Path of Exile 2 Daybreak of the Hunt — its first main replace because it launched in early entry final yr — has been a catastrophe. When gamers logged in final Friday to strive it out, they instantly realized the sport had turn out to be nearly comically troublesome. Killing weak monsters within the opening hours of the marketing campaign took ages, and the brand new Huntress class felt limp. Reddit exploded with posts titled issues like “This recreation seems like an enormous waste of time” and “Recreation feels depressing”. Standard streamers rage-quit the sport.
In response, developer Grinding Gear Video games issued a number of small patches to offer gamers a preventing likelihood. Monsters misplaced a few of their life, and a few underperforming abilities, like skeletal minions, had been beefed up. However many gamers nonetheless don’t assume it’s sufficient to repair the sensation that the sport is unrewarding.
Grinding Gear Video games put up a submit addressing the broader issues with patch and what it plans on altering within the coming weeks, most notably the sluggish pacing of its marketing campaign, which you’re required to replay each time a brand new season drops. Whereas a few of the modifications have already gone by means of, gamers are nonetheless struggling to seek out the persistence to play the sport lengthy sufficient to achieve its endgame dungeons.
“I can completely inform you that our objective right here was to nerf the issues that had been trivializing the endgame earlier than you’ve even managed to get your gadgets and stuff like that,” recreation director Johnathan Rogers stated in an interview with streamer Zizaran on Tuesday.
“There have been some blatant fuck-ups, talking bluntly,” recreation director Mark Roberts added, particularly calling out the underpowered abilities that had been rapidly hotfixed. “We’re firing from the hip loads right here and stuff like that we’re like, ‘Let’s simply get it in there, let’s strive it out, and see how individuals assume and if it’s dangerous we’ll simply undo it.‘”
“I feel a operating theme with PoE 2 basically is that the goal to hit is smaller [compared to PoE 1] as a result of if we would like the fight to be extra partaking then meaning there’s a smaller goal; it places extra strain on the steadiness to be proper,” Rogers stated.
Rogers defined how he feels PoE 1 rewards gamers who’ve spent 1000’s of hours mastering its techniques and that PoE 2 was designed to keep away from that drawback — it’s simply actually onerous to get proper. On the similar time, the sport is supposed to have the form of deliberate, dodge-roll-heavy fight you’d count on from a Soulslike. It’s speculated to be onerous.
Each builders say the group is trying into numerous issues to alleviate, however they need to watch out about pushing it too far into the opposite course the place gamers begin flying by means of dungeons in only a few hours.
“If we get to the purpose the place a great participant by no means has to face a single problem ever then I don’t assume that’s going to be a recreation that will probably be finally enjoyable in the long run,” he stated.
