Upon installation and first startup, 7.55 always runs fine.
Often as early as the second game startup, Windows hangs upon attempting to start D2/CE. The cursor will move but no mouse-click response ever occurs. I must reboot Windows, sometimes with <ctrl>+<alt>+ (the only keyboard action that gets any response) and sometimes with reset button.
In response: I delete the entire "diablo II" directory, then copy "copy of diablo II" => "diablo II", then re-run the 7.55 install exe, and I'm back to being able to run once at least.
This suggests that the files in "diablo II" are altered by d2/ce in such a way that the game can't be started again.
Chaos: I'll happily run any scripts or tools you sugest and make note of results to track down this behavior.
Now, I made a copy of "diablo II with CE installed but not run", so I can replace files in "diablo II" with files from the saved copy, or compare them. Any suggestions which files to try replacing first to see if there is just one corrupted file?
Since I first posted on this hang-at-startup behavior, I tried making the files in DiabloII read-only, but this causes a crash in game.exe (invalid page fault).
I haven't found a set of files yet that restores play-ability in the corrupted directory. Clues begged-for piteously.
Brian/Webwalker (I love cats, I'm just allergic to the fur!)