Diablo Knowledge

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A Diablo Shout-Out in Fyresdal

Walk into the butcher's house in Fyresdal for the first time and he'll bellow 'Fresh Meat' the moment he spots you, the exact same line The Butcher shouts the first time you run into him in every Diablo game.

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Where the Name Actually Comes From

Diablo's name isn't some deep lore reference, it's just geography. Creator David Brevik grew up near Mount Diablo in California, and Blizzard North's studios in Redwood City and San Mateo weren't far from it either, so the name just kind of stuck.

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The Cow Level Started as a Total Lie

Back when the original Diablo came out, players spread a rumour about a secret cow level hidden somewhere in the game. It was completely made up, but the joke got so big that Blizzard actually built a real one into Diablo II a few years later.

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Diablo II Almost Didn't Happen

Making the first Diablo wrecked the team, so much crunch and so little sleep that by the time it shipped, nobody at Blizzard North was exactly jumping at the chance to start a sequel straight away.

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Why the Soulstones Exist in the First Place

According to the Horadrim monk Jered Cain's own writings, Tyrael gave his order the Soulstones purely to trap the Three Prime Evils. The catch is the stones only pull in non-corporeal spirits, so they were never going to work on anything with a living, breathing body.

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The Butcher Started Out as an Offhand Joke

The story goes that someone on the original dev team looked at an early bloodied-up dungeon room and just said it looked like a butcher's shop. That one throwaway comment is apparently how one of gaming's most feared bosses got his name.

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His Dying Words Are Actually a Parenting Tip

Beat the final boss and listen to his garbled death message played backwards, it comes out as 'eat your vegetables and brush after every meal.' Not exactly the dark prophecy you'd expect from the Lord of Terror.

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It Shipped on New Year's Eve

The original Diablo came out on December 31st, 1996. Releasing a game on the very last day of the year is a weird call by today's standards, but it meant it technically counted as a 1996 release right under the wire.

Diablo II Source

Diablo II Reused a Familiar Tune

When you walk back into Tristram in Diablo II, years after the events of the first game, the exact same music from the original Diablo's Tristram plays. It's a small touch, but it hits harder than it has any right to.

Diablo II Source

The Leg You Need to Reach the Cows

Remember Wirt, the peg-legged kid who overcharged you for gambling items in the first game? Click his corpse in Diablo II's Tristram and he drops his own severed leg, which you then need alongside a Tome of Town Portal to actually crack open the Secret Cow Level. Grim way to pay tribute to a character, but it works.

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