From Hope to Frustration: My Early Access Feedback on PoE2

Introduction
With about 150 hours of playtime in Path of Exile 2 (PoE2) since the launch of Early Access, I felt it was time to share my feedback on the experience. My ARPG background primarily stems from the Diablo franchise, so I’m well aware of the key differences between these two ARPG realms in terms of difficulty, progression pace, itemization, and economy. However, as a new player in the PoE universe, I will base my feedback on Grinding Gear Games' (GGG) statement that they aim to make PoE2 accessible to newcomers.

My feedback will cover the following aspects: overall impressions of the game, the campaign and progression, endgame and related systems, as well as specific mechanics like the Ascendancy Trials. For context, I was unable to gather the materials required to face any of the pinnacle bosses, nor was I able to complete the 4th Ascendancy Trial.

Overall Impressions
I believe PoE2 has great potential to claim the ARPG throne in the coming years. The art style, visual fidelity, sound design, and overall atmosphere are outstanding. When evaluating an Early Access game, I focus primarily on the foundational elements, as much of the in-game content is likely to change over the course of development.

Thus far, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my time with PoE2, but I have also never felt more infuriated or frustrated by a game. Some of the punishing mechanics occasionally overshadow the rewarding aspects. My hope is that over time, feelings of frustration will give way to more aspirational, satisfying experiences. While I understand the challenge of balancing risk and reward, I firmly believe that playing a game should never feel punishing. While veteran players may accept and even thrive in this environment, new players unfamiliar with the genre may struggle to embrace this philosophy. I’ll expand on this in the sections below.

Campaign
The campaign is well-designed, with engaging lore, diverse content, and an interesting storyline. However, I view campaigns as something you experience once or twice before moving on. The idea of having to repeat this lengthy journey—up to 60 hours per character—at every league start is unappealing.

While league mechanics can help make subsequent playthroughs more engaging, the campaign ends up feeling like a chore you’re obligated to “suffer through” rather than something you look forward to. Both Diablo and Last Epoch have acknowledged this issue and implemented alternatives that allow players to bypass campaign replays if they wish, without removing the campaign for those who enjoy it. The argument that "this is the way it's always been" is no longer valid.

Endgame
The transition from Act 3 (A3C) to Endgame was jarring. After feeling accomplished at the end of the campaign, the sudden leap in difficulty during early mapping felt like a cold shower. To me, endgame should be where the real character progression begins.

While the challenge was occasionally fun, it often left me feeling frustrated and demotivated. PoE2 demands player skill and situational awareness—unlike many games in the genre, it can’t be played while multitasking, which is a positive feature. However, the level of randomness determining success or failure is often excessive and unfair. I suspect this is an area where changes will be made during the Early Access period.

On the topic of risk and reward, I believe this is where the balance needs the most work. Losing experience, loot, the ability to retry maps, or revive teammates in multiplayer is unnecessarily punishing. Failure should come with consequences, but punishment on this scale feels overly harsh. For many players—myself included— this system detracts from the overall enjoyment of the game. If PoE2 is meant to encourage multiplayer interactions, punishing those who play together seems counterproductive.

Ascendancy Trials
The Ascendancy Trial system has potential, but its execution is currently flawed. The difficulty tuning and randomness are frustrating, to the point that I eventually stopped attempting them. The fact that some trials can take over an hour (or more) to complete—only to end in failure—discouraged me from engaging further.

Compounding this issue, poor decisions early in a trial can significantly reduce your chances of success later. I avoided Ascendancy entirely after a few attempts and managed just fine without it. The prospect of retrying trials, knowing I could be one-shot by off-screen mechanics or lingering death effects, was simply unappealing.

Allowing players to restart a trial from the last stage they completed—at the cost of loot or experience for that run—would make the system far more forgiving and enjoyable. At the very least, completing a trial should always grant the Ascendancy points.

My Wishes for the Future of PoE2
As I mentioned at the beginning, PoE2 has immense potential. I’m excited for its future and believe the right changes will solidify its place as a centerpiece in my gaming rotation. Below are some of my main wishes for improvements during development:

Campaign Alternatives: Introduce alternative activities to progress from character creation to endgame after completing the campaign once per league.
On-Death Effects (OdEs): These effects should be clearly visible and telegraphed. Lingering effects (e.g., DoT pools or shards) should dissipate when the enemy dies, rather than lingering unnecessarily.
Mob Density and Agility: Swarming mobs with no opportunity to evade or react, as well as off-screen mechanics like anchors and meteors, are overly punishing. Rare monsters with extreme movement speed or mana-stealing auras should be tuned down.
Itemization and Crafting: The crafting system lacks determinism until late game and feels unrewarding early on. Reintroducing a crafting bench or similar mechanic would make crafting accessible from the start, as GGG intended.
Ascendancy Trials: Allow players to revive teammates during trials and continue from the last completed stage. The "honor system" mechanic should be optional or adjusted, as it detracts from situational awareness and overall enjoyment.
Risk and Reward: Introduce penalties for failure that don’t include losing XP, loot, or the ability to retry content. In multiplayer, allow fallen teammates to be revived, with reasonable limits on revives per session.

Closing Thoughts
PoE2 has the potential to set a new standard for ARPGs, and I’m looking forward to seeing how it evolves during Early Access. With the right balance changes, this game could easily become a genre favorite for many years to come. If you made it all the way to the end; thank you for taking the time to read my feedback.

+1 for reviving in multiplayer.

As it stands now, if one member dies then the other has to feel bad for completing alone, and the one dying has to sit in town doing f all. It just can't work like this in maps.

They have to balance reviving in maps like this or there would be no downside to people who do 6 man mf like empyrian. This is the same way they balance the economy around blasters like fubgun.

I guess what they could do is only allow x amount of revives based on how many portals are left. If 6 people go in no revives.

Good feedback!

Its a great game in the making - They only need to adjust the RNG, refine the endgame systems, balance stuff and make, as you said, endgame activites less punishing.

Also! Make a search function in Atlas. Would be awesome to be able to search for specific affixes, activites, biomes etc.

The game does look and sound pretty good. I agree. It does need a bit of heavy optimization though, my only complaint with the graphics. Plenty of people play on 4k screens these days. Sucks having the entire screen turn into a blurry mess because there's a few instances of fire on the group, and I've got a decently powerful PC. It also helps to bring players in. Lower requirements means more players can have a good experience.

I also LOVE the WASD controls. It feels so much better to play like that compared to mouse clicking.

I like the campaign too. I feel some area's are too big, but other than that, the experience is actually decent and pretty solid. I do still feel they can improve on it. But that's a given, everything will get fleshed out and polished as the Early access continues.

Unfortunately, most of the rest of this stuff. I haven't experienced yet so I can't really comment. I gave up when I realized that to progress on my second character, after my first was bricked without a full respec. Was to buy a multiple divine orb weapon. And at 45, it just wasn't feasible.

My main other complaints about the game are just, the combat needs way more polishing. Certain mechanics like XP loss on death, are just unfun. And this game should seriously look at "The Economy" because I feel it's negatively impacting the game in many different ways, being so reliant on it.

I feel like this game would do better with emphasis on fun engaging combat, and a good solid co-op gameplay experience. Rather than focusing on stuff like endless map spamming and economy. PoE 1 already has that, don't see the need for both games to do the same thing.

I am looking forward to seeing what GGG does in the next few months. We'll have a better picture of the direction the game will take.