After 60 Hours of play...some suggestions and impressions

Feedback and Suggestions
1

Hello all,

I “discovered” Last Epoch few weeks ago and I was very interested at that time for this game (still I am, but with few doubts for the future, honestly).

I’m into the “end game” loop (the “monolith” section) and I have few remarks about the game as a whole:

  • I feel the entire game still as “incomplete”, as if the game is in a status of “after-beta” but I will explain better: the game loop is basically just grinding and that’s ok, but I feel no “RPG” things, no decisions, no different paths, nothing about the even a minimal “evolution” of our character, a background. Obviously this is an “action RPG” and is expected to be more focused on the “action” part, usually, but in this game I feel no traces of the RPG part at all.

  • I felt the game, after the first hours, boring, but not because I expected too much from it but mostly because I feel it as a reskin/remake of an older version of Diablo in which basically we have just to continue slashing monsters to gain better loot…and that’s it. So basically I feel like replaying an old game with no real innovations. The “time travel” idea is good but it could be expanded and not only used as a way to change scenography/biome and monster types in different maps and used as a fast travel mechanic.

  • In 2024 I expected a bit more of interactivity with the environments and not only with the “ever green” boxes and trunks (not even all of them).

  • The “story” campaign is not really 16-20 hours but much less as most of the campaign time is spent in slaying monsters and bosses, not really exploring the story of the “Last Epoch”.

As a personal experience, I feel like in this game they could remove completely the part about the “story” as it is completely useless, not appealing (until now), with the only goal of slaying things and get better loot.

Again, I know that the “action RPG” genre is mainly focused on combat, but honestly I expected a bit more from it, more “complex” side quests, a true story that could be appealing and well written not just with few lines in total spread over few forgettable NPCs.

If the goal was just “create the best build, slay things, collect loot and repeat” they could focus directly over a mobile-style game with good graphics. Until now I saw in Last Epoch no story, no effort in write down an interesting story and characters backgrounds and just focusing in a repeating and boring “end-game” loop that immediately drop the interest in the game after few hours.

I read that the developers are focusing on more “end game” modes…honestly I wish not, as I think they should improve much more the campaign part, expand the story, adding characters background, adding a quest log with the text of the past dialogues, a bestiary, including more “written” side quests (not only based on slaying things preferably), adding more diversity in timelines and not just “copy and paste” several maps modifying slightly the environment (burning, corrupted) and filling them with different monster types.

Finally, I feel Last Epoch still as a “potentially” good game, but right now quite boring and too much repetitive, with no real innovations (apart the skill trees and the crafting).

Again, if the only innovation is about skills and crafting and killing monsters in different ways they could drop completely the “story” part and call the game “Skill&Kill” and drop completely even the effort of creating new graphics and assets.

I honestly wish that they will improve campaign and story aspects because if the game will remain like it is right now and just adding more “end game” modes based on “kill and loot” mechanic I think this game will be forgotten very soon.

2

To comment on each point you’ve made:

-Yes, the game is fresh out of beta, some mechanics aren’t fully fleshed out yet, end-game content will follow along in 1.1, for a fresh release it’s very good though.

-Welcome to the looter ARPG genre. Story is flavor, game-mechanics are key. And EHG clearly knows what the die-hard fandom of the whole genre loves, focusing on that rather then other aspects. In my book? More then great!

-I have to disagree, distracting from the core gameplay which makes the game as fantastic as it is (if you enjoy that type of gameplay at least) wouldn’t be worthwhile. Loads of effort, animation, small-scale tinkering needed for close to zero returns. Good to have, not needed. In more ‘lax’ development times in the future surely would be enjoyable though!

-Name a diablo-style looter ARPG which has a heavy focus on the storytelling itself without having neglected the game mechanics integral to the genre. D4? Great Story! Game mechanics are atrocious though. PoE? The story at best is a side-note. Torchlight Infinite? It was barely worthwhile to follow and is also not fitting with how the end-game is set up.
So it’s all too common for the whole genre.

As for LE? It actually has a fairly interesting story. You’re a wanderer, or ‘the wanderer’ rather. You start out on a diplomatic mission and then get thrown into holding the epoch, seeing how the world changes in time while trying to fix those problems.
Especially when following the outcomes of the monoliths on their own it begins to become very interesting with lots of future potential to expand on.

So no, I don’t think the story can simply be removed, it sets the tone, it sets the feeling, it’s actually rather well done for a game of this genre. But that doesn’t change that as you said it ‘it’s best lost, slay stuff, repeat.’ Mobile-style though? That’s an insult to the game, can’t name it any different.

A bestiary is a good choice actually! I recommend putting that into a separate post, it’s a worthwhile thing to flesh out the game’s lore further. But end-game has to have priority as it’s the weakest part of the game currently. And while a small amount of people playing this game… actually a miniscule amount… focus specifically on the story it’s not the target audience, sorry to say.

As for it having ‘no innovations’.
I have to disagree. As you already mentioned, the skill tree is something which isn’t seen in that way anywhere else. The crafting system is superb. Also we got the factions which are dedicated to solo- or community-style play, not seen anywhere else. Those are huge systems which warrant the prime attention to them.

And I also have to highly disagree on your last paragraph. It’s the core of the genre, that’s what people search for when coming here. Not focusing on those will make the game be forgotten, in comparison you can have a fantastic story (Diablo 4) but still provide a shit product.

A game is first and foremost there for the enjoyment, a good game doesn’t need a story, it needs the proper gameplay elements. Best example: Minecraft.
Sure, there are also story-driven games out there, but usually the game mechanics are ‘ok’ in those cases, not ‘amazing’ at all. The combination of both is hard to achieve, and for a long-term lasting game it’s paramount to have the mechanics down 100% and not any flavor stuff around it, those only make the experience better… but don’t aid in keeping it fantastic no matter how long you play.

4 Likes
3

Well, I have not said that LE should not focus on action, for me the part related to crafting and looting is ok, nothing really to complain about those aspects.

The skill and crafting approaches are new and appreciated but for me it is not something that makes me cry out for a miracle, enjoyable yes, but after the first few minutes understanding it and using it for the next 40-50 hours you are ok with that.

Anyway, “enjoyed” it until the end game loop (the story for me is quite rushed and basically I feel the main character just as a passenger, not really meaningful for the story (until now)), then it went quite boring for me.

Finally if most of the people enjoyed it as it is now good for them, I wished something more especially related to the lore management, but maybe in future it will be addressed.

4

It’s an isometric hack and slash game. Midnumbing grind is 95% of the genre so what did you expect?

1 Like
5

LoL , sorry man

6

I saw that there are a few chapters still missing, so I will wait for them obviously.

I will wait for the “campaign content” (apart all the rest) the devs announced on 27th of February.

7

This will take some time but I wish they will implement them in the near future.

8

Yep, I wish too, but I would prefer that they take time on it to make them good.

I was just thinking, while doing a monolith, that could be even interesting if they could add “timelines” in which they would tell (as different timeline stories, not just as mini-arenas) the birth/evolution of the bosses themselves, or even main mobs (or even exploring better the past of the main NPCs or the deities)…

As I said, the “timeline” stuff is good, but this approach could be expanded almost endlessly using it not only for slashing mobs, but even to introduce complete whole new “stories” and maybe even include a kind of “end of time museum” in which it could be possible to collect some key objects (not necessarily as an equip item) from different timelines at the end of these alternate stories and that could give passive buffs also.

Another suggestion? After 1 or 2 years give players the chance to send EHG a written potential story (based on the game, obviously) that could be voted by the community and then developed by EHG to be implemented as alternate timeline in the Monolith of Fate.

That’s what I mean when talking about “expanding” the game and giving something very new to the action RPG genre.

Do you want slay mobs? Ok, but in addition we get also additional (and potentially endlessly) stories, potentially additional NPCs and so on.

If they will instead continue only on “add additional maps in the monolith, new loot, increase mobs difficulty, increase levels, etc.” then actually I see “another” plain and normal action RPG, nothing really new at the end.

9

Oh, absolutely! Expanding on the (not fully finished) story will surely be a major point for them. Fleshing out lore keeps people immersed after all. And also it’s a way for them to bring in new maps and enemy types to handle, so a win-win there, as well as maybe 1-2 new major mechanics they think up along the line.

For a 1.0 it’s solid though. Not mind boggling amazing… but it does what an loot-based ARPG needs to do. Expanding on it will take time and effort, but I’m also sure it’ll be done. And also is in the making.
But shifting the focus from the weakest part for long-term players (end-game) with campaign and lore that doesn’t do anything to keep longer-term players also longer-term engaged is obviously not something EHG is intending to do… or even should.

Patience is the key here, the game is barely 5 years old from the introduction of the first available alpha stages and has taken massive leaps since then. We can be sure to see more of those to come in the future.

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In fact I wrote “After 1 or 2 years”, obviously not tomorrow or next week.

11

Am I the only person who just clicks through story stuff?

12

After the reworks in the early chapters I ask myself if we need the new ones soon or if they should take their time and polish all chapters even more and bring the new chapters when they are equaly polished as the early ones.

The time travel theme in this game is kind of a joke to me. Time travel offers all kind of things you could do but in LE the only reason to have time travel seems to be to reuse map layouts. If our toon was violently thrown through time without any chance of doing something against it I would understand it but as soon as I traveled though a rift and ended up in a cosy place where the worst thing that could happen to you is to step into Dino poo I realy ask myself why we don’t build a nice hut somewhere and go fishing… or you know… kill the big bad enemy who messes up the whole world ahead of the time when shit hits the fan.

In 99% of al cases fanfiction is trash so thx but no thx ^^.

No rest for the Wicked might be a different kind of ARPG that is coming up. EHG are fans of the genre and how it was back then and the positive aspects of modern gaming. They aimed to make a good hack and slash game that isn’t bad within it’s genre. Hack and Slash games are simply about grinding and looting as well as killing enemies. This is another plain and normal ARPG because that’s what they wanted to develop as we all knew when we bought it or backed it at kickstarter ^^.

I’m just intrested to see how their endgame tweaks will unfold and if they handle the nerfbat well even when a bunch of people go into babyrage mode because their OP class was bugfixed/nerfed. On top of that I already fear the so called pinacle boss content will be something rather not pinacle or content for the 1%. I wish for more endgame with more variation for a broader audince. I run Monos down without thinking because the layouts are always the same and the mobs are not worth to bother with at all unless they are a prophecy objective. I don’t think that is a good endgame philosophy at all. If I wasn’t forced into timeless I wouldn’t even touch a dungeon because I realy dislike them and see them as a waste of time personaly (If you have fu nwith those more power to you have fun :wink: it’s just a matter of taste) and the most not fun dungeons I ever entered in any game.

I just wait and see what time will tell. Right now I think we are months away from a first season if they haven’t worked on it in advance and I think the balancing alone will take weeks unless they nerf like back in the day and kill builds left and right untill someone finds the next broken build.

I’m here for the long run and if seasons don’t overlap I’ll play LE gladly as long as there is nothing else I want to sink time in.

13

Ah well, if for that I will use LE also as something to sink time in until there will be something new or interesting to dive in, in the meantime there are obviously much more games to play.

If the main goal of LE at the beginning was to create “another plain and normal ARPG because that’s what they wanted to develop” I’m good with it.

14

Well at least it has more passive skill trees then other arpgs :smiley:

15

Yeah, at least :smiley:

16

Oh, the time travel aspect and the traveler not settling down is actually fairly clearly fleshed out.
He does it since he doesn’t know who the ‘big baddy’ actually is.

Beware as spoilers are incoming for those who don’t want to read it, I’ll bolden the text when it’s over.

So first you get the Epoch, then get thrown into a time where the world is literally breaking apart, everything’s going under, the world is ending.
Obviously… not good! So, what to do against that?
He goes back since the Imperials seemed to have let the Void take over, hence trying to end the Emperor to avert that. But… it doesn’t work.
So it’s back to your initial timeline, trying to stop Rahyeh… which turns out is also not the main issue as suddenly other gods do loads of crap. Lagon starts messing up, Majasa as well. Everything goes down the drain.

The story isn’t finished yet, but we get glimpses of things happening when the wanderer isn’t interfering, alternate timelines.
If the dragons aren’t stopped then humanity and the gods are prone to be wiped out.
If Rahyey is stopped early then Heorot becomes a mess. If Rahyeh gets his way he brings the void into the world.

So currently it’s simply that whatever is tried out… the wanderer can’t - yet - avert the downfall of the world.
I imagine it’ll all culminate towards the death of Eterra, saving her so she is able to keep the world stable which clearly is flung to the path of oblivion without her.

Spoiler over

But yeah, time-travel is always a iffy topic, it needs much to be done well. In LE it’s… decent, not one of the bad ones. More used to re-use game assets in a meaningful way rather then having them a one-time thing while also leaving tons of options open for the future.

17

Look at the final boss. You come there and see “Ah here things go down for real!” then he dials back a few years and strangles the baddy in her sleep. Problem solved. With time travel he could even jump forward in time to see if something good or bad comes from his deed. If things go well so be it if things got even more out of hand just try it again and again and again you have all the time in the world.

On top of it I realy hope at some point of the story we find out that our toons started the end of the world by sticking our noses into things no mortal should be involved with and we do and endgame redemtion arc like Deadpool getting rid of all the former sins ^^.

18

Oh, that would be one amazing twist definitely, would love that!

But yeah, works with the ‘normal’ people but not so much with the gods probably. Strangling Lagon needs very big hands :stuck_out_tongue:

19

Depends where you strangle him?

20

In the ancient time, when he is a still a small insignificant octopus :smiley: