04-07-2006, 05:05 AM
My first taste of Diablo was the demo game loaded into a CD from a Mac magazine. That's right: I first played the game on a Mac. Diablo, of course, was released in a hybrid format where the same disc could install to either PC or Mac. My particular copy of Diablo has had the grace of touching both types of computers in the seven-odd years it has been around.
The thing about the Macintosh version of the game was that the save files were not hidden as they were in early marks of the PC version. The character save files on a Mac were right there in the Diablo folder for all to see, and only later did the PC version get patched to do the same thing.
I haven't touched a Mac in years, but I carried a legacy of my earliest Diablo playing days: all these years I've been holding in storage an Iomega Zip disk, Mac-formatted, that contains the character save filesâ of my first trio of Diablo characters. When I switched to PC, I started all over again, leaving the Mac trio suspended in magnetic limbo since August of 1999.
Well, this week I bought a Zip drive for my clunky ol' desktop and downloaded a Mac format reader for PCs. When I opened the Zip disk up, there they were: three multiplayer files and two single player files. Curious as to the possibility, I copied the multiplayer files into my hard drive and renamed them as if they were PC character files.
If anyone was ever curious, the Mac save files are indeed the same format as the PC files, and transfer of Diablo characters between Macs and PCs are possible (how about that for belated research!). Quite simply, I was curious about one thing: my PC version of Rhydderch Hael is superior to his Macintosh brother in many ways. The PC RH has never touched FOS shrines or danced with Black Deaths, he's higher in clvl and generally has better equipment (including an Ob/Zod amulet and a KSoV). But ol' Macintosh RH has something that PC RH has not had in his possession for a long time: a King's bastard Sword of Speed. Today, I was able to get a glimpse of the KSoS that I haven't set eyes upon for nearly seven years now: +95% ToHit and a decidedly paltry +157% Damage. In practical terms, this isn't great, but it's good enough for now.
In sentimental terms, the baby's priceless.
The thing about the Macintosh version of the game was that the save files were not hidden as they were in early marks of the PC version. The character save files on a Mac were right there in the Diablo folder for all to see, and only later did the PC version get patched to do the same thing.
I haven't touched a Mac in years, but I carried a legacy of my earliest Diablo playing days: all these years I've been holding in storage an Iomega Zip disk, Mac-formatted, that contains the character save filesâ of my first trio of Diablo characters. When I switched to PC, I started all over again, leaving the Mac trio suspended in magnetic limbo since August of 1999.
Well, this week I bought a Zip drive for my clunky ol' desktop and downloaded a Mac format reader for PCs. When I opened the Zip disk up, there they were: three multiplayer files and two single player files. Curious as to the possibility, I copied the multiplayer files into my hard drive and renamed them as if they were PC character files.
If anyone was ever curious, the Mac save files are indeed the same format as the PC files, and transfer of Diablo characters between Macs and PCs are possible (how about that for belated research!). Quite simply, I was curious about one thing: my PC version of Rhydderch Hael is superior to his Macintosh brother in many ways. The PC RH has never touched FOS shrines or danced with Black Deaths, he's higher in clvl and generally has better equipment (including an Ob/Zod amulet and a KSoV). But ol' Macintosh RH has something that PC RH has not had in his possession for a long time: a King's bastard Sword of Speed. Today, I was able to get a glimpse of the KSoS that I haven't set eyes upon for nearly seven years now: +95% ToHit and a decidedly paltry +157% Damage. In practical terms, this isn't great, but it's good enough for now.
In sentimental terms, the baby's priceless.
Political Correctness is the idea that you can foster tolerance in a diverse world through the intolerance of anything that strays from a clinical standard.