file APIs.

~~~
mewmew
[https://github.com/doggan/diablogl](https://github.com/doggan/diablogl)

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dancek
The most recent release (0.3) is from 2015-08, but apparently there's been
good progress recently.

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smegel
Good. I found the only way to play Diablo on a modern system is WinXP in
virtualbox and with certain compatibility setting enabled. Was painful to get
working.

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oridecon
Is there controller support? I know the UI is not made for that but I always
wanted to try it.

~~~
jakebasile
There was a PSX version of Diablo. I'm sure a ROM is floating around
somewhere. It was pretty terrible though :)

~~~
mewmew
The Japanese Playstation 1 release of Diablo 1 did include debug symbols
though!

[https://github.com/sanctuary/notes/issues/1](https://github.com/sanctuary/notes/issues/1)

~~~
jakebasile
Thank you for this, I'll enjoy reading through this and some of the linked
material. Diablo 1 is the game that got me into gaming and it holds a special
place in my heart.

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orionblastar
If only I could find the old Diablo CD-ROM that I had owned. Not sure where I
put it, but if I find it I will give this a try.

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SXX
How it's compared to Flare? ([http://flarerpg.org/](http://flarerpg.org/))

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YeGoblynQueenne
Wow, nice, but gosh- _freeablo_?

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zavandor
Any bets how long it'll take for a cease-and-desist letter from Blizzard for
this one?

~~~
tormeh
It's just an engine - you have to get the content from Blizzard. OpenMW is
doing the same with Bethesda.

~~~
zanny
You don't have to get consent from anyone without reusing, redistributing, or
modifying their copyrighted materials.

A cleanroom reverse engineering is perfectly legal, without any "permission",
in most countries.

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prewett
Yes, but distributing the copyrighted art with your clean-room reverse-
engineered engine is not legal. Hence, no art is available for this engine,
and you have to procure your own copy of the art, presumably from the CD you
purchased, in order to use the engine.

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JustSomeNobody
Wouldn't libre-ablo be a better name?

~~~
GFK_of_xmaspast
Depends on if you want to pronounce it or not.

