Like the title says, the item comparison feature that has been standard in ARPGs since the late 1990s has been broken since last season and still hasn’t been fixed.
One of the most important parts of an ARPG is finding loot and upgrading your character. Being able to quickly compare new items with what you already have equipped is something almost every ARPG player expects these days. So why is this feature in Last Epoch still broken and not even being discussed?
The issue is this: by default you can’t use the “show mod range” key on a ring without it swapping focus to your offhand ring. If you turn on the “always show mod ranges” option, the opposite happens — you can never see the mod ranges on your second ring. On top of that, the hotkey to look at the other item conflicts with the default keybindings. It’s just a mess and way harder than it needs to be.
This makes the game feel low quality to new players, like the basics aren’t being taken care of. Most long-time ARPG fans shrug it off because the rest of the game is good. But when I tried to show the game to my brother, who’s more of a Diablo 4 fan than a hardcore ARPG player, he noticed it right away and came away thinking the game felt incomplete and low effort. That was just one opinion, but I wonder how many other people feel the same when they realize something as simple as item comparison is a fight with the interface.
And honestly, I feel the same. For such a fundamental feature to be this poorly handled is frustrating. It feels like the game skipped over the basics to focus on adding depth and complex systems — which are great and one of the main reasons I support the game — but things like 3D art for uniques and a smooth item comparison system never got the same attention.
I do think this could be fixed very simply. Just rework how it functions so that if I mouse over a ring (or any slot with multiple items), it shows both items on screen at the same time. That way it doesn’t conflict with keybinds and doesn’t interfere with showing mod ranges. It’s how most ARPGs already handle it, and it would be far more intuitive.
I want to add that I think the devs have done a great job with Last Epoch overall, and I really enjoy the game. I just hope this gets addressed so I can feel good about showing it to more players and help grow the community even more.
