By Adam Smith on September 11th, 2012 at 9:00 pm.
The year of the ARPG marches on, cannily disguised as its more enigmatic and unpredictable cousin, the year of the Kickstarter. Diablo III managed to be more exciting as something I was excited about than something that was actually (sort of) on my hard drive, but now that Torchlight 2 actually has a release date and Path of Exile is frequently testing its stress levels by mixing with the general public, I’m preparing for a few more days lost in the lands of loot. This weekend, free to play Path of Exile is open to all once again, so download the client in advance and prepare to add to the servers’ strain. It’s all for the good of the eventual release. The details are all here.
11/09/2012 at 21:02 Phantoon says:
I’d really be more interested in returning if the third act was released.
11/09/2012 at 21:24 Koshinator says:
Closer than you might think…. when Open beta hits
12/09/2012 at 12:04 RegisteredUser says:
This, and the fact that my chars get wiped once it goes open have stopped me from actually using my closed beta account.
11/09/2012 at 21:16 jikavak says:
Path of FACE
11/09/2012 at 21:35 NailBombed says:
WAR of FACEile
11/09/2012 at 21:47 Blackcompany says:
Face of Exile?
Facepath?
Pathface?
FACEPALM.
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12/09/2012 at 08:53 jikavak says:
We can only get spambots laughing at those these days.
12/09/2012 at 22:24 Shodex says:
30% OFF FACE!!!
11/09/2012 at 21:38 Askeladd says:
PoE is interesting in some ways but the skills feel a little bit boring, which may be a tradeoff they get from their open character building system.
I didn’t get to attached to my character which is a bad thing in a ARPG, or RPG.
11/09/2012 at 22:09 golem09 says:
The active Skill System only opens up after act I when you start to find more and more support gems that change how your skills work.
And your passive skills can completely change how your character plays. You can make a melee witch, or a marauder that uses wands.
11/09/2012 at 23:24 frightlever says:
“You can make a melee witch, or a marauder that uses wands.”
You can. But not very effective ones.
12/09/2012 at 03:23 sharkh20 says:
Have to call you out on this. Melee witch can be one of the best builds in the game.
11/09/2012 at 21:47 povu says:
I’ve been playing this since the last open beta, I’m having a lot of fun.
11/09/2012 at 21:48 Blackcompany says:
Going to give this a try this weekend. Got the client. Got the account. Eager to see how this plays.
11/09/2012 at 22:11 SkittleDiddler says:
I haven’t been back since they revamped the difficulty level. Combat just comes off as a monotonous clickfest now that it takes more hits to do basic damage. Maybe I’ll sneak back in for the open test.
11/09/2012 at 22:36 Euphoric says:
*yawn*
This placebo isn’t released yet?
11/09/2012 at 22:46 subedii says:
Placebo? I’m failing to see what you’re trying to say here.
So I mean, what exactly are you saying this is a non-cure for?
11/09/2012 at 22:56 Euphoric says:
The answer to everything DIII wasn’t.
The best ARPG ever.
An “amazing” talent tree.
What should have been the true DIII.
….Pick one, there’s more.
11/09/2012 at 23:58 mouton says:
Sounds like you just want what D3 hasn’t delivered.
I wouldn’t call it placebo – just “upgrade”.
12/09/2012 at 09:53 mondomau says:
I think the confusion stems from the fact that you probably meant ‘Panacea’.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/panacea
11/09/2012 at 22:39 VileJester says:
Don’t forget to mention Grim Dawn.
It looks amazing too!
11/09/2012 at 22:42 aliksy says:
Last few times I played it, it was kind of almost good. The pacing’s a little slow, it takes a lot of levels to get to interesting places on the sphere grid, and there’s a lot of bullshit “run back to town to sell” trips.
If leveling was faster or more meaningful, and if support gems were more common, I’d probably like it more.
11/09/2012 at 22:52 golem09 says:
Support gems do get a lot more common starting on the second playthrough, and you also get them as quest rewards. And leveling is already fast, and because keystones on the grid that completely change the mechanics of the gameplay, it’s also meaningful.
And there are only a lot of bullshit runs if you take every piece of loot you find, which you shouldn’t.
11/09/2012 at 23:10 Squishpoke says:
It’s worth a play through. It’s basically a straight up clone of Diablo 2 with extras…. Diablo 2+, if you will.
It’s a shame that this is online only. But look on the bright side, it’s free, compared to a similar $60 game that dare not be mentioned.
11/09/2012 at 23:25 zeroskill says:
Hm not really. I used to play Diablo 2 non-stop and Diablo 2 felt way more dynamic to me, had more interesting skills and the item design and the way skills and items could create interesting character builds is unmatched to this day (I feel). But maybe that’s just me, I loved Diablo 2.
11/09/2012 at 23:22 zeroskill says:
I played the beta of this in the last public beta event, and while it was pretty good, did get burned out on it after Act 1. Probably because of the skill system, or the actual skills itself seemed a bit bland to me.
Still gonna give this another try when it releases to see if they added a bit more variety to the skills. Maybe I just wasn’t far enough into the game yet.
11/09/2012 at 23:37 Arglebargle says:
I was in very early on the closed beta of Path of Exile, and they have really revamped the look and feel of the world alot. Not a huge fan of running through the same area over and over, but they’ve worked hard on making the foes incrementally more difficult and visually distinct.
Their mechanics are fairly well done, certainly designed to give you the carrots to shoot for on the passive tree, while keeping the loot acquisition syndrome going on the drops.
Thought it was a better game than the D3 beta, but then I am not a Diablo fanatic. Cut my teeth on Titan Quest which I liked better due to the theme.
PoE is well worth a look, imo.
12/09/2012 at 00:32 Narretz says:
Strange. I downloaded the .msi setup, and when I want to install, I click teh button that has the “admin” symbol, indicating I need admin privileges. But after clicking, it just sits there doing nothing, and the usual admin password dialogue does not come up. And what’s funny, I cannot even run it as administrator, because it is not in the .msi context menu (but I have it with all other file types).
12/09/2012 at 02:16 Vorphalack says:
Unfortunately for PoE, 2012 is the Year of the Sequel. Guild Wars 2, Planetside 2, Torchlight 2 and DotA 2 pretty much have my gaming time booked up well into 2013. As interesting as this game is, I don’t know if I will be able to make time for it.
12/09/2012 at 06:56 maweki says:
I had a go last weekend with the closed beta. Hoping not to break it, you can take a look at a few screenshots here:
http://www.maweki.de/wp/2012/09/standing-behind-shit-the-game-two-days-of-path-of-exile/
In short: I Frapsed a Screenshot every 10 seconds and about 10% of the screenshots my character was standing behind shit.
And because of all the sockets (and their colours) with their links and stuff and because armour has either armour or evasion or energy shield, you never ever get an item that is better than the one you have. You have to eyeball whether you can maybe craft a useful item out of the stuff you got.
Maybe nice for a min-maxer but for me, as a casual player, not so much.
12/09/2012 at 07:08 Zanchito says:
The game has very good ideas, and the general tone is much more Diablo 1 than either Diablo 2 and of course 3 (to me, Diablo 2 was fun, but 1 had WAY more impressive ambience), but it needs a little bit more dynamism and a more visceral feel. I really want them to improve on that, because otherwise the game is awesome.
12/09/2012 at 08:12 Tom De Roeck says:
And here I thought you were talking about KOTOR 2.
12/09/2012 at 13:34 derbefrier says:
I bought my way into the closed beta after the first open weekend and i think its a fantastic game but I , like many other people are waiting for the open beta before I really put some serious time into it. IF your interested and dont have anything else to play this weekend i would recommend giving it a shot. Just be warned it does start off a little slow which can be a turn off for some but spend a little time with it and the potential this game has to be great will become apparent.
15/09/2012 at 00:23 Hamlet says:
Great game, been playing since July. If you loved Diablo II and were disappointed with D3, this is exactly what you’re looking for.