Looking for a good hack and slash that doesn't have cartoony graphics like Torchlight or doesn't have the mistakes that Diablo 3 made on release? Look no further! Path of Exile is just that. Path of Exile by no means is a perfect game, but it is a good "more modern" take on the original Diablo.

The Combat

The combat is great! It is very meaty and I can "feel" the impact. All the spells have good graphical and sounds assets to them. You are also constnatly getting mobbed left and right by monsters, so you will never have a lack of monsters to smash in the face. However one thing that does hurt their combat a bit is the latency. Most games when played on around 100 ping doesn't make a big difference, however in this game when the server decides to start running slow (which happens more frequently than I want it to), you end up getting a lot of warping monsters. This gets especially annoying when the monsters you are fighting can blink or leap everywhere. It does seems like hit detection have lag compensation, because I have managed to kill a few mobs that are no where near me due to lag with melee attacks a few times.

The Graphics

With all my settings on max, the graphics isn't all that great. This is mainly due to graphics on characters and monster models. They are a bit outdated. The actual terrain textures, and the graphics of the environment is "beautiful" (cause calling anything beautiful in this game would just be outrageous). The player can really see the game's doom and gloom artistic direction. Like mentioned in the combat section of the review, the special effects from skills and abilities are great.

The Game Mechanics

This is hard to judge. If you are a "core" gamer, there is definately an appeal to the way passive skill tree works, and the way the vending/trading system works. However with that said, these systems do have their flaws.

Selling things to vendors is essentially a horadric cube. There are crafting recipes you need to consider when selling things so that you can get the best payment for the items you get. What a bunch of scroll of identification? Sell the vendor any non-magical or rare item that is not peiced into a recipe properly. However that skill gem you don't use, or that iron ring you don't use that you just sold for scroll fragments could have properly be sold to make something much more valuable. Meaning, for people that doesn't what to wiki their way through the game, the trading can be very fustrating when you found out later on you just got jipped by the vendor.

Talking about being jipped by the vendor, buying things from vendors are utterly useless. Most of the currency items you use to buy the gear with is more useful to be just used upgrading a random white superior gear that you pick off on the ground. The only time I ever find myself every buying things from vendors is when I need to convert 1 type of currency to another. Or when I have 1 really underleveled gear that I simply couldn't find a good replacement for, because I either never get a magical/rare version of that item type of the right level, or I don't have the currency items to upgrade a white version of it.

The passive skill tree is massive! At first glance it seems like a core player's wet dream. Unlimited possibilities. Your OWN custom build that fits your play style. Well... that might not be COMPLETELY true. I love it because its innovative (kinda), but it have some major flaws. The shear size of the skill tree will turn average players away. There are people out there that isn't playing in hardcore league and they just want to play a hack and slash to enjoy themselves. Most of the passive skills on the tree are boring and redudant. Majority of the tree is just a flat base stats increase or flat damage increase. The amount of skills that does anything interesting is no different then that of any other passive skill tree you find in any other video games. Also there is a "one true build" mentality within the community when you play certain subtypes of a class. So placing skill points wherever you think that seems nice? Not possible if you wish to party with pubs at higher levels. Though they don't see your build, but they will complain about you not being completely optimized.

Questing

The questing in this game is awesome. Storywise it is really no different from any other hack and slash, but the fact that a lot of side quests needs to be "discovered" is a pretty good addition to the game.

Conclusion

I love this game. I definately would recommend it. It does have a few problems, but in all honesty most of it is just more because of fustration then anything else.

However a word of warning. Casuals should stay away from this game, because the game hates you. The way that the health pots and mana pots work in this game may seem like a good thing for casuals initially, however because you are constantly swamped by mobs, it balances it back out to become a relatively hard game.

Despite all the negatives I brought up in this review. Remember, THIS IS A FREE TO PLAY. Complaining about things that can only be fixed with a higher budget only goes to show your insensitivity. For example, a lot of people complain about lag, I even did to. However in my review I was questioning why we get warping at 100 ping (which isn't bad), instead of just simply complaining general lag, which requires money to fix. Another example is character animation. People complain that there are bad character animations. To be perfectly honest I can barely see that over all the FUN I am having. I am impressed that Grinding Gear Games is able to create a nearly triple A quality product as a free to play game.