Keeping a game running can be an incredible amount of trouble, and sometimes that trouble catches up to the point where it dominoes into an even bigger issue. Such seems to have been the case with Diablo 2, as Blizzard was forced to take the servers offline entirely so that they could perform some emergency maintenance.
What the core of the issue is, Blizzard hasn’t revealed to the players of the classic title. Whatever the issue was, however, it seems to have proven an even bigger issue than the developers thought it would be, as the maintenance was extended from the original two hours to almost a six-hour maintenance.
[#D2] We are currrently performing emergency maintenance. During this time, the game will be unavailable for play. https://t.co/q8SEGe7M5V
— Blizzard CS – The Americas (@BlizzardCS) May 8, 2020
“Diablo 2 will be undergoing maintenance on its servers beginning at 11:30 am PDT today,” Blizzard wrote in their announcement earlier this afternoon.
“During this period, login issues may arise for Diablo 2, and access to the game may be limited. We expect this maintenance to last for two hours. We apologize for any inconvenience caused and we will do our best to complete this work as early as possible.”
Whatever the maintenance entailed seems to have become more of a problem, as the game has only been taken further offline as the developers work to fix the issues. While they originally planned to keep the game playable for the time being – hence the mention of possible login issues and limitations – they’ve since taken the game completely offline, making Diablo 2 completely unavailable for play.
This termination of play, unfortunately, seems to have extended to the game as a whole. Online servers are down, and single-player mode seems to be unplayable as well, as the developers were forced to take the game as a whole offline.
The good news is that as of writing this, the maintenance should be ending at any minute, as Blizzard’s updated maintenance window is approaching. The developers haven’t announced any further delays or extensions to their downtime, so it seems that whatever issues they ran into must be close to being solved.
Diablo 2 is still going strong, and it’s great to see Blizzard paying such close attention to a game that turns twenty years old this year, an anniversary that might make some veterans feel ancient. Many still consider the title to be the best in the franchise, with the massive departure from the second title’s design being one of the biggest complaints of Diablo 3.
Even more than the consistent popularity, Diablo 2 has received a surge in players in the last few months. This surge began around last November’s BlizzCon and has continued up to now.
Much of this surge in the player base could likely be blamed on the announcement of Diablo 4 at last year’s BlizzCon. The fourth installment in the franchise has been one of the most highly anticipated titles in years.
