As it turned out, character hacking, item manipulation and item duplication were so prevalent, the majority of "high end" items that were traded around for other in-game items and money didn't actually exist in the game's drop tables. My "Godly Plate of the Whale," a piece of armor that I paid top dollar for, was dreamed up by some kid with an item editor.
I was crushed. Me, a white blood cell, tainted by the very people who I was trying to keep out of my world; I turned into a bad T-cell. But then again, that Godly Plate was some pretty swank armor. In fact, I thought, I could probably make something better; just to help me fight off more cheaters ...
And so I fell. And I fell hard. I became the yin to my previous yang. If Diablo and Battle.net were a world I couldn't protect, I was going to do the next best thing: destroy them. The internet is a very black and white place, and so is the teenage psyche. In my mind, if I couldn't have my community the way I wanted it, no one could.
By the end, if there was a way to cheat, I probably knew about it. If I couldn't talk trash better than you, I'd chop your ear off in game. If I couldn't beat you in game, I'd sniff your IP address and "nuke" you so your computer would spontaneously reboot.
All of this, just because the world I loved was so terribly flawed. I was in deep, foregoing the Holy Trifecta of teendom (food, sleep and girls) and it took the same guys who got me into Diablo to get me out.
It was the middle of summer, and we'd spent most of our time together on Battle.net, because we lived pretty far away. One of them had a birthday coming up, so we decided we'd actually get together in person and hang out. We ended up burning a weekend at one guy's house, playing N64 and venturing outdoors in search of girls. Much to my surprise, I was having more fun just being a normal kid than I was being an online service's nemesis. This was my intervention, one that would snap me out of a dangerous fixation that had become all too comfortable. And all it took was a weekend of normalcy.
When I got home, I uninstalled all my cheating programs and gave Diablo one last look, waffling on whether or not to remove it from my hard drive and bury the CD in my back yard like a cursed object. Here it was, the game that stole my personality and replaced it with an internet asshole, staring me in the face, daring me to wipe it from memory. I hit the power button on my PC and went outside, leaving the game in its place. Ultimately, it didn't turn me into anything. I did it to myself and used Diablo as a focal point. Getting rid of the game would be a dangerous catharsis, one that might let me forget what I could let happen to myself.
So, you'll have to forgive me when, three years later, I installed Diablo II and was underwhelmed. I was expecting another experience that would intertwine itself with another personal journey. But it was just a game. Our arcs didn't intersect like before. It might be too much to expect, but I'm waiting for another Diablo to come, no matter what form it may take, just to see what I'll turn into next.
Joe Blancato is an Associate Editor for [i]The Escapist[/I]. He enjoys procrastination and thinks he's a good listener.
