As avid followers of the ARPG landscape here at Digital Tech Explorer, the journey of Path of Exile 2 has been one we’ve watched with keen interest. The game has been a polarizing force right from its announcement. Many of us, including myself, TechTalesLeo, who have dedicated countless hours to the original, grew accustomed to a certain rhythm—a familiar dance for players of isometric ARPGs: obliterate monsters, gather loot, and then obliterate monsters even faster.
PoE2’s core vision aims to slow this pace, promising more engaging combat. While this sounds excellent in theory, the community’s response to the recent Dawn of the Hunt update suggests that Grinding Gear Games (GGG) is still grappling with this fundamental design tension.
It’s a vision worth pursuing. It would be a genuine missed opportunity if Path of Exile 2 merely became a reskin of its predecessor. I personally champion the idea of more deliberate, technical combat that pushes the boundaries of the genre, offering more than just optimizing map-clear speeds and currency farming. However, the changes in patch 0.2 haven’t quite hit that mark, leaving a significant portion of the player base disheartened and questioning the game’s current fun factor.
Why the Patch Stumbled
When PoE2 entered early access last December, the initial campaign experience was widely praised. It delivered on its promise of being tense, difficult, and engaging. I vividly recall inching through the acts, repeatedly facing challenging bosses, and scouring my resources to learn mechanics and overcome defeats. It was a refreshing challenge. This deliberate pace and sense of mastery drew comparisons to the demanding nature of Dark Souls, albeit within an isometric ARPG framework.
The community, it seems, underestimated just how significantly Grinding Gear intended to adjust the game’s difficulty and pace.
As weeks passed and players delved deeper into the endgame, a different pattern emerged. Builds were optimized, exploitable mechanics were discovered, and the familiar high-speed “blasting” returned. While some imbalances are inevitable in early access, after a few targeted nerfs to the most egregious offenders (like Magnetic Salvo and trigger gems), the development team appeared to shift its focus towards the new update, allowing the powerful, albeit broken, mechanics to persist.
Consequently, it was anticipated that the new update would introduce significant nerfs. Game director Jonathan Rogers, in an interview preceding the patch, reiterated that “making sure combat is engaging is ultimately our goal,” implicitly acknowledging that high-speed, screen-clearing builds weren’t aligned with this vision.
However, the extent of these adjustments caught many by surprise. Beyond nerfing nearly every popular build from version 0.1, GGG also made monsters faster, tougher, and more time-consuming to defeat. This combination led to players feeling underpowered and frustrated, resulting in a surge of negative feedback and departures from the game—a clear signal of widespread player dissatisfaction.
The Bright Spots in Update 0.2.0
My personal experience with the update was somewhat different. I managed to clear the campaign in roughly 16 hours. While this is about double the time I’d typically spend in PoE1’s campaign, it didn’t feel excessively drawn out. This was partly due to finding a potent build: I leveled using a Glacial Bolt/Artillery Ballista Amazon.
Eager to try the new Amazon class, I scoured the patch notes and noticed that crossbows seemed to be one of the few weapon types that received improvements rather than nerfs.
Had my entire campaign experience mirrored those initial, arduous hours, I might have shared the broader sentiment of frustration.
I did, however, get a taste of what other players were enduring. Artillery Ballista isn’t available until level 31, so I initially leveled with Lightning Arrow, a skill I had used successfully in version 0.1. This time, it was an agonizing experience. Act 2 alone consumed over four hours as I slowly chipped away at packs of basic enemies that felt like overly resilient bullet sponges, reminiscent of some encounters in games like Destiny.
It’s a shame because Dawn of the Hunt introduces several positive elements. The new mini-league mechanic, Azmeri Wisps, is quite enjoyable. These wisps appear early in the game, buffing monsters and luring players into challenging situations. They eventually empower a rare mob with animal spirits, creating tougher but more rewarding encounters.
I appreciate the tension the Azmeri Wisps add by encouraging a faster pace (they disappear if you lag too far behind), and the encounters with buffed rares provide a welcome variation to the gameplay. The Spirit of the Ox fight is particularly memorable, even if its phantom buffalo stampede evokes a Mufasa-esque sense of dread.
Rogue Exiles are another excellent addition. These are AI-controlled opponents based on actual player classes, complete with skills and gear, appearing in later acts. While I often found them tedious in the original Path of Exile, their implementation here perfectly aligns with Grinding Gear’s vision for meaningful combat. Fighting them feels akin to being invaded by a hostile spirit in a Souls game, and the fact they can use Unique items in combat is a fantastic touch.
Changes to the endgame are also largely positive. The revised tower system, featuring fewer towers but allowing multiple socketed tablets, is a welcome improvement. I was initially concerned this might limit “juicing” maps, but overlapping tower areas still exist. The new corruption/cleanse mechanic adds a layer of strategic depth, and shifting progression quests from generic tier completions to hunting corrupted nexuses feels more engaging. Instead of merely grinding maps, the quests now encourage exploration of the Atlas, which is what players inherently want to do.
All these are steps in the right direction. The campaign will likely feel less repetitive once Acts 4-6 are introduced, eliminating the need to play through the same content twice. My combat experience as an Amazon often feels precisely as GGG intends: blasting through weaker mobs, but requiring careful battlefield management, repositioning, precise targeting, and distance control against tougher foes like Ritual encounters or Azmeri-possessed rares. This offers a glimpse into the potential for truly engaging combat mechanics.
Recalibrating for Success
Clearly, GGG has considerable work ahead. Game balance is currently skewed, some archetypes like minions are struggling significantly (though recent hotfixes aim to address minion damage), and overall player power feels too constrained.
Some ascendancies lack compelling early passive point investments, many notable and keystone passives on the skill tree come with such severe downsides they feel more like penalties than rewards, and a greater influx of currency is still needed to facilitate meaningful crafting and gear experimentation during the campaign.
I shouldn’t feel as though I’m fighting a Dark Souls boss when I’m just trying to clear out packs of trash mobs.
The challenge with adopting Dark Souls-style combat in an ARPG is that progress is fundamentally tied to efficiently dispatching thousands of enemies for loot. Dark Souls excels because it affords players time—time to observe, learn patterns, and adapt. Death is a learning opportunity, leading to mastery and eventual triumph. This dynamic works well for Path of Exile 2’s act bosses, where victory unlocks new areas and provides a similar sense of accomplishment.
However, endgame map bosses or pinnacle encounters are fought less frequently, sometimes requiring dozens of hours to farm an attempt. The methodical, high-stakes feel of a Souls-like encounter is less appropriate for the rank-and-file enemies that constitute the bulk of ARPG gameplay.
Ultimately, we must remember this is a game in early access. With only half the acts, five missing classes, numerous unreleased ascendancies and skills, and an admittedly underbaked endgame, GGG is juggling game completion with managing the current player experience and developing content for Path of Exile 1—a monumental task.
If GGG can achieve better balance and find a middle ground with player expectations, Path of Exile 2 has the potential to be an exceptional game. My experience with the Amazon this update has offered tantalizing glimpses of this potential: combat is engaging, I’m making meaningful choices between risk and reward, and there are moments of genuinely inspired design in encounters with rogue exiles, empowered rares, and map bosses. Unfortunately, for many players, this positive experience remains elusive for now. Here at Digital Tech Explorer, we’ll continue to monitor its development closely, hoping GGG navigates these challenges to deliver on the game’s promising vision.