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Diablo: Original Game Development

David Brevik's GDC 2016 post-mortem of the original Diablo, covering how it evolved from a turn-based claymation DOS game into the genre-defining action RPG. It includes development anecdotes and lessons learned.

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Why HN readers recommended it

HN considers it one of the best GDC post-mortems, with funny anecdotes (such as turning down Hotmail equity) and multiplayer insights.

This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.

Video & recommendation details

Creator / channel
jon d
Topic
game development postmortem
Format
talk
Level
general
HN recommenders in dataset
3
HN mentions in dataset
4
Recommendation years in dataset
2021–2023

These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.

From the original HN conversations

Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.

  • I can't wait for this to go up on Youtube. GDC post mortems are amazing, especially the ones on Diablo[0] and Fallout[1]. I've loved Fallout since I was 12 and it really got me into post-apocalypse fiction. I ended up watching and reading all the …

    somedude895 on Hacker News · 2022-03
    In Wolfenstein 3D secrets revealed by John Romero in lengthy post-mortem chat

  • An even more interesting and funny perspective is from another programmer beforehand: In this post-mortem talk [0] on Diablo 1. The creator mentioned his worst business decision - the Hotmail guy offering 10% of the company in return for an office in the back they …

    namelosw on Hacker News · 2022-09
    In Ask HN: Which startups have the most interesting pivot stories?

  • Unrelated to the post here, but I think both Pat and this guy[1] say that they build the multiplayer for Diablo by themselves… Anyhow, both talks are fascinating and surely worth a watch. [1] [VIDEO]

    martinohansen on Hacker News · 2023-10
    In MMO Architecture: clients, sockets, threads and connection-oriented servers

Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.

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