GGG has to decide whether or not they want this game to be mainstream or remain niche

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_rt_#4636 написал:

The 580k player peak and 400k+ players online on Steam after release are proof of that

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Waitn4D4#0477 написал:

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_rt_#4636 написал:

The 580k player peak and 400k+ players online on Steam after release are proof of that

250k right now in the middle of the day on a weekday, still as high as the best POE 1 league and we are a month into launch.

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_rt_#4636 написал:

All the design choices that made PoE 1 a niche game are here in PoE 2, and they're worse to an extent that even PoE 1 players are frustrated:

1) Long and boring campaign that has to be repeated for every new character is now even longer

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Even MMOs already give you an option to skip the initial phase of the game after your first character. Let's not forget in MMOs you're not creating several characters every few months and the universe needs to be more immersive.

The fact GGG still hasn't given us that option only makes me doubt their skill as game designers. Development? Decent. Visual design? Very good. Game design and choices? Bad.

2) Cheap and artificial difficulty mechanics that are unavoidable or exist only to push you into senseless grind

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Phantom one-shots, detonate dead mobs exploding stuff from outside the screen, exploding mobs, dying to a random set of small and hidden mine-like attacks thrown by mobs that died 2+ seconds ago = cheap and artificial

One-death maps = artificial, and if you want the adrenaline of avoiding death as if you'd die in real life, go play hardcore

One-death bosses = senseless grinding into trying to get to a boss only to learn the fight, die, grind and go again to learn a bit more

Honour system = pushes senseless grinding (becomes a non-factor when you acquire decent relics)

Chaos damage = cheap and artificial difficulty. The amount of time and resources required to max out chaos resistance without running CI makes no sense. And if you're not willing to do it, prepare to get one-shot by some random chaos damage source later in maps. Just make Chaos resistance much easier to obtain or remove it completely from mobs and bosses.

And let's not forget the extremely outdated notion that EXP penalty on death should exist in any game played primarily by adults with limited time. One extra point towards my belief that GGG lacks in the game design department.

3) Lack of diversity

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Very early into mapping I already knew melee was going to be a no-go unless I was prepared to invest way more time in grinding and farming than I was willing to.

Then, as I approached T15 maps, I started to see the same pattern I saw in PoE 1 repeat itself: even among the ranged ones, most skills weren't going to be viable due to a lack of damage (unless, again, you spent a ton of time grinding for high-end or specific gear.

4) Lack of sense of progression

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Gambling, I mean, crafting, actually got worse than it was and feels less an option than it was in PoE 1.

Trading has had zero actual improvements and the amount of bots, price fixers and players that do not respond turned trading into a time waster unless you're desperate for a given item.

Item drops got worse: drop quality hasn't improved at all but drop quantity was severely reduced.

The endgame Atlas feels awful and a chore if you want to sustain T15+ maps:

1) Exhaust good nodes with your T15+

2) Run very low tier maps in shit notes and lost towers

3) Activate lost towers and use tablets

4) Run very low tier maps in shit nodes

5) Exhaust good nodes with your T15+

6) Repeat endlessly

I've played 80h of this game, all on a single character, and have been running T15+ for a few hours. It feels like I've finished the game and have nothing else to strive for.

Creating a new character is definitely not an option in the current state of the game. The campaign wasn't fun even the first time I've played and it felt like a chore: just farming for lvls because I was forced to, getting the permanent buffs because I was forced to. There's no way I'm doing it all over again, even if I have some gear to speed it up (it'd still take 15+ hours anyway).

This game had potential to be mainstream. The 580k player peak and 400k+ players online on Steam after release are proof of that. GGG's stubbornness on keeping nonsense mechanics catered towards streamers and hardcore players will ultimately push PoE 2 out of the spotlight and back into its previous niche corner very quickly (and considering how many players dropped the game for the holidays and did not come back, it feels like it has already started).

Or maybe GGG is aware and this is their intention.

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AliquamGames#5952 написал:

>artificial difficulty
Stopped reading

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NickyRick#1268 написал:

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AliquamGames#5952 написал:

>artificial difficulty
Stopped reading

Imagine the following scenario. You use a melee class that is so slow that it seems to be in Slow Motion (Warrior). And you are in Trials of Chaos, with the modification that makes any mob, when it dies, release an ultra-fast energy sphere that chases the player.

I don't even need to say that this does not go with a melee class at all. And it gets even worse when everything causes a oneshot and there are 10x more traps chasing the player.

It's definitely not artificial difficulty, right?