Petite note Française, pour les francophones qui ont la flemme de traduire tout sa je post mon avis en français également.
To begin with, I would like to point out that I do not speak English and that such a long text in English is a first, thank you not to judge too much.
To begin with you will have seen it in the title, I have more than 200 hours of games in a few week, we can say that I have bleed the game well, and if I was able to play as much it is that I appreciate the game regardless of the criticism that will be formulated. If I criticize certain aspect of the game it is only to do my job as a beta player.
To begin with, it is necessary to note a possible point that I really appreciate.
The game is fluid, I rarely encounter big lag. The game is pleasant to play keyboard in hand, its may seem silly but a heavy game there is nothing like it to make you want to stop. Another point that attracted me here and I want to highlight it from active devs. (I suffered a lot on wolcen before I had to stop hoping.)
After that I will not list all the positive points of the game, there are too many of them, and it would not be interesting. We will rather talk about what I have to improve for the future, and tell you that if I am not criticizing something, it is because I like it.
I’m going to start with some things that are missing, because the devs haven’t made any progress on the subject yet, I know that this is only a beta and that the game is not complete so it is not really reviews but more a list of what I expect in the future.
First of all as French, well a translation, I appreciated the maps of the story, the gameplay all but clearly I did not understand what its talking about. Its can be annoying, in an ARPG, often the story takes a back seat but hey, even if I have a story I would like to understand it. Another essential thing which is seriously lacking today, a multi is really urgent, an ARPG without a multi that cannot exist, it is the very purpose of the games. So I know it’s in the process of being developed and that’s good news because, otherwise, we piss off quickly. What will be moreover most of my future reproaches the really boring end game.
Last thing I added quickly would be different writing channels, again I would obviously appreciate talking with people I can understand, because the English channel is good but I have to spend 2 hours on google translate to understand the others and make me understand. Once again, an ARPG is above all a game that is played in a group in a community, and therefore without mastering the majority language, we cannot communicate. Making a French, German, Russian or whatever channel shouldn’t take a lot of time and it would help a lot, it won’t divide the community, I appreciate the English community, just I find it hard to interact live with them, its going too fast for me.
Okay now let’s come to this famous end game that bothers me. I said it on different subject, but for me the end game is the same boring thing as all the games of the genre. I put the arena aside for the moment, I find its rather original and cool, and it will be even more in multi. My problem is the monolyte, or nephalema fault or whatever in POE in short, an endless bland dungeon, without flavor without interest which does not recount anything and does not bring any particular challenge either if you have the equipment. Why not all games of the genre are able to offer a more interesting end game. Especially in this kind of games, it is generally the very heart of the game, the story is generally used as a tutorial. But the tutorial for what?
There is simply nothing after the story except making random pieces of the map with the same monsters and at the end of it you have 80% of the time a forge with mobs. Super 3 spells in the pack and is done. Or if you are lucky you have the right to a mini boss, very mini because it is often enough to ignore it is attack to mess around like a moron to kill him.
For me it is currently the main problem of the games, almost are alone, but it is not enough to “update” to finish the development of those game modes. It is necessary to completely review the operation because it is his which is boring. For me you have to feel involved in something that there is a goal, just to make loopholes to make loopholes does not make sense, to find equipment so that there is no challenge or the use is useless. I want some new gear to beat this boss, without which I couldn’t, it makes me want to spend hours farming to get this gear and then have the right to an epic boss fight that makes me sweat.
Today I don’t want to piss off optimizing my gear to make a smithy or a boss smack, which I can beat with my correct gear but not optimize.
For that to be able to change it is necessary to review the bosses, it is necessary that it is much more irritated, that a bad possession be punished instantly, that there are Patterns which change. I am going to take an example of games where it is successful hence the reason for the success of the game is Final fantasy 14. It is certainly an MMO and not an ARPG, but we just talked about combat epic bosses not in the style of the games.
In FF a bad positioning on a boss is a one shot, no matter your equipment or your level, the boss has mechanics you must respect them, he also has phases, clearly passing a level of life, the patterns change accelerates , its lasts long enough that in general when you finish a fight after 20 tries with your group, you are a sweat, you are slammed and you take a crazy pleasure, because you deserved this victory.
And this is what it lacks, vaicre lagoon, does not provide this pleasure, with a character with a minimum of regen life steals you cannot die, even taking the laser full head, and not even talking no others spell that they are completely harmless. There is nothing spicy about defeating this boss, but just like all the bosses in the game. None have really punitive mechanics.
So if all the game bosses were like final fantasy with real mechanics and challenge to overcome, it would make things more fun. But back to the monolyte, so the bosses suck, and even the operation sucks, to make a good boss you have to hit 50 wave of mobs and if you just miss your boss fight you have to start all over again, fortunately he are not spicy, because otherwise no one would do them, you have to deserve access to the boss fight, but after having the right to several tries, after you are successful you give up. But restarting 40 levels before being able to start again in a group will not be playable.
The problem is that at the moment the games are not thinking for multiplayer, nobody is going to make 15 monster waves get to the boss fail because a guy screwed up, and have to start all over again, already in most games if a guy misses something once the group explodes, imagine in monolyte … In short I pence that you understood what I pence of this mode which is boring for me, without a fight that makes you want to and not think for the multi.
And currently we have finished the end game of Last Epoque as much to say that it is clearly not enough. The end is the heart of the game in an ARPG, it’s really going to have to be improved in the future if you want people to stay, otherwise it makes the story test two or three characters for fun, then go on games. , or when the story is finished there are some interesting things to do.
Again this can pass on a negative opinion, it is absolutely not the case, I am simply exposing the problems, I would not have played as much if I had not liked the games, for me there is still something missing thing but this is normal the game is in development (I am thinking of all the character branches, has a customization of his ext character) But its clearly not the priority. I am much more critical of the monolyte because it is not a problem of lack of development but of philosophy and choice.
So to end on a positive note, this game is great, a lot of good stuff, I think the atmosphere is good, we have a good keyboard feeling in hand, it’s fluid, the characters have all their style, even if details are to refine its remains really very well for a beta. This game is full of promise and the developers are doing a great job, I just hope they change this monolyte and do something more exciting, or at least tweak it, with epic bosses and the ability to restart fights from boss, just keeping the structure could make it infinitely better. That will be all for me on my overall game view, for each character or more specific subjects I would give my opinion in the section of the characters in question,