Done for my fellow Hellfire players : Fully functional TCP/IP Multipla

[DarkLegacy]

Well, I've defeated one of the hardest challenges to ever cross my path, successfully incorporating TCP/IP into one of the most overlooked video games in history. Diablo's only expansion ever created: Hellfire.

Hellfire was created by Synergetic Software - a division of Sierra and released in 1997. It was regarded as a major failure by many original Diablo players because:

- The game's atmosphere was not as effective as the dark, gothic environments of the first.
- New sound effects for new monsters are at a much lower bitrate. One set is only existing effects, resampled and distorted by the lower bit-rate (Goatmen - Satyr Lord)
- Most monster designs were uninspired, and of little relevance to the source material of the first game (for example, a certain enemy in Hellfire resembles a leaping pumpkin with feet and glowing eyes).
- The majority of the new spells were unimpressive, as they had a tendency to be simple modifications to existing spells (Firewall -> Lightning Wall), or convenience spells, such as Search and Warp.
- Hellfire had no support for Battle.net, the online service utilized by Blizzard's online multiplayer games. This is arguably the most flawed aspect of the Hellfire expansion, given the impressive popularity of the first Diablo.
- Frustrating pathing problems, especially pronounced in the Crypt levels, resulting in "dithering" behavior while trying to pursue ranged-attack monsters (e.g., liches).

Cited from: Wikipedia

Well, I have - after all of these years - finally incorporated TCP/IP into Hellfire. It is not totally incorporated, but it uses a very clever method and exploits the "Serial Cable" connection protocol in order to establish a TCP/IP connection. Up to four players can simaltaneously play Hellfire now.

Here's how you too can run TCP/IP on Hellfire:

1. You need to enable the hidden Multiplayer option in Hellfire.

To this you must create a text file with the name of "command.txt" in your Hellfire directory, and enter only the following line:

"multitest;"


There also several other hidden options you can enable in the same command line:

cowquest; - Enables the hidden cow quest for the Bovine plate.
theoquest; - Replaces one of the Act 5 quests with a little girl who lost her teddy bear in the crypt.
bardtest; - Enables the secret "Bard" class that uses the Rogue artwork and can wield two one-handed weapons at once. Arguably a cheat class since the weapon damages stack.
barbariantest; - Enables the secret "Barbarian" class that uses the Warrior artwork and uses vitality to enhance damage as opposed to the Warrior's strength. The Barbarian cannot use magic of any kind.
nestart; - Uses the alternate nest art instead of the default.
cryptart; - Uses the alternate crypt art instead of the default.

If you want to enable everything, here is the line you would put:

"cowquest;theoquest;bardtest;multitest;nestart;cryptart;barbariantest;"

2. You need to download TCP/COM, a serial port emulation tool that will allow the TCP/IP connection.

3. The game of the host must have port "1000" open by default. This port can be changed within TCP/Com.

4. The host and clients must all run TCP/Com and must set the settings as accordingly:

Image: http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/1443/settingstj7.jpg

Text transcribed:

Connector: COM1
Baud Rate: 14400
Parity: None
Data Bits: 8
Stop Bits: 1
Flow Control: None
Buffer Size: 8192
Create Virtual COM Port [Enabled]

Obviously the people connecting to the game must check "This PC will act as TCP client" instead of host.

5. The final step is for everyone to run the game. The host goes to "Serial Cable Connection", makes a game, then everyone else clicks on it. They will get recieving game data and be able to play.

6. Play!

[LennyLen]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but some of us have been playing HF over TCP/IP for many years, using much simpler methods than yours.

See Kali and Hamachi.

[DarkLegacy]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but some of us have been playing HF over TCP/IP for many years, using much simpler methods than yours.

See Kali and Hamachi.

I have tried using Hamachi with Diablo and Hellfire numerous times with numerous failures. This is the only method that I've tried and has worked flawlessly each time without tinkering with IPX/SPX, driver settings, disabling network drivers, re-enabling them and such.

Kali requires a $20 membership fee to use it, I believe.

Not to mention that TCP/COM works on virtually all old games, some of which don't even have Lan support such as Red Alert 2.

[Alamara]

I lol'ed at "unrealistic spells."

I haven't actually tried using Hamachi, I guess that I just assumed it worked normally. I know from use with StarCraft, though, how truly simple it is.

[LennyLen]

I have tried using Hamachi with Diablo and Hellfire numerous times with numerous failures.

What sort of "failure?" The only people I know who've had trouble which Hamach didn't have their firewalls configured properly.

Kali requires a $20 membership fee to use it, I believe.

Probably. It was free when I last used it, but that was around 2001.

Not to mention that TCP/COM works on virtually all old games, some of which don't even have Lan support such as Red Alert 2.

Not to mention of course that it will fail for any game that doesn't allow serial connections.;)


I missed this the first time around:

This option was hidden by the developers since it was considered "beta" and not ready to be shown to the public. Blizzard perfected that system with Battle.net, if anything it should be a PATCH to their networking system. Idiots.

You should be careful whom you call an idiot when you have no idea what you are talking about. It was Blizzard who demanded that Sierra remove the multiplayer option that they had implemented for Hellfire. Luckily for us, the development team did not remove it, they just removed the access to it.

[DarkLegacy]

What sort of "failure?" The only people I know who've had trouble which Hamach didn't have their firewalls configured properly.

Have you recently tried playing Hellfire using Hamachi?

I had a properly configured network on both ends, and the only results were being able to see each other's games through IPX/SPX, and when we attempted to join - the game would freeze for a little while and then display "Network connection failure".

Both computers had the IPX/SPX protocols installed via Networking Manager, and had DMZ enabled to the correct local addresses via Router firmware menus. DMZ hosting opens up all ports, so the 'firewall' should not have been a problem at all.

If you do not believe my results, please attempt to run Hellfire using Hamachi yourself, with a computer other than one on your Local Area Network.

Also: If you notice - you can use TCP/COM with Hamachi, check the screenshot. The IP Address begins with a 5.

Probably. It was free when I last used it, but that was around 2001.

http://www.kali.net/register.asp

Not to mention of course that it will fail for any game that doesn't allow serial connections.;)

True. :D Hamachi wins on that one.

I missed this the first time around:
You should be careful whom you call an idiot when you have no idea what you are talking about. It was Blizzard who demanded that Sierra remove the multiplayer option that they had implemented for Hellfire. Luckily for us, the development team did not remove it, they just removed the access to it.

Oh, in that case I should be thankful to Sierra and not yelling at them.. But I'm still puzzled as to why Blizzard would want the expansion pack to be shipped without multiplayer.. :unsure:

[the Langolier]

I've had the same experience with Hamachi. Despite checking IPX for only the hamachi adapter and everything you need to do with it, I have seen games and been unable to join. I have gotten it to work once and gave up after half an hour of tinkering the other times. Another downside to hamachi is when see other users connected, you have no idea what they if they are even at the computer, let alone running a game (not to mention which game).

Oh, in that case I should be thankful to Sierra and not yelling at them.. But I'm still puzzled as to why Blizzard would want the expansion pack to be shipped without multiplayer.. :unsure:

It's probably because they thought it sucked just as much as everybody else!

[Alamara]

Another downside to hamachi is when see other users connected, you have no idea what they if they are even at the computer, let alone running a game (not to mention which game).

Hamachi includes an Instant Message form of chat. It's not obvious, but if you click someone's name I believe it says "Chat" or something along those lines, which opens an IM window. That should help a bit with communication. =D

[splatz]

Dark Legacy,

I appreciate the effort you've put in to finding a solution for Hellfire over the internet! I have also recently embarked on this quest, and ended up learning how to get Hamachi to work properly.

Your solution is no less functional or graceful than mine, so please don't interpret this reply as a jab at it. I think that the readers of this thread would benefit from seeing as many solutions as possible, therefore I want to mention that I have written a guide for setting up Hamachi.

You can find my original thread here

Enjoy playing Hellfire over the internet!

-Splatz

[Jarulf]

Oh, in that case I should be thankful to Sierra and not yelling at them.. But I'm still puzzled as to why Blizzard would want the expansion pack to be shipped without multiplayer.. :unsure:

I think the original deal was for single player only. The fact thatit did not work for battle.net is not surprising since it was not done nor supported by Blizzard so it would have been very hard to allow it on battle.net. Why other multiplayer variants was also removed one can always wonder about regarding the motives by Blizzard. Sierra did basically thus only focus on the single player but the multiplayer code was in the source (they built Hellfire on the at the time current 1.04 code) and it seemed to still work with no extra changes needed, they decided to have the hidden activation put in without any support. Of course, Blizzard got mad and demanded the removal of the "multitest". Due to several other controversies (like the Barbarian who was also supposed to appear in Blizzard's upcomming Diablo 2) the guys at synergistic didn't really have much of an option but to remove it in the patch. Considering how things went with the almost complete breakup of Synergistic and removal of the lead programmer and transfering others inside Sierra, I suppose they could have risked keeping it there. But it is always easy to be smart after you know how things turned out.

[DarkLegacy]

Dark Legacy,

I appreciate the effort you've put in to finding a solution for Hellfire over the internet! I have also recently embarked on this quest, and ended up learning how to get Hamachi to work properly.

Your solution is no less functional or graceful than mine, so please don't interpret this reply as a jab at it. I think that the readers of this thread would benefit from seeing as many solutions as possible, therefore I want to mention that I have written a guide for setting up Hamachi.

You can find my original thread here

Enjoy playing Hellfire over the internet!

-Splatz

[splatz]

I agree that Hellfire will work with those settings, but I do not think it is necessary.

During my testing, if all the steps of the guide were followed, then the IPX settings could remain at their default values ("Auto Detect") and still work properly.

Whatever the case, I'm sure that ALL computers on the network must have the same configuration in order to see each other.

-Splatz

[Surreal]

Registered for an account just to say that I love you man! :D

However, I havn't been able to use this method when connecting to a remote computer, it has only worked on LAN for me =/

Got this semi-working using BOTH Hamachi and TCP COM..

I configured tcpcom as server using the hamachi IP, two players connected to my hamachi IP over TCP COM and I saw them both ingame, but alas they could only see me and not eachother! :wacko:

I'm pulling my hair here guys...

We all installed the IPX protocol for hamachi and diabled IPX on all other network connections, but we were only presented with the "Create Game" option when selecting Multiplayer->IPX in Hellfire. This was why we tested the Hamachi/Tcpcom idea.. but like I said, was only partly successfull.

Have you guys been able to play more than 2 players at once?