How do you like the direction POE took since the investment of Tencent?

I think people fail to remember that part of the buyout agreement was to allow Tencent and the China realm to basically do whatever they want.

They do stay out of GGG's way for the other realm(s), but make no mistake, if they start to flounder, Tencent will be more than happen to absorb the Western realm and monetize/ develop it they way they want.

Tbh the cynic in me wonders if Tenect would actually prefer that Chris and the Western GGG team struggle.

As soon China would be able to do whatever they please with our version, we would have AH "tabs" (for money ofc), pets that loot for you (several tiers, for money ofc) and other P2W crap they love out there.

Idk how pets(loot pick-up) and an AH would be P2W, but ok.

Respect the "weight" of those clicks.

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DarthSki44 wrote:

Idk how pets(loot pick-up) and an AH would be P2W, but ok.

Respect the "weight" of those clicks.

People call stash tabs P2W. Some even call COMSETICS P2W. You think something that saves you time (because you dont need to pick manualy) wont be P2W? People would lose their shit.

VERY BAD direction

GGG developed console versions and announced POE2 under Tencent.

I’m pretty sure the only thing that tencent’s acquisition affected was the content moderation policy - in particular the “no politics” rule.

I strongly suspect that rule is a cover for censoring political criticism of China. Especially since, as I recall, the rule went into effect just before a major anniversary of pro-democracy protesters getting run over by tanks in a certain country.

I don't like the direction game took since conqueror's of atlas expansion. Whether it's Tencent to blame for or GGG themselves, doesn't really concern me at all.

I expect that the acquisition of GGG by Tencent has had virtually no impact on the direction of the game, that's all on the team in NZ.

While there's been some welcome QOL improvements over time, I haven't enjoyed the direction the game has been heading in for some years now. It's a bloated, zoom-zoom mess and it appears it's not going to improve.

Legacy was probably the last time I felt the game was in a good place as far as play mechanics and we're a very long way from that now.

I get it's chic to dump on Tencent and there's a lot of room for it -- but this is really off-base.

Okay, so you're almost certainly not getting the same sort of aesthetic content you'd have gotten from an indie GGG, but even without Tencent's ownership they'd probably have designed with China's odd restrictions in mind. It's just much easier to maybe NOT do content you'd have to then later censor for a significant market when players have no idea what you were or weren't going to do. So yes, you can operate under that assumption.

And yes, the push to sell mtxes has ramped up, but again there's no telling if that would have happened anyway.

But that aside, Tencent are famously hands-off as long as they get their cut.

@Ves: you'd be wrong there. It had nothing to do with China. Anyone paying attention to the off-topic board when that rule came in can tell you exactly why it happened, but they won't, because I don't think any of us want to really think about it. It was a good move, because if you want to talk controversial crap, the internet is FULL of outlets and platforms. Nixing inflammatory topics on a computer game's off topic forum is hardly an attack on free speech.