Recent reviews by Botsuo

do yourself a favor and buy this game

There are a lot of good parts but there are also a lot of parts i dont like.
Keep in mind that everything in this review is subjective to my experience in the game. If some of the things here are addressed in the late-endgame feel free to let me know in the comments. Another note, I am playing a monk. I’ve heard people say that melee vs ranged is almost like an entirely different game in terms of difficulty and such.

I reached the character limit in this review so please go to the comments to see mor

MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD

The good:
1- The early game: The early game was phenomenal. The game throws you into the scene immediately after character creation. As long as you're doing your reading, the game explains the systems well enough to gain an immediate basic understanding. The only things I've looked up are what certain items can be used for. I haven't used any guides or anything and my character felt pretty powerful throughout the entirety of the early campaign. I got a little bit weaker towards the end of act 1 but things quickly picked up once i got into act 2 again,

2- Skill gems: Killing enemies will occasionally drop skill gems depending on what level zone you're in. Obviously the higher level the gem the better skill you can get out of it. You can store and switch skill gems out for others whenever you want, free of charge. Each skill gem comes with 2 support gem slots but can be expanded using items to a total of 6 per skill i believe. Support gems drop the same as regular skill gems and they can be socketed into your skill gems as long as the gem can benefit from that specific support gem, They can introduce a lot of build changing effects. They're also interchangeable between all of your skills so you can switch them around and see what works out best for you. The 3rd type of skill gem that you'll find are spirit gems. Spirit gems give you permanent buffs as long as you have the spirit required to use them. These gem types are much rarer than the other two. If you've got all of the skills you want on your character then you can simply store any extra skill gems you get in your stash and use them on a different character if you choose to make one. The gem system gives you a lot of freedom in what skills you choose and how you choose to use them.

3- The passive skill tree: The skill tree in this game is massive. There are tons of options for you to choose from when you're leveling so i recommend looking through what options you can take, and try to find an optimal path you'd like to go in order to further your build. Respec costs early on are fairly cheap but they get more expensive later on so you have to make your decisions wisely. Some nodes will offer just a slight amount of character power, while others might be more impactful for your build.

4- Boss Monsters: All of the boss monster that I’ve fought have been well designed. They have audio queues whenever a lethal attack is coming (something that is sorely lacking from rare monsters). They’ll have visual queues that play whenever a lethal attack is coming (again, something that is sorely lacking from rare monsters). The attack hitboxes are pretty fair. I don’t find myself often getting hit by attacks I thought I was out of. And most boss mechanics can be avoided by using the dodge roll.

The Meh:

1- Trials: Trials are a system introduced in act 2. Basically you'll get an item that you take to a certain location and you can undergo a trial and the first time you complete each trial you're awarded with 2 ascendancy points. Ascendancy is an important part of character progression so at some point you will be doing trials. There are 2 trials with 2 difficulty tiers each so you can get a total of 8 ascendancy points (i think). The first trial introduces a system called Honor. Basically you have this bar at the bottom of your screen that is reduced whenever you take damage. And if that bar reaches 0 you die. Effectively ending your run. As a melee player, it is very unforgiving because there is barely any room for failure. And if you mess up you're punished heavily. The 2nd trial has the player going through a series of rooms and getting these boons, kind of like hades for example. Except these boons are debuffs to your character that last during the trial. And these debuffs can be heavy as you progress.

2- Crafting: For the most part i think the crafting in this game is pretty good. While you're playing you'll get item drops that can be used to upgrade items. The way it would go is | you'll take a base item and upgrade it to a blue item. Which gives the item a modifier. You can then add a 2nd modifier to that item. Blue items cap out at 2 modifiers. Then you can use another item to upgrade that item to a yellow item. You can then use an item to add up to 6 modifiers on yellow items. (different item than the one used on blue items. it is much rarer to find |. Follow these steps and congratulations, you have successfully crafted an item. Unfortunately, if at any point during this process that item rolls with a stat you dont want. Your item is effectively useless and the only thing you can do with it is to disenchant it. What this means is you spent all of those resources you've been farming for a while only to just waste them completely because you got a bad stat

speaking of stats

3- Pointless stats: In poe2, your items can roll with a variety of stats. Ranging from absolutely amazing to literally useless. Stats such as light radius (literally just makes you glow), stun threshhold (makes you stun enemies quicker. limited use case), and stun duration (self explanatory). Just to name a few. And while these stats may be useful in some extremely limited cases, 99% of the time there are multiple other stats you're looking for and it feels like a punch in the gut every time you use an exalted orb on a yellow item just for it to roll with light radius.

The Bad:
1- Campaign Scaling: At the beginning of act 3, i felt significantly more powerful than the enemies. But as i went i quickly found myself dying more and more often. Until now where im towards the end of act 3 and im getting hit for 50% of my hp by basic attacks from normal enemies. And if i run into a pack of blue enemies or a yellow enemy that run is basically over and im instantly killed by something i could barely see. Even if I knew i was approaching a rare. (Keep in mind, this is my experience as a melee player. Ranged might find things to be easier.)

2- Zone size: The zones are massive. They start out a good size in act 1. Then in act 2 they get a bit bigger and it starts taking longer going from zone to zone. Then in act 3 it feels like the more of the campaign you progress, the larger the zones get. I’ll die and then spend 10 minutes running back to where I was due to checkpoint scarcity in act 3. And when I finally get back and start making progress I’ll get instagibbed by something and have to do it all over again.

3- Vendors and Item levels: During the early campaign, I would actually consider this to be part of “The Good”. But especially after you reach act 3, item upgrades become more and more scarce. During acts 1 and 2, whenever you level up the vendors in town will reset their stocks so you can go to them and buy on level items which you can then craft up into better items. But I’m towards the end of act 3 and all of my vendors have capped their item levels to 33-37. I am level 48 and the zone I have been trying to progress is level 45 I believe. On the topic of item drops. Item drops are randomized to an extent. Been above level 40 for about 6 hours of gameplay. Yet in that time I have only seen one item drop above level 40, and it was an item that was not meant for my character. Most of my item drops are around level 33-37 just like my vendors. And I’ll occasionally see drops as low as level 28. What am I supposed to do with these items other than disenchant them for the extremely minimal resources it provides?

Foul tarnished, In search of the Elden Ring. Emboldened by the flame of ambition. Someone must extinguish thy flame. Let it be Margit the Fell!

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ my pants

arrg

i like my anime wallpapers

good game

fun

THIS GMAE DGRFS

fun