Path of Exile would likely not exist if not for the Diablo series, specifically Diablo II. Its existence and popularity is owed not only to Diablo II, but how long it took for Blizzard to release Diablo III, how poorly-received Diablo III originally was when it launched in 2012, and even when it was fixed, how it wasn’t quite what hardcore Diablo II players wanted. They thought Diablo III’s systems were too streamlined, and didn’t find the depth and variety they were looking for. Meanwhile, Grinding Gear Games gave the Diablo II community constant balancing, fixes, content, expansions, and features in wave after wave, league after league, for years with Path of Exile – and what’s more, it’s free-to-play. Path of Exile won the hearts and minds of not just of Diablo-lovers, but a large portion of A-RPG enthusiasts over the last ten years, dethroned Blizzard, and the Diablo series, to become the new king of the A-RPG.
I almost feel unqualified to write this review because, even though I’ve put over 250 hours into Path of Exile, there’s a good amount about the game I still don’t know. However, I know enough to have played through the main campaign twice with two different classes and spent some time in the endgame, which is extensive.
When playing Path of Exile, it helps if you’re familiar with Diablo II going in, or at least have played some sort of A-RPG in the past. Path of Exile takes Diablo II’s gem system and really runs with it. It’s the heart and soul of the gameplay and how you build your character. Path of Exile is essentially Diablo II on steroids. Which is ironic because Diablo II is essentially the original Diablo on steroids. Diablo II made the original Diablo look like a tech demo by comparison. Path of Exile makes Diablo II look almost the same. It’s very deep and complex, but not so much that it’s inaccessible. If you’ve played Diablo II or other action-RPGs fashioned after Diablo II, you’ll have a basic understanding of the systems and gameplay in Path of Exile.
I’ll try to explain the basics without getting too tedious. It goes like this:
- The core gameplay is simple: pick a class and kill monsters. Every monster you kill gives your character experience points. Experience points make your character level-up and grow stronger. Monsters will also drop loot in the form of gear for your character, and other items that can help you customize that gear. The gear you don’t want you can trade for items. The better gear and gems you get, the more powerful your character becomes. Rinse and repeat.
- Gems are what give your character special abilities. While many of the gems focus on abilities, some are support gems that serve to enhance ability gems if they’re socketed into the same piece of gear. Not to mention, your gems gain experience and level-up as your character gains experience and grows stronger. There are hundreds of different gems to choose from that can be socketed into your gear that either focus on dozens of different abilities related to the various classes in the game, or support and enhance those abilities.
- There are three skill trees in the game. One is the colossal passive skill tree where your passive skill points will be set that you get when you level-up or complete certain quests. Another is the Ascendancy skill tree where your Ascendancy points will be used for completing the Aspirant’s Labyrinth on different difficulty levels. The last is the skill tree for killing gods and goddesses, which are the bosses you do battle with throughout the campaign. The latter two skill trees are much smaller than the main passive skill tree, but are important nonetheless.
- Then you have the customization options. Much of the loot you pick up in the campaign and endgame allow you to customize your gear to some extent, whether it’s changing the number of gem sockets in a piece of gear, or changing the color of gem sockets in a piece of gear, or linking those sockets in a certain way to allow for support gems for an ability you might want to use, or improving the quality of a gem or a piece of gear, or changing the modifiers in a piece of gear to better fit your class, etc., etc. The list goes on.
That’s a lot to take in, right? Do you see where this is going? Almost endless customization of character builds, and massive amounts of gameplay variety depending on your skill tree, gem, and gear choices. Diablo III is a superb game, but doesn’t come close to matching what Path of Exile offers with abilities, customization, and variety. No A-RPG does. Also, did I mention Path of Exile is free-to-play?
Path of Exile’s story is not a big, epic, apocalyptic fantasy like the Diablo games have. It’s more understated, with smaller, more self-contained stories that are loosely connected to each other about oppression, survival, and overcoming impossible odds against gods, goddesses, and men and women who are trying to attain some sort of divinity. Wraeclast and Oriath are a more human world than Sanctuary in Diablo. It’s got strong influences of ancient Roman history and culture and Greek/Roman mythology mixed with elements of Diablo’s hellishness. There are no cutscenes, and most of the story is told through talking to NPCs, who are all voice-acted, and other exposition. It’s a well-written game.
While most of the voice-acting is good, if not superb, some of it sounds like it’s being read off a script. Also, if you’re someone who likes to invest yourself in the story of the RPG you’re playing, Path of Exile just throws characters into your lap, and doesn’t bother with introductions. It just starts talking about them and expects you to know who they are. Each act of the game has different characters as well, so it can get difficult keeping track of everyone. I had no idea what was going on in the story during my first playthrough, but my second playthrough was better.
The campaign has grown to ten acts at the time of this writing. Given that Grinding Gear Games is now focused on Path of Exile 2, it’s unlikely they’ll add anything more to Path of Exile’s campaign, but I wouldn’t rule it out. You can spend a good 30-40 hours in the campaign on one playthrough, or even more if you’re slow like me and choose to do all the side-quests, side-activities, and complete every map. However, hardcore Path of Exile players consider the campaign to be just the tutorial to the endgame, especially the Atlas maps, which are the main content of the endgame. As you go through the campaign you’ll attain maps in the form of tablets that you can’t do anything with until you complete the campaign and you’re introduced to the Atlas, which is a giant mechanism for running the maps that get progressively more difficult, and yields better loot.
The main problem with the endgame is that so much of it is obtuse. In fact, if there’s one major criticism to aim at Path of Exile as a whole, it’s that the game in general does a very poor job of explaining mechanics, systems, and new content to new players. You’re usually given some very basic instructions, and if you need anything above and beyond that, you have to go online and find out. I don’t think I’ve spent more time looking stuff up online for a game than I have for Path of Exile.
For example, when running Atlas tablets in the endgame, the player is never given one very important piece of information: the tablets you pick up are only good for that league. What that means is, every time Grinding Gear Games updates the game with a new league, which is usually every 3-4 months, not only do your current Atlas tablets immediately become obsolete, but all your progress on your Atlas map gets erased. Why this is, I was never able to find out. The only reason I was able to find out any of this was after looking online for quite a while trying to figure out why no progress was being recorded on my Atlas map after completing a run: my tablets were from a previous league and obsolete. Of course, the game tells you absolutely nothing and I got so frustrated with the whole ordeal that I almost uninstalled the game.
Also, the game isn’t optimized as well as it could be. I haven’t played it on console, but on PC, even if you have a rig that meets or exceeds the recommended specs, you’re going to get frame drops. Sometimes a lot of them. The game is constantly being updated, but not all the updates go well. You might experience not just framerate issues at times, but crashes and freezes just trying to load into an area. It’s not very excusable for a game that’s been out for over a decade. Hopefully, optimization will be more of a priority with Path of Exile 2.
Since it’s a free-to-play game, one of the most frequent questions about Path of Exile is if it is ‘pay to win’. The answer is no, not even remotely. What you can purchase in Path of Exile isn’t connected to the game’s systems or mechanics. You can pay, if you choose, for convenience and cosmetics. Cosmetics are outfits and gear you can customize the look of your character with, but which doesn’t affect the gameplay in any way. Convenience is mostly related to your stash, with special tabs that have options to organize the large amount of items you will accrue during your adventuring. However, you can’t pay for special gems, items, gear, or anything that affects the core gameplay. It’s not even an option.
VERDICT
Free-to-play games have gotten a lot better over the years. Just the term ‘free-to-play’ used to be synonymous with phone-game shovelware. However, with games like Path of Exile and Warframe turning out the way they have, that’s no longer the case. If you’re into action-RPGs like Diablo, Torchlight, or Grim Dawn and still haven’t played Path of Exile, I can’t recommend it enough. At this point, I can’t think of a game in the A-RPG genre that is better, and given that it’s free-to-play, you have nothing to lose but a few hours of your time. Just be prepared to spend time looking online if you need help with the game’s systems and mechanics because it does a pretty poor job teaching the player what’s going on.
Path of Exile is the best thing that could’ve happened to the Diablo series because Diablo finally has a legitimate competitor, which it really hasn’t since the series started back in 1996. Blizzard won’t like Path of Exile’s competition, especially now that Path of Exile 2 is in early access, but it will do them good, and hopefully serve to make the Diablo series even better in turn, especially now that they’re under Microsoft’s umbrella and no longer under Activision’s.
So if you have a PlayStation 4, Xbox One, or a halfway decent PC, and want an action-RPG that is deep, complex, rewarding, and free, give Path of Exile a download. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.
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