The moment you get to the first encampment, they should say something like "Your weapon looks worn. Here, take these and craft a replacement." and give the player a health shard and stat shard depending on class or something and make it an actual quest step to progress. Early, basic introduction and it gets the player looking at the system earlier on.
There is a part in the game where you click on a forge for a quest step and when you click a crafting tutorial pops up. First time anything new happens a tutorial box pops up. Unless that has changed for 1.0
That's a great idea actually! It remids me of Dragon Nest, in the main quest at the very begining, you had a quest with 2~3 steps teaching you how to destroy/upgrade an item! I was too afraid of wasting crafting resources in LE, so i finished the campaign and THEN started to mess with the crafting system.
@@natel7382it was since Kickstarter a online game with a chat and login. The steam true offline mode, is a 1.0 present for players, who need a game for the "island 🏝️" and is totally new. They had never since Kickstarter a non login client.
having offline mode is just absolutely amazing for me, as my area only gets comcast internet and its really really bad, I even tried getting there 1Gig speed but the internet is really bad in my area. I cant play path of exile because my internet is shit, so having offline makes me enjoy this game so much, I love it last epoch > Path of exile
About crafting: I've gotten road blocked a few times in mono's, gone to my stash and crafted gear that help me best those challenges and make my toon better. What a good system 🎉🎉
Same here. Got wrecked by one of the first bosses, and saw the message: "you were killed by X ability with fire damage". Crafted some fire rez and HP on my gear - problem solved.
Only started myself since full launch, it's no where near as complicated as you think, just watch 1 video if you don't have friends to help you and then just ay around with stuff, they are only crafting mats you will get tons, so just mess around with the crafting system and you will pick it up easy.
Considering you're new to the genre I can understand why you feel that way but as someone who's played a lot of these kinds of games let me tell you that LE crafting is basically as easy and intuitive as you're going to get.
The concept of finding that perfect Lp3 - Lp4 unique for your build and then combining it with your best exalted to make a one off legendary is absolutely amazing- fuck grinding mats for duriel when I can make my own Ubers in LE
IIRC you played LE/TS Deadeye, SRS Hiero, Boneshatter Jugg for Gauntlet on POE by following a guide. I do agree that its easier in LE to make your own build. But in terms of theorycrafting builds, POE still wins. You may not be able to make builds that could blast juiced T16s or cruise through uber bosses yourself, but self concocted builds that could clear maps and all contents just fine is pretty much doable without a guide (see DM arc of surging). In terms of builds and theorycrafting, poe is just way above LE imo. First set of characters for me in poe was a self-concocted Poison Cobra Lash Assassin and ED/C Trickster. The skill tree was not mega optimized (like you would find in build guides) but i could still clear Sirus and all league-specific contents just fine. The theorycrafting in poe is just way too good, that you could spend a whole session in Path of Building. I daresay that the skill tree in Last Epoch is bad-mediocre 'cause it does not change the way you play too much, as its mostly stat increases. While in POE you have keystones such, "you can't miss attacks but you can't crit", "life leech is doubled but can't regen", "Life is 1, immune to chaos damage CI", "Eldritch Battery: Energy shield covers mana instead" and many more. Not trying to be hostile or anything, just surprised you made the score to be the same as poe when i think its pretty clear cut that poe is way better. If its about it being easier to make your own builds, i think it would be in another point for accessability. Or just Last Epoch being way easier that you could clear high end game contents on an objectively shittier builds compared to meta.
The fact that you can spend a whole session in Path of Building is exactly why a lot of players are turned off by the complexity of PoE. It's fun for more hardcore players, and it obviously offers more meaningful choices, but the sheer amount of mechanics and interactions that you have to know to make a build is overwhelming, and not in a good way. Not to mention that the game is unforgiving and doesn't really allow you to test anything as respec points are limited. There is much more to say about a game that is able to simplify theorycrafting so it's able to be enjoyed by a wider array of people, while also making it feel satisfying when you are able to make an efficient build. Also, saying that LE's skill tree is bad-mediocre is a hilariously bad take. They're both good for different reasons. Personally I'd rather kill myself than have to spend more than 30 minutes looking at PoB to determine if my build is any good. I'd rather just build something by reading the tool tips, test it, and make changes along the way :)
@@jaydiism Oops. I meant the passive tree not the skill tree. The individual ability/skill tree itself i dont have much problem with it. Its not shallow or just stat increases as ive said. LE Good. My entire point with the post is that you could clear contents in poe even without using pob while making your own build. At the same time, you could spend more time, actually theorycrafting, into making your build a lot more efficient or make a new one entirely out of a new mechanic you just found. I can't really describe how good the feeling of your first self made COC build or successfully transitioning to CI feels. For new players, if you can't even manage to think a little with the initial passive tree or at least be excited about it, ARPGs is probably not the game for you. You could literally search for the damage your skill does on the tree, and path there along with some defensive or health nodes and youd do just fine. Although respeccing is a clear problem and getting fixed in poe 2. As i said in the post, most of your arguments really is a plus for accessability rather than the actual theorycrafting part about the game. I agree with making builds is simpler and able to be enjoyed by more people is good, but thats not a plus for theorycrafting imo.
@@jaydiism And no. You do not need to know every mechanic on the tree to make a build. Im a right side enjoyer and i dont have a single clue what goes on the left side of the tree. You probably need to learn, THEORYCRAFT with mechanics, if you want to make your build better, either defensively or offensively. The more you know and learn , the BETTER BUILDS and MORE BUILDS you can make. That is theorycrafting.
I think cycle challenges with MTX rewards (akin to PoEs) would do wonders for LE's end game and longevity. It's always fun trying to get 40/40 with the PoE seasons (i never have, but i've 36'd a few times lmao), and I think that'd translate well to LE. And I think a quick fix to make sets viable is to just let them also get LP like the uniques. Being able to slam sets would be pretty fun.
Skins, and character graphics are something they didn’t focus on much at all for release. They wanted to make the game good first. They did say that as the game succeeds and they have the funds, they plan to fully face lift character models, item skin models, and etc.
The gold and red portals in Lost Ark chaos dungeons are gone.. they now have a chance to drop fate embers(from everything, not just boss), which give an rng reward from card xp, card packs, silver, or massive gold.. upwards of 100k gold possible(but rare) which the gold/red portals were like 500gold-3k gold. And you can potentially get multiple fate embers per chaos dungeon.
14 minutes in, very good review so far! As expected from you. One thing I'm missing here as someone who hasnt played this game and was looking for your review, is quick in-game clips of what you are talking about. For example you were talking about slamming exhalted into other items, it would have been nice to see a clip to have a visual of what you are saying at that time.
Big help to the crafting system would be to mark the affixes as rare or common. Just need some sort of indication that you should keep certain affixes and others you can trash. Would be great to put that in the loot filter as well.
I've settled for just re coloring desired affixes, and Highlighting + Recolouring higher tiers of desired affixes. It helps friends who are.intomidated by loot filter not make a scuffed hierarchy that ends up hiding loot they might want.
with regards to crafting there are 2 points in the early game, that show you a crafting forge and say hey, you should try crafting. its a clickable, glowing questlike thing that you have to walk past - you actually cant miss it (the first one), then the second one is an actual blue quest that says go down here to the forge. and the skill respeccing is very clear, one option removes points and one despecialises the skill entirely, the game makes it very easy to understand the difference, if you can read.
How I'd like to change the process of shattering for affixes is something like; Separate the shattering from the forge. Add a "Crucible" that is still accessible through the forge UI. The "Crucible" interface has an inventory as large as the player inventory or one stash tab. You can then dump all items into the crucible and shatter everything all at once, consuming the appropriate amount of Runes of Shattering in the process. Would pair well with a "Move all items from [inventory]/[current stash tab] to the crucible." button so that you could make a dedicated stash for items you want to shatter between monos. This gets rid of the one-by-one shattering process and turns it into something of its own loot explosion.
In terms of base game at launch, LE is probably the best ARPG ever. Now the key thing is to see how they iterate from here. I have very high hopes for this game. Paired with PoE2 and maybe D4 if they get their shit together, ARPG gamers will be in gaming paradise!
I guess you just won't bring up all the missing QoL features like a simple feature that doesn't reset campaign map progress every time you leave the zone...lol and multiplayer being way outta sync.
I fucking Hope so. They had 10 years of poe to steal from and a Community That was desperate for a new „Not complete Garbage arpg“. they just needed to take the best things of poe, d3, d2 mix it together and call it „Last Epoch“ . And That is what they did.
@@nicholasestes4028 I'm sorry but, in terms of QoL, LE is second to none. That being said, quest tracking needs some attention, and they already said they're working on it.
When you mentioned the tracker I was like "yep, for sure." I was playing my new alt yesterday, and when I reached End of Time the quest tracker gave me the main quests for chapter 3 and chapter 4 simultaneously. Not that I could skip the rest of the Ruined Era; it just told me I could speak to Gaspar about the Imperials. My main didn't seem to have a problem when I first went through the campaign, but maybe it's because I didn't know any better at the time. Still, that's a super minor complaint on my part; the game is amazing.
You're so right about casuals and understanding the game. I've been a gamer all my life, but now I'm pushing 40, and I don't have all the time in the world to play and learn every detail by putting in a lot of hours. But I'm still a hardcore gamer at heart and I will always try to min/max a game, even though I'll never be a blaster like you. It's why I find PoE too much. There are too many systems and things to track, that I give up before I get to the really fun part.
Thanks for the review, Raxx. I have sunk about 15 hours into the game so far, so I cannot say I am familiar with everything you talked about, but one thing I myself feel is the game gets more fun the more you play. I wasn't super into it at first but find myself liking it more and more. Its the opposite of D4, which has an amazing first play through and then falls off
Hi there ! I don't get what's not working for the quests tracker There's an icon at the top for the era and then another one next to the relevant zone. Go, kill or talk, done, no ?
i think its that there are multiple areas in each era and it doesnt always zoom to the relevant sub zone. also theres a lot of broken connections in the pathing for time travel that isnt immediately obvious. Sometimes tracking/targetting a specific side quest when you have multiple is annoying as well
Yea Lagon is when it just stops being a lawnmower dungeon game and you have to start paying attention to resists and where you spent your points etc... I don't even think I did any crafting until I hit that fight and realized if I don't want to get 1 shotted I should probably get some cold / lightning resists. Also my only complaint that is not mentioned is the Gambling. Personally I am a gambler at heart (I live off and on in Vegas) - and I probably spent a few hundred k gold on gambling when I just need something better for the 1 slot or what ever - I have never seen anything good. I mean not even 1 unique. I get the game wants you to craft but maybe since you can't really do much with uniques anyway - toss a few more of those into the random gambler? (Maybe they did and I have the worst luck on the planet). But I freaking love this game so far. Now if someone could make a game that combines the story / lore of BG 3 with the gameplay of this I would be super happy.
Doesn't the game explicitly tell you there are no uniques to be had from it? When you hover over an item in the Gambler, there's a blurb that says "can't be unique/set" IIRC.
If you want to gamba uniques you need to do the soulfire bastion dungeon and talk to the NPC at the end. He's the mega gamba mechanic. The gambler you find in town is only good to get a good item base (good implicits) that you then craft to get decent gear for leveling
@@linkblade91 Yes that should change at least for uniques. That said - I did not read that blurb because when I approach the gambler I would only be half paying attention and just looking at my own gear. LOL! But to be fair wtf else am I going to spend the gold on when I am only level 40 ish? I could be dropping gold on Shattering runes but I honestly get enough during runs. But yes thanks for pointing that out - I should probably read more huh?
One QoL addition I want is being able to hover my cursor above any element of the map (minimap, overlayed map and big world map) and to get some info of what it is.
I'm confused why you would give PoE an 8 on campaign and LE 8.5. Playing LE, it's almost like the campaign doesn't exist? Everything else makes sense to me, but I'd give LE's campaign a 1. Honestly, it may as well just have not been made. Make the "campaign" just some kind of RNG rogue like thing.
I'm glad I played the game a few months ago in early access so that I would have a much better idea of what to do on launch. The game almost feels like a crafting game first and foremost.
QoL in LE is really great. Agreed on keys. I don't need a "keyring" per se, as you mentiy, but being able to hit the sirt button and have them all organized by type would be nice. Currently if you hit organize on a yab of keys it does nothing.
Exiled mages are a neat event. I noticed their "drop rate" dropped at launch. Edit: Theorycrafting saved my bladedancer. My buddy and I had a hard time with the Lagon trial, I looked a few things over, did some respecs, and now I have 3 movement skills... and Lagon became quite fun for me. The cooldown management is on par with what I deal with in LOL, so I find myself getting some sick combos down. Shift-dancing strike-cinder strike-smokebomb never stops being fun. (Side question: anyone else see a lot of LOL influence in the rogue skills?) Edit2: 8.5 seems fair.... I feel like we'll need to re-visit this score in Feb 2025. A few tweaks here, some added content there, and it could hit in the low 9s.
After so many years playing POE, I wanted a change and bought LE. Much more basic and simple but surprisingly interesting, QoL that really helps, addictive and with enough content to last several months. Monoliths are simple and repetitive but I never get tired of them, they are pleasant to play.
the game is just a diamond - i restarted my "i wanna play totems" build three times now, cause i found new options of designing it. first was beastmaster, cause i thought "yeah totems count as minions, so probably ..." then i made a druis, cause thorns and the forms and spriggans added well - then i realized: i can pick shaman, and still paly sprigganform + spriggans and ALSO skill the bear companion. then i made it a cold build so everything scales with minion cold/minion spell dmg ^^ thats just ONE character/one build i was figuring out. this game already got me so many sleepless playthrough nights -.-'
Great review. I love multiple builds/alts up to 25 online chars. Also, I think perhaps you should rate a category as a 10 if it is in your mind so very good. "Perfect" is such a subjective term, and presents its own "bias" (not to assign a perfect score). Anyhow, thanks so much for your review!
To me the faction system is revolutionary. I play COF and i hear that flipping is non-issue in the MG. (You buy you use) The game is only going to get better. Amazing review! Thank you
The thing with Uniques is the exalted item is never really "BiS". A Unique will almost always be better if you can get the right one with 4 LP because it's essentially the same as the "Exalted BiS" but one steroids (the only difference being the implicits and sealed affixes). The problem with making a guide like this is that it's not really helpful because getting a lot of really good uniques with 4 or even 3 LP is just not feasible, even with CoF dropping absolute boatloads of uniques.
If they will add some horizontal progression tied with the corruption system, than this game is gonna be insanely fun. At the moment grind in endgame is a bit too much, and maps do not have any "personality" to them (like all maps in PoE or even Nightmare Dungeons in D4) - they all feel like randomly generated locations that you run through to finish the objective and gtfo. Some kind of "time catalogue" similar to Atlas would be great addition. Other than that - game is awesome, and if they will continue to listen to community - we're in for a real treat.
Loved the video. Thank you for looking at the GAME and not the fucking servers. If I hear one more person complain about the servers I'll vomit. I loved your comment at 29:30, the game AT LAUNCH is so fucking good. Imagine where we will be in 6 months to a year!!
LE is already my #2 ARPG despite being undercooked still. And it does some big core stuff better than the #1 already, imagine what it can do in the future. #1 is PoE. PoE has better endgame content and a deeper range of stuff that you can do in the game, but I genuinely think LE has a better skill system, a better crafting system, a better trading system, and it has better overall combat because PoE is plagued with instant "one shots" that you cannot react to and the entire game is balanced around either being at 100% life and having enough defenses or not having enough defenses and immediately getting deleted with no in-between. I agree with your final score, PoE is a 9 and LE is a 8.5, if LE had the 11 years of expansions and refinement that PoE did it'd probably be a 10.
Nice summary. I think you should add Graphics as an assessment though. Arpgs are about fantasy as well as gameplay and good visuals help with this. It would also allow for a big differences in your rankings between Poe, Le and d4
Agree with the score except for the builds part. For Build, I would give it an 8.5 rather than a 9.5. What is missing from Last Epoch are the "Technical" builds from POE like Ward loop, Cast on Crit, and other builds made possible by Jousis. From what I see from the CORE - it looks like it cannot be supported as well. Unless they have something like that, I don't think LE can overpass POE in the builds category.
My first campaign play through was like 70 hours, and that didn’t include any dungeons or monoliths. Not sure why anybody would beat the game in seven hours but some gamers like to rush through it while I much enjoy getting My moneys worth enjoying the game, and atmosphere. Last Epoch is a 9.7 / 10 For Me, and it’s the greatest arpg I’ve ever played, and I’ve played them all !
Biggest issue I'd like to see them fix for leveling up is the itemization trash. You pick up a lot of rare items and there's just nothing to do with them, can't really salvage most of them, selling them gets you almost no gold. And with the crafting system, its better to level up your current gear which means finding new gear is very rare. Huge part of ARPGs is finding great new, better gear as you level up. You can go a long time filling up your inventory over and over again and none of it's useful in almost any way. They need to make finding loot more exciting as you are leveling up.
There are no time limits, no presure mechanisms that make me as a player want to move faster or push harder. it makes the game feel very slow for me. I did really really enjoy the boss fights. The rune of removal is the most frustrating thing in the world.
The lack of currency (other than gold) and the restrictions on trade make it so you can't get rich. I play these games to get rich, not farm items for alts I don't have.
im a filthy arpg casual. and this game still managed to make me investerd enough that i made my own build. and it fucking works and im so fucking proud lmao
Very impressive takes. I hope they watch it, game seems infinite in potential. I adore the spec progression, especially the skill skill trees. That's what I've been dreaming of since D3, I figured that's what that game needed most. It feels like it brings POE skill versatility, but in an easier and better form. Don't watch the other reviews, they aren't you, like at all.
Fair assessment. Considering the various categories it seems odd that LE scored lower than PoE, but whatever. I mean the casual/new category being so overwhelmingly in LE's corner along should have swayed the over all score, but I guess it wasn't mathematical.
Yes the game is great but two points: You made it sound like the game is a week old and thats not true. People play this game for years, so of course it is pretty complete package. Not trying to undermine it, just saying. Second point is, that they said they wont monetize the game further, but thats just a promise and you shouldnt take they word for it. No matter how much you love some company, never buy into promises. The game is imho worth 35 dolars easily, but any promises of not monetizing it further are worthless.
You haven't got a category for "gameplay". Minute to minute, mob to mob killing. The aspect of the game a player will spend 80% of their time on. While I agree with most of your scores more or less. The actual gameplay is clunky. It's the one area the game falls far short of most other ARPG's in the "Diablo-Like" genre. I'd give that aspect a 4 or 5. And to me - that's probably the most important score of all. It's what I spend almost all of my time in LE doing. And it's not very good
I played the Alpha and I did not like it at all. I never thought LE would achieve this amount of improvements and growth. Its an excellent game and they have done an awesome job with it. Highly recommend if your on the fence about it.
With in game market place once you buy something you can't trade it again. It's locked to you. Not sure what to think about it yet. I thought it's fully unlocked but it's not.
Completely agree, which is surprising lol... I am long time POE player, POE in my opinion still the best, but it took 10 years to get there. LE is the best i've ever seen at launch. I still like D4 campaign better, and D4 has great combat, is fun (sometimes) but gets boring very very quickly after just few days of new season. LE is a legit contender in the ARPG arena now and I think thats a great thing if you like ARPG's like I do. We need more games like this, now if D4 can just look at all the great thing this game did and copy it. These companies should be learning from each other and innovating, Diablo keeps using 20 year old combat systems from MMO's with Build/spender which is just wierd.
Activision Blizzard have acted as though they were uncertain if they wanted their audience based on the mixed opinions of Diablo 4, on checking the top 100 most played Steam games Last Epoch has now claimed Diablo 4's audience. Tragically Diablo 4 has completely lost its place on the list, hopefully Activision Blizzard learn something from the experience.
This is what happens if a company cares more of the what a players will play than actually monetizing it. Blizzard used to be like this. Now they are just people pleaser.
Thank you and maxxroll for the build guides and videos. Now i have something to replace D3 with . !!!!! ❤❤. GG last epoch , the game feels amazing to blast through
i dont get why people think lagon is hard. aslong ure not a 100% melee build just stay on the stairs and he cant hit u with his attacks. the only thing u need to dodge is the circle he casts on u occasionally.
Have to disagree that with your scaling, Last Epoch likely has to take 1.5 points off each segment for it to be objectively compared to POE. Economy and Trading is around a 4-5 at the moment because of various search function issues and gatekeeping, it's way better to do COF. Builds and Theorycrafting is nowhere near POE (LE is simple, but not overly complex however that still doesn't mean there are that many diverse builds). QOL is not worth a 9 just because it has a guide and other minor perks (at best 5, at most 7)
Casual/new: a low 3 for PoE vs 8.5 for LE, but endgame: 9.5 for PoE vs 8 for LE! So, 1-7.5 is essentially 0 and that 1.5 represents the entire spectrum of what currently exists as endgame content????
Just hit the end game. My feeling is there is not enough of the campaign. I hope they keep making new chapters and very often and regularly. The area with Lagon the squid. They need more and better of this. They need raids like FFXIV where group play is essential. Where the fight is complex and needs to be learnt and takes skill to complete.
The biggest draw to this game for me is that the developers want me to make a strong character and have fun. Whereas blizzard wants to hamstring players and builds.
The biggest downside for me is that right now its not available on ps5. And the gameplay FEEL is nowhere near D4. Yes LE has many great features, but D4 feels just better. And its not just the music, the atmosphere or the graphics… Its the overall experience while playing the game. Competition is good, hopefully with time both games are improved upon🤷🏻♂️
I don’t know man, I understood the reasoning on some of your points, but the campaign doesn’t deserve an 8.5. An 8 for vets to the genre? There’s not that much to do in endgame. An overall of 8.5 seems a bit inflated, this leaves me wondering how much they paid you to try and save face after the shit launch.
You kept saying on launch, on launch, but that seems disingenuous. The games been in early access since 2019... Those 5 years have to be accounted for even if not fully. I mean, whats next? A game that's been in early access for 10 years then "launches" with 4 full expansions worth of content? Instant 10/10 and best launch title to ever exist i guess? :/
Offline mode alone is worth the money. A lot of people that play solo anyway complaint about the problems the online mode had at start, instead of playing offline which worked like a charm. All the while the same people complain that POE or the Diablo games are forced always online. And then they gave a bad rating on Steam.🤭 My only issue with the game is crafting. It is too random. It is very easy to destroy a good item just because of bad luck.
Respectfully disagree especially with endgame as I found the camp. Mid and the endgame worse. 6/10 without server problems or char. Getting deleted may come back in a year or 2.
Don't understand why hardcore PoE players can't review this game without comparing it to the 10 years of updates of PoE. Why? Why can't it stand on it's own? I guess at least you're trying to be fair about it, but still...
Just think your rating of "8" for endgame is a bit high, I would even say bosses a point or two, too high. Endgame is a 5 for me, bosses are like a 4, maybe 5. I would give it an overall of 7.5 tbh. Within a year or two from now, I can defintiely see it reach 9 / 9.5
PROS: comprehensive, clear and apparently honest review, not too concerned about what other reviewers think - huge props for keeping it real. I like it covered most aspects of the game, assessing each one of them. Educational at various points too. CONS: "I've done the campaign more than most people". How do you know? This "most people" digital entertainers' spiel is getting old, as if their community represents the largest portion of all games' demographics. Reality check: that's rarely the case.
Campaign drags for me. Feels like it goes on too long. So many zones, so many loading screens. The art design also is very busy on the map. Just my opinion.
Gotta say the trading/merchant's guild takes way too long to level up. It took the POE sweat-lords like 30+ hours of gameplay in order to rank up to a high enough tier in merchant guild in order to buy whatever they want. For the rest of us that means it will take closer to 60 or 70 hours just to trade properly. So many aspects of this game try to be a bit more casual friendly than POE(Which is good), but that is a huge gatekeep on the trading system if I've ever seen one.
@odds Considering you will most likely need to re-level it each league/cycle, yes it is. Defeats the whole purpose of playing trade league instead of simply going circle of fortune for boosted drops. It's needlessly long until you finally get to engage with the mechanic as it's intended. You shouldn't need to have a character at level 100 in order to finally make use of the whole trading system. Lol
Trading is most important on your first character. Part of what makes PoE great is if you jump into a league late you can catch up easily because of trade.@@shagohodds
@@SuperCatacataYeah, and because the next cycle people won't be going in blind between how each system works the CoF will be the go to for leveling. The big problem for MC is that because its an opt-in economy the fewer people who use it the worst the choice to be MC gets. In other words it has a very bad negative feedback loop. The only thing that should be gating what can or can't be bought/sold is favor.
Idk, you treat it like a new game, but this is 5 years old and not going anywhere in that time. it has nice ideas, but after that chaotic early access i honestly dont expect much from last epoch anymore. its unfinished and just pure boredom after level 70-80. 7/10 maybe, if the novelty of the skill system wears off there is not much left.
