Being a Sierra product, the installer will install Sierra utilities in your startup menu if you don't already have it, with no option to skip them (although you can uninstall it separately); the utilities are the Sierra-typical uninstall/readme/support/auto-update. Auto-update, if invoked, asks you to connect to the net, searches your system for Sierra products, then queries Cendant Software's site to check for any patches or other updates, including updates to the Sierra utilities package itself. (The original Hellfire release must be patched for the town characters to properly interact with you, for instance - otherwise their Gossip mode will be stuck.) The Sierra utilities wind up under Program Files on drive C, no matter where the user asked the actual game to install, and the icon for the utilities is added to the start menu.

Once you have Hellfire installed and patched, you'll see some differences from (actually, additions to) baseline Diablo right away as you start your next new character. A few new character types have been added. (For a basic Hellfire install, only Monk has been added, but if you download and apply the Purgatory modification on top of Hellfire, you'll get Bard and Barbarian as well; their icons look like Warrior and Rogue, respectively, but they have a different mix of skills.) Also, a new game can be started at any of 3 difficulty levels - but a weak character has little chance against the higher levels, so prudence is recommended.

A nice bonus is that Hellfire gives you the option of *running* in town, regardless of your character.

You'll also see new types of items to pick up.
- Oils. Some allow you to repair your weapons without running to the blacksmith, while others improve their statistics, such as Oil of Accuracy and Oil of Fortitude.
-"Runes". These aren't related to Diablo II's runes; they're plain-looking gadgets that cast a single spell when set off, like crude grenades, such as Rune of Fire, or Rune of Stone.
- New types of scrolls, such as Search (*very* helpful for locating any loot in your vicinity; Search temporarily gives them an aura and marks them on your map).

Hellfire also adds 8 additional levels. A new farmer character has been added to the town of Tristram, and he has a problem that he won't discuss with you until he knows you fairly well - that is, your character must have a minimum expertise before he'll give you the explosives you need to break open the Hive south of town. The Hive is 4 levels deep, and contains 2 new quests that you'll always receive leading to two Level Bosses. Defeating the final Level Boss in the Hive will give you the key needed to enter the remaining four new levels, via a crypt in the cathedral's graveyard.

The Hive's monsters are mostly variants of giant insects covering several different physical types with different kinds of attacks. As well as scorpions, spiders, and boar-like monsters, there are monsters that spit poison or acid, and giant floating orbs with tentacles that shoot energy bolts at you - and hunt in packs, of course. The Hive's labyrinth generates random mazes, as does the original Diablo engine, so the replay value is very high, and its atmosphere is well done - the 'walls' look like a wasp's nest, and instead of breaking open barrels to hunt for goodies, the Hive offers pods.

The Vault has an even wider range of new and interesting beasts: lichs (undead beings with a ranged attack), satyrs, Anubis-like creatures that look like animated metal statues, firebats like those who appeared later in Diablo II. The final Vault level is something of a set piece because of the Level Boss' prison. The Vault also provides the Cornerstone of the World, a place that is the same in all worlds - that is, a mechanism for allowing different single player characters to exchange items.

"Lame"
I was expecting something good from the expansion even though it isnt multiplayer, the only reason to play diablo is the multiplayer. Dont buy this. Go get diablo ii

"If you like Diablo 1, you'll like this add on pack"
First, if you are having troubles with games crashing or locking up on your computer, you probably need new video drivers. Go to the manufacture's web site and download them following the instructions carefully.

Second, I worked on this game so yes those "hacks/cheats" were put in there. We thought you folks who liked Diablo would like to have a litte more fun with the game. We couldn't get an artist to do the character work at the time. Sorry, so it reuses the character art for the Barbarian and the Bard. Oh well, use your imagination, the character class data is all there. There is art for the cow quest and the "theoquest" The later was pulled by the game design team after we had all the work done. So we left it in for you to judge and play with.

Yeah that cow quest has people laughing out loud. You will too. It's probably not as good as the Diablo 2 cow level, but we had a limit to the amount of stuff we could hide on the CD.

Ok, So you've got my interest, how does it work?
Well create a text file called "command.txt" in the same directory as the hellfire.exe file, using your favorite editor, in it put the following line
cowquest;theoquest;bardtest;multitest;barbariantest

You only get the barbarian with the patch to 1.01. (you'll have to hunt elsewhere for it. It's probably on the Sierra site, but if not, its still on a lot of the fan boards.) It doesn't hurt to have extra stuff in the file. It's only a text file for pete's sake.

Each of the names between the ";" enables a different feature. If you don't like them, just remove them from the command.txt file. Pretty simple huh? Well that's 'cause we designed it for you to be able to do this.

Oh, these are SINGLE PLAYER characters. And if you want real art, and full multiplayer support for these characters buy Diablo 2. It has a more fully developed Barbarian.

So have fun,.....Your game developers at Sierra......

"Nice addition if Sierra would offer better support."
Before Diablo II came out I played Diablo quite often. I thought HellFire would be a great addition, but after installing it the game would crash or lock up my system. I tried installing HellFire on a different computer with the same results, and Sierra's patch was no help. I'm not suprized since I've had similar problems with Caesar III and Pharaoh.

Sierra has great ideas, but falls short on support after the sale is made.