Diablo (DevilutionX)

Also known as: DevilutionX (the engine); Hellfire (the expansion, also played by DevilutionX).

Status

DevilutionX 1.5.5 built by us (devilutionx 1.5.5-1+ps3.N, built from gamedb/games/diablo/packages/devilutionx/: DevilutionX is under the Sustainable Use License 1.0, non-commercial and not DFSG-free; the user accepted that on 2026-10-29 (“I’m not using it commercially”), so it is public in the testing suite, marked non-free in its description, README.Debian and the GameDB page, Section still games). Two patches: 0001 opens the audio device in the host byte order (AUDIO_S16SYS; AUDIO_S16 is little-endian, so the PPE swapped every sample twice); 0002 fixes the see-through mouse cursor (below). Upstream’s defaults are already console-like: fullscreen at the screen’s mode (SDL_WINDOW_FULLSCREEN_DESKTOP, the picture widened to 16:9 and scaled up), SDL game controllers on. The package links game-data-packager’s diablo-data files (/usr/share/games/diablo/DIABDAT.MPQ, Hellfire’s hellfire.mpq, hfmonk.mpq, hfmusic.mpq, hfvoice.mpq) into /usr/share/diasurgical/devilutionx/, a folder DevilutionX searches (it never looks in /usr/share/games). The player’s 1.09 DIABDAT.MPQ (517,501,242 bytes) is not the GOG file GDP knew (517,501,282); gdp patch 0019 accepts both for diablo-data (tags ?gog and ?1.09). Proven on the PC (2026-10-30): game-data-packager diablo -p diablo-data on a folder with the file builds the deb, and the helper’s manifest check takes its data stream (release 1.09); the import itself on the PS3 is in TESTS.

The cursor (patch 0002, 2026-10-30). DevilutionX draws a hardware cursor: Source/hwcursor.cpp hands SDL a colour cursor (SDL_CreateColorCursor; sdl2-compat on SDL3, whose X11 driver copies the ARGB8888 surface into an XcursorImage in host order: correct on big-endian). When the renderer scales the picture up (1920x1080 for the game’s 854x480: 2.25), it first converts the 8-bit sprite to SDL_PIXELFORMAT_ARGB8888 and scales it with its own BilinearScale32 (Source/utils/sdl_bilinear_scale.cpp), which takes byte 3 of each pixel as the alpha. ARGB8888 is a packed format: byte 3 is alpha on little-endian, blue on big-endian. On the PPE the scaler used the blue channel as alpha, so Diablo’s browns (no blue) went transparent and the rest blended wrong. Upstream master still has it. 0002 uses SDL_PIXELFORMAT_BGRA32 for that path (ARGB8888 on x86, so nothing changes there; BGRA8888 on big-endian, alpha in byte 3). Checked on the PC with the X server’s cursor read back (XFixesGetCursorImage) under Xvfb at 1920x1080, the main menu’s 80x67 cursor: the shipped ppc64 build (qemu-user) had 268 opaque, 1711 partly transparent and 3381 clear pixels; the patched ppc64 build and the amd64 build both 1733, 665 and 2962. The host test packages/devilutionx/tests/hwcursor-alpha-test.cpp runs the same path on a test sprite: on ppc64 1322 of 2401 inner pixels lose alpha with ARGB8888, none with BGRA32; none either way on amd64. Not seen on the PS3 yet (TESTS.md Next).

The PC side. DevilutionX isn’t in Debian, so tools/play-pc.sh diablo plays our amd64 build: the recipe’s REF_IMAGE=devilutionx-amd64, made by tools/ref-image.sh devilutionx (after make devilutionx-src; a local image, rebuilt the same way when the package changes). The data: the diablo-data .deb if one is in build/, else PLAY_PC_DATA_DIR=<folder with DIABDAT.MPQ> mounted at /usr/share/games/diablo (the recipe’s REF_DATA_DIR). Tried 2026-10-30 under Xvfb: the intro, then the main menu at 1920x1080 with the player’s 1.09 file.

The data is the player’s: Diablo 1.09’s DIABDAT.MPQ (517,501,242 bytes, sha256 6bc120a603fdb383ff91f374e7db599765d6230d81e5a4c1b33f8254911774e7, md5 68f049866b44688a7af65ba766bef75a), in ~/.local/share/diasurgical/devilution/ (SDL’s pref path for “diasurgical”, “devilution”: not devilutionx; diablo.ini and the saves go there too; --data-dir names another folder).

Smoke runs on 2026-10-28 (kernel .874, Mesa ps3.924, the VRAM swap on; the last one ps3-bench-20261028T223638Z): the recipe (benchmark/recipe.sh) starts devilutionx --diablo -n with a save folder of the run’s own, then Return through the menus and a typed name (DevilutionX fills one in only for a pad) into Tristram. The title menu, the hero creation, the difficulty and the town are drawn right (fire, pentagrams, the Warrior, the panel’s orbs; xwd and webcam), fullscreen 1920x1080 (geom fs=1). In town: 58 fps steady on the Gallium HUD, 1% low 25, 10 frames over 100 ms in 90 s (2.3 s, the longest 425 ms), 48 MB peak RSS; the sound running with 8 audible dropouts (to be judged by ear). The hero was saved (single_0.sv, an MPQ the game writes). DevilutionX found the DualShock 3 (“PS3 Controller” mapping); the pad is not tried. Its --demo/--timedemo options would make a benchmark once a demo is recorded.

Played session ps3-bench-20261029T213401Z (ps3.931~dev, 2026-10-29): 21.5 min, quit, 1273 s of play, fullscreen 1920x1080 (21 shots: Tristram at dusk, then the cathedral levels, the inventory open; in proportion, no bars). Median 59.3 fps, 1% low 23.9, longest frame 2.3 s, 1.8 s a minute of stutter, load 15 s, 47 MB RSS, 11 xruns, 3 audible dropouts by the form’s count. The form: sound and music heard, controls full, pad menus worked, play seamless, no glitches; its note: “Very minor issue, cursor is semitransparent”. The cursor is an X pointer (XFixes saw it in 16 of 21 shots), and X cursors are not in the xwd captures, so the shots can’t show it; reviewed as wrong colours or blending (-25, the only category near it); the cause is found and fixed (patch 0002, above). No PC reference sheet: play-pc.sh had no PC side for DevilutionX then (it has now) and upstream’s x86_64 release was run by hand. Rated Gold 80, provisional (0.35 h of play): smoothness 62 is the weakest aspect.

Engine options

• DevilutionX (the pick: complete, very active, 9.9k stars, BE prior art)
• devilution (the matching decompilation, Windows exe: DevilutionX’s source)
• freeablo (stalled since 2023)

Research

What the surveys and plans said about it, newest first; each line names its source, the section and the date.

• 2026-10-26, docs/backlog/games.md, “Games to smoke next, and Wesnoth’s music”: on the “try now” list (shareware spawn.mpq); not started.
• 2026-10-20, pc-classics.md, “RPG”: Diablo + Hellfire (1996, PS1 too): DevilutionX, complete, SDL software; a Mac OS X Tiger PPC build (45 fps on an iBook G4), Amiga 68k, a BE network fix; shareware free; effort S.
• 2026-10-19, game-reeval.md, “devilutionx (Diablo 1)”: no hard no: the game renders an 8-bit palette surface itself, SDL_CreateRenderer only presents it; SDL1.2, SDL2 or SDL3. Not in Debian: own build (CMake, bundled libs). Big-endian good: explicit LE loads/stores (Source/utils/endian_*.hpp); changelog “Added support for 32bit PowerPc”, “macOS 10.4 PowerPC”, “Correct networking support on big-endian systems”; Amiga M68K port. RAM estimate 60-120 MB (runs on the 3DS in under 100 MB). Data: spawn.mpq from the Blizzard shareware (first dungeon levels; tolerated, not an open licence); full game DIABDAT.MPQ (GOG). Effort S. Verdict: TRY NOW, the best 2D candidate of part A.
• 2026-10-19, game-reeval.md, “Addendum: GameOS port exists?”: no known PS3 port (its README’s platform list has no PS3).