Highly Addictive, VERY Re-playable Action/RPG Game

Diablo 2 Battle Chest includes the original Diablo 2 game as well as the "Lord Of Destruction" expansion. The game is an RPG-type action game. It would be extremely difficult to try to describe every aspect of this game. Therefore, I will describe the basics and explain WHY this game is an outstanding game. When completely installed, you can create a new character based upon 1 of 7 different character classes: amazon, assassin, barbarian, druid, necromancer, paladin, sorceress. Each character has skills and traits which are unique to that character. You begin by creating a new character. There are two different types of characters: open and closed. Open characters are stored on your computer. Closed characters are stored on Blizzard's online gaming service called Battlenet. To start, you create a new character based on one of the character classes. You create a new game and start in the first area or act 1. In each act, you fight monsters, find literally millions of different items, complete quests and gain experience. As you gain experience, you will also advance your character level. When you advance a character level, you are given character stat points and skill points to make your character stronger. The goal of the game is to complete the last quest in act 5. However, there are 3 different difficulty levels so there is a lot more of a challenge than just completing act 5 on normal level.

The concept is simple. However, the game has enormous re-playability. Most of the people who play this game online have been playing it for over 3 years. There are several reasons for this.

1) Each character class provides a completely different playing experience. In fact, even the same character class can be built up so many different ways. For example, you can build a barbarian who specializes in swords or you can build one who specializes in axes. There is no "right" or "wrong" way to build up your character. It is truly your own build.

2) The areas are somewhat random. Many parts of the game are pre-set. However, most of the areas and monsters are generated randomnly. This adds to the excitement.

3) There are millions and millions of items to be found. In fact, one of the main reasons many people play this game is to find and use these items. There are even trading forums where people exchange items.

What all this adds up to is one extremely fun, highly addictive game. It's a little different from other RPGs that I've played. This game tends to be more focused on building your character and finding items, rather than completing the quests.

There are only a few issues I have with the game.

1) On the higher difficulty levels, some areas are extremely difficult to complete unless you play online in a "party"

2) Building a very strong characters requires many hours. This includes repeating areas in order to find better items before you advance.

However, the entertainment value quickly makes up for these issues. I definitely recommend this game. I've played many games and no other game matches up to Diablo 2 Battle Chest in terms of re-playability. Overall, you will get the most fun for the least amount of money with this game.