If players were wanting any further confirmation that Diablo 2: Resurrected is faithful to the original game, they got it during alpha testing. The ability to dupe has been a persistent problem in the Diablo franchise since its inception, and fans playing the Diablo 2: Resurrected alpha managed to find a way to do it yet again.
Duping is short for duplicating. In the simplest terms, duping in Diablo games is creating a copy of a specific item. In the original game, Diablo, if a player were to pick up a dropped item, and simultaneously pick up an item from their belt, the resulting glitch would cause the item on the ground to be copied. Diablo 2 was rife with ways of duping items. When a trade window was opened in Diablo 2, all of the items shown were actually duplicates of the player's inventory. By exploiting this mechanic, players were able to dupe entire inventories with ease. Now, Diablo 2: Resurrected players have found a new way to dupe items which ironically feels completely faithful to the Diablo 2.
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The bug was brought to light by Reddit user iiNexius, who posted a brief clip showing evidence of duped items. Apparently, the duping bug is somehow related to the shared stash mechanic in Diablo 2: Resurrected which seems like it could be exploitable for the same reason that the trade screen was exploitable in Diablo 2. As some commenters pointed out, a shared stash, by its nature, is inherently exploitable. Luckily, Diablo 2: Resurrected will not feature in-game transactions, which will lessen the incentive for duping, but players have already begun to craft exceptionally powerful items using the exploit.
One of the largest issues with duping is that it allows players to accrue massive amounts of gems and runes. They can then use the duplicates to upgrade other runes until they reach the high-tier runes that are used to craft powerful items. A classic example, as noted in the Reddit post's title is "Enigma." This runeword requires "Jah" and "Ber" runes which are considered high-tier runes and would normally take a while to obtain, but through duping, players will be able to easily craft these runes in a short amount of time. "Enigma" is an ultra-popular crafting choice because it allows players to teleport regardless of their class, an important ability in nearly all Diablo 2 speedruns.
Unfortunately, duping is nearly inseparable from the Diablo experience. Even if Blizzard manages to fix the problem with the shared stash, it's likely that fans will find another exploit to facilitate duping. Despite the headaches that this bug can cause, some fans are excited by the news since duping is just another nostalgic similarity to the original Diablo 2.
Diablo 2: Resurrected is in development for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
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