Heist, Harvest, Delirium, Metamorph, Blight, and Legion are a proof...

...development has shifted toward one market, the market that plays in softcore trade to chase 36 challenges (achievements) for MTX in new content (theme park) and come back to repeat the same cycle every three months. GGG stopped using its resources to host flashback events after they brought the private leagues. Delve was the last league done in mind for those who play the game enjoying to compete, enjoying to learn and discover things that would give them some advantage.

 The question is why would I or anyone else want to support a company that delivers what hundreds of other single player games are delivering and have been delivering through the past 2-3 decades, games with difficulty in mind for the mainstream audience, games that pretty much keep the interest of players within a week at best as they complete em?

PoE in its state is a terrible multiplayer ARPG compared to a traditional MMORPG like WOW: Shadowlands that is about to arrive a month from now and then there is other better multiplayer FPS. Yes, the industry has been lacking over the decade to make AAA or even AA multiplayer games as they've been showering us with more single player with some multiplayer mode, games with better graphics and for a good reason why ....as they are cheaper, quicker and easier (simpler) to produce. PoE has no deep endgame and combat that makes the game a poor multiplayer experience. The economy is plagued with bots and using a terrible, outdated trading system. I also don't believe GGG has a system to prevent and enforce players to "earn" things.

Weeks ago I mentioned how we can improve the state of the game and push for more rewarding events, overall for many to have a purpose to continue playing the game for most of its leagues duration. Our wallet and how we use it (vote) is one way to influence what more Uncle Sam will be delivering. If we want to see more 1-2 events every 3 months where they end within a week, and most of its prize given away after the first day, usually because their objectives are easy to accomplish in a poorly balanced game keep supporting the game and these organizers. Example, most expected the trickster ascendancy as well as some of the skills associated with it to receive a major nerf, but of course it never happened and this pattern has been every league now.

Do you enjoy not sleeping for 36+ hours? Do you enjoy seeing events finish with 10+ weeks left in a league? Well, continue supporting those who organize these events. For the rest, well we need to find a way to organize our own rewarding events, events that are done for our best interest first, and it starts by redistributing our money from supporting anyone in the past and present who hasn't shown an interest of doing this, despite being in the best position to do it.

 This game is seven years old and some of these supposedly "top" players were non-existent within its first few years and for a good reason why. Each year the game has become more mainstream with more bloated loot and more powerful skills + items + ascendancies. Today most have the assistance of fully developed third party programs like POB and use an item filter done by someone else. Most today are paying to "win" significantly more against the majority of the player base as they handle the bloated loot better with newer and better special tabs of convenience, and this is only going to get worse after the recent announcement of the league stash policy going forward with "Stash Tab Folders and Stash Tab Affinity systems"

My interest is always to have the best experience and that means to have fun playing a game without having to move on to the next or to think what else to do for "fun". So, the longer a game can keep my attention the more I'm going to support it, and that's included to everyone that helps with that. I did spend $40 on this F2P game because that's how much it was worth it to me. The other new game that released over the decade that took $20 from me was Marvel Heroes Online. January 11th, 2011 was the last good AAA game I saw the industry deliver. It used a superhero IP called "DC Universe Online". It cost me $35 to purchase (saving $15 with some promo) with free 30 days of sub and afterwards I had the option to lock to a monthly sub for $10. I played that game a lot for the next 1-2 years before it shot itself in the knee.

Kopogero with a vengeance.

You do realise that being the first respondent to a Kpoptart thread is like losing The Game, right?

Poe has the best gambling system in any game iv'e seen, let alone played. As a rpg it's terrible, as a casino it is the best

All praise lord Vaalue

Another wall of text saying: "I refuse to pay GGG until they pay me".

It's getting old at this point, Kopo.

On the contrary in many ways a game is what majority of players want it to be.
PoE is definitely not a multiplayer game. Most people will play it alone with ocassionally some friends / guildmates - 2 people team. And this is fully ok as we want it to stay such!
There should never be a reason to have full party team play. All content should be as well single person doable and with same level of difficulty to say!

As for catering to SC crowd, this is unfortunatelly true reality. The minority of HC players, which I'm belonging to are kinda neglected. I believe this is mainly due to lack of time to balance things properly on GGG side.

However I have to disagree that racing events should be taking a long time. They in fact should not as it's exhausting for people who are participating in it! Most racing events should be few hours short therefore.
The price fund for 3 months long racing event would have to be in millions of dollars so that it makes it worth to do such commitment.

You compared PoE to a MMORPG and thus lost all of my interest. Have a great day.

@Shagsbeard

The fact I am here (or was during these years) despite how much more I enjoy the MMORPG genre says a lot about the state of the industry. This is how many are weathering the MMORPG drought, by playing filler games that usually come as "free to play".

Marvel Heroes Online was another free to play multiplayer ARPG I played a lot through the years. Multiplayer ARPG in terms of similarities come closest with the MMORPG genre, so idk what are you "arguing" about. If there is another genre that's closest to MMORPG's from multiplayer ARPGs that I haven't heard of, please my lovely Shagsbeard enlighten me.