My Glacial Progress In The Path Of Exile Endgame

There is no game I've put more hours into than Path of Exile. I've been there since the beta, played the game when it only consisted of three acts, and I'm still playing today's version with its ten story chapters and a weird Pokémon league. At this point you'd think I'm a hardcore veteran, who has seen, done and achieved absolutely everything. Instead, I'm still leveling my very first character in a masochistic relationship with one of the hardest games I've ever played...

Once upon a time there was an early beta of Path of Exile. January 2013. You could play cool characters like the brawny, hulking marauder or the agile, wisecracking duelist. I tried those for a bit and enjoyed them, because they worked more or less the way I expected. Then I noticed the comically oversized skill tree and the skill gem system and realized that, basically, every character can learn to use every skill there is, so I immediately wanted to do something silly and exotic, maybe even break the game a little. So I rolled a witch and thought, you know what, let's have her dual-wield claws and rip enemies to shreds in melee combat. Because throwing fireballs and lightning just seemed so boringly obvious for a witch.

Then came the zombies.

Of course the game didn't care about my plans and just dropped me a "summon zombie" skill during my first minutes of witch gameplay. Turn a corpse into an undead minion that fights your enemies for you. A couple hours later I was surrounded by pet zombies, skeletons and spectres, all of which came from the repurposed corpses of my enemies. Some more hours after that and I had raised my character's strength some more. I was now rocking heavy armor and shield-charged into hordes of enemies, pummeling anyone into the ground who wasn't getting torn to shreds by my undead minions. It was the coolest thing I had ever done in a hacky, slashy action RPG.

I immediately fell in love with PoE's skill system. Slap a fire damage support gem on those zombies - boom! Fire zombies! Skeleton minions with a nasty triple attack. Ghost wizards, who could be upgraded to shoot five fireballs at once instead of just one. Every skill, spell, special attack and minion could be customized and upgraded in fun and exciting ways! Okay, I definitely wasn't breaking the game or doing anything super exotic, but being a heavy warrior-type with tons of undead pets was still incredibly cool.

I added more and more minions over the years.

Back then the game pretty much ended after three acts. You killed the guy who got you exiled, he utters some ominous words as he kicks the bucket, then you could do it all over again on the higher difficulty levels. And that was fine. PoE felt about as "long" as Diablo 2 and was heavily inspired by it. I didn't feel like anything was missing, I played it on all difficulties and ultimately stopped again, because I had seen it all. 

Then came a new fourth story chapter. And then endgame maps. Literal maps. They dropped as items in high level content, then you could use them to enter deadly monster-infested areas, which were more difficult than the regular story bits, but also rewarded you with more experience and better loot. That stuff was fun, but also prohibitively difficult. Sure, endgame was now a thing. But basically, they could have slapped a sign right over the entrance. "You must be this meta to play." Anything but the most ideal (or broken) builds would just perish. And receive a harsh 10% experience penalty on death.

And thus began the grind.

I didn't want to start over with a "meta" build. I didn't want to spend all day trading for "best in slot" items. I started to grind out levels. Went from level 60 to 70. From 70 to 80. And started completing endgame maps. But PoE is deceptive with this stuff. You have a good run, then another, you feel that you've finally overcome that brick wall, that annoying progress-stopper, only to get curb-stomped by another pack of elite baddies or a particularly nasty boss. And with one quick death, all the progress you've been gaining that day is wiped out. And that's because I'm too much of a pussy to play hardcore, where death means death. That way, you lose everything.

Then came the ascendancy classes. Upgrades to all playable characters, which allowed them to specialize in completely new ways. Turn your ranger into a survivalist, who draws her powers from healing potions, of all things. Upgrade your duelist into a hulking slayer, who stays alive by draining the life from his enemies. And of course one of the specializations for the witch was necromancy, so I knew where I was headed. There was just one problem: Izaro's Labyrinth.

Welcome to being completely fucked.

Imagine a labyrinth, where you have to fight your way through room after room after room, trying to find the correct path to the final boss. Choosing the wrong path will lead to dead ends or a super nasty optional boss. The place is also full of traps. Floor-spikes shooting out of the ground to impale you, floor panels heating up to burn you to a crisp, gigantic swinging blades swinging to chop you to bits and all that sort of thing. Of course, the place is also crawling with some super high level monsters. If you die, teleport home or disconnect, you have to start over from the very beginning. And you must complete it in order to choose your ascendandy class. In fact, if you want to get the maximum amount of ascendancy points to full utilize the powers of your new class, you most complete the labyrinth not once, not twice, but four freaking times!

Until this day, the labyrinth is still the most divisive content in PoE. Because suddenly it's no longer about killing monsters. About having a good build. It's about timing, being able to read and avoid the traps and about having a decent enough connection, that doesn't kick you out while you're only halfway there. Super. So now I was spending all of my time completing the normal, hard and super-hard labyrinth versions. I have yet to complete the "uber" or "endgame" labyrinth, because I'm currently 80% into my level and I don't want to reset my experience to zero by repeatedly dying down there. I'll get my level up, then finish the highest difficulty setting once and for all. I hope.

Right after I'm done with the story, which suddenly contains more than twice as many chapters as before.

After inroducing ascendancy classes, the developers came out with a huuuuufuckingge update, which raised the previous four story chapters to a whopping ten. The game was suddenly twice as big and you could easily hit level 70 just by completing the story. Making progress actually became easier! Meanwhile, the Shaper, the final boss for the game's hilariously difficult endgame map system, received an overhaul and was now battling a new entity, The Elder, over map control, resulting in all sorts of deadly new monsters and mechanics randomly appearing all over the maps. So on the one hand it got a lot easier to get to the endgame, characters could become stronger than ever before and the challenges just got a whole lot more... um, challenging.

For over a half decade now, I've been playing the same witch, tweaking, editing and dicking around with her build. I'm finally using dual claws like I planned to back in 2013. Progress is so ridiculously slow, gaining a level-up at this point can take me anywhere between 5 days and a whole week of extensive play, depending on how many times I die. There are people, who grind their way from zero to the level-cap in a matter of days, especially when using the most popular builds and powerful items, while I'm crawling along at the pace of a snail with my own gear and build. Then there are people who absolutely lose their shit over the fact that, for the vast majority of players who make it this far at all, the game basically stops at level 90. Because at that point you get so little experience when you level up, the only way to realistically level up is to play content at such a high difficulty, that most less than perfect builds will be absolutely crushed, causing them to lose much more progress per death than what they could possibly ever hope to gain.

Maybe I should go back to Dark Souls. That was nice and easy...

I should hate this game. And in a way, I do. I hate the pressure when I'm close to gaining a level. Knowing that I could fuck up at any moment, lose god knows how many hours worth of progress when I die. Worst case, I'll get furstrated, throw myself at whatever killed me to get revenge and just die again. And again. Ruin everything. 

But you know... it feels pretty damn rewarding. You hit this roadblock, this brickwall, a point where you feel like you cannot possibly get any further. You have the ideal build, the best gear, you can't possibly get past this boss or that map. And then you sleep over it. Come up with new ideas. Change some stuff around. And what do you know, that seemingly impossible part of the game suddenly isn't so bad. Until you crash and burn at the next, more difficult obstacle. It's a fucking chore. It's insanely punishing. It's like a horrible job that nobody even pays you for. And I keep coming back.

I hate the experience penalty. I hate the stupidly oversized skill-tree, which is a dumb, fucking gimmick that should have been removed and consolidated into something more useful years ago. I hate having to re-think my build over and over, having to adjust to a game, that only gets more difficult and every harder to beat as time progresses. And yet, I hope it's never going to change. I never hated a game the way I hate Path of Exile. And I'm so fucking hooked, it's not even funny.

-Cat

Switch SNES Controllers And Kirby

If you happen to own games like Mario Kart or the stupidly awesome upcoming Kirby game on the Switch, then there's really no such thing as having too many controllers. Unfortunately, a pair of Joycons costs about as much as three (!) official wireless Xbox 360 controllers. So why not spend your money on something less overpriced than a Joycon, which looks eleventy times more awesome and doesn't feel like total ass? Like this classy as fuck SNES-Controller for the Switch.

Alright, alright. Obviously, if you've never used an original SNES controller, then this probably won't do it for you. This thing looks and feels as close as the real deal as it gets if you add analog thumbsticks and an extra pair of L/R buttons, as well as HD rumble. So it's a bit heavier than a proper SNES controller, the buttons and D-pad have been moved ever so slightly to make room for the sticks and it probably won't feel as good in your hands as a Switch pro controller. Or any modern controller shaped like PS4/Xbox Controllers, really, because we didn't care for fancy-shmancy ergonomic design in the 90s.

Did I already mention that Kirby is stupidly awesome, though?

If you do get the nostalgic feels for this neat little toy, though, then you can also use it on a Mac, PC (D-Input and X-Input) and just about any device that recognizes Bluetooth controllers. PC-Users can also hook it up via USB. It takes some getting used to, but I'm using it for Street Fighter V, emulators and even stuff like Dark Souls and GTA. Not sure that's really something you'll want to do for any extended amount of time, but it's doable once you get used to the messed-up button prompts. Stupid backwards Nintendo face buttons!

The rumble is fine, if a bit noisy in some games. It even has a gyro sensor, so you can move the controller around for motion controls in games like Splatoon 2, Breath of the Wild, Resident Evil, Doom and so forth.

DOOOOOOOOOOOM!

In case I haven't mentioned it yet, there's a new Kirby game coming to the Switch and it oozes quality. It looks absolutely amazing with bright colours and awesome landscapes and the typical shiny, happy Kirby visuals. Everything is incredibly detailed - there's a free demo available, which starts in a forest that is full of flowers and grass you can cut with a sword Zelda-style. There's the obligatory boss tree at the end, but this time around you see the shadows of its leaves dancing in the background. Kirby travels with up to three AI or player-controlled companions, who can combine their abilities in fun ways. If Kirby wields a sword, you can use one of your companion's powers to freeze the blade or set it on fire for extra damage. If you turn Kirby into a rock, a friend with ice powers can freeze him over for a special curling attack, sliding Kirby across the stage and into enemies and obstacles.

Art style trumps sheer graphical horsepower everytime.

What I've heard from the orchestral soundtrack so far was really great and the game is just an absolute blast to play. I've never been the world's biggest Kirby fan, but the demo absolutely blew me away and I can't wait to play the full version. Nintendo are really knocking it out of the park with their Switch releases and while Kirby may not attract the same large crowd Mario or Link could reel in, I feel this may be another heavy hitter on the system.

The Switch is completely changing the way I play videogames these days. On my PC, if at all possible, I'll run a game in 1440p or even 4k, if playable. Games like Doom or Warframe run great in 4K and a semi-decent rig can handle a maxed-out GTA V in 1440p just fine. Games look more and more realistic, up to a point where some screenshots almost look like photographs. 

Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?

While there's a bunch of players out there, who will lower each and every detail to the absolute minimum to keep their FPS in the triple digits, I'm on the opposite end of the spectrum. I will max that shit out for best possible image quality, even if it means that I'll occasionally dip down from 60 FPS to the high 40s. And then there's the Switch, which gives you the worst of both worlds - low details and resolution and low FPS. Yay!

It's the weirdest thing. On a PC it simply annoys me if I don't max out the settings, because I always feel like I'm missing out. The game doesn't look as good as it could. I'm not using all the options. I'm not getting the full experience. In one extreme case, this obsession caused me to destroy some hardware. It was when Everquest 2 came out and had some of the most realistic, but also the most demanding real-time shadows I had ever seen in any game. I absolutely had to activate this stuff, even though no computer could seriously run this game with everything cranked up back in 2004. It didn't take long for my Radeon 9700 pro to overheat and die for good. And that thing was an absolute powerhouse back in its day! 

Like most games that looked "realistic" at release, it has aged like shit.

And then there's the Switch. I'm playing L.A. Noire with crappy draw distance and low resolution textures on there. I'm playing Doom 2016, which only ever manages to maintain 720p when I stand perfectly still and there are no enemies around. Once the action starts, the resolution and framerate will drop and if the game has to stop loading a bunch of textures for a while to keep things running, then so be it. It's not anywhere near as dreadful as it sounds, but in terms of visuals and performance, it's simply the weakest version of Doom on any platform.

I can't hear your bitching over the sound of my chainsaw.

With a remastered version of Dark Souls coming out in May on multiple platforms, I have no doubt that the Switch version is going to be the least impressive in terms of visuals and performance and I can't wait to get my hands on it. It's amazing how easy it is to tolerate drawbacks and adjustments when you add "...and you can play it whilst taking a dump" to the decription of a game.

I find it absolutely hilarious. Microsoft released the most powerful console ever. Performance-wise, the PS4 Pro isn't that far behind. These puppies allow people to experience games like Destiny 2 in ultra high definition. Sure, people are so tired of Bungie's anti-consumer bullshit and microtransactions that nobody really even wants to play Destiny 2 anymore, but if you want to get ripped off by Activision in 4K, then there's your chance. Mind you, all three systems are selling like crazy, with the PS4 outperforming the Switch. But it's amazing to see Nintendo's little Hybrid doing so well, actually selling more units than Microsoft and all, what with its weak hardware and everything.

I'm about to literally bite this guy's head off. On a Nintendo console.

The only thing that slightly worries me is some of the garbage in the eShop right now. Generally, Nintendo has decent quality control and offers a nice mix of platform exclusives, mainstream AAA titles and indie games. But there are some awful mobile games crawling over to the Switch. The situation isn't Life of Black Tiger levels of awful. It sure as fuck isn't Steam asset flip garbage levels of awful. But seeing terrible, low quality mobile games like Gear Club with PlayStation2-era visuals, terrible controls and non-existent driving physics with a AAA-pricetag, I get a bit worried. In its defense, the game is actually playable (if you can get used to the terrible controls), but it re-uses the exact same assets over and over again in every single race, the landscapes never change, the game crashed on me several times and it's perfectly normal for the sound to glitch out every so often. Every race lasts 30-50 seconds, which is usually shorter than the amount of time you spend staring at the damn load screen.

These are issues I find tolerable in an otherwise functional title for 10 bucks. This game, however, costs 60 Dollars, which is completely unforgivable. For comparison, there's the equally shitty Super Toy Cars, which also features unimpressive visuals, re-uses the same tracks over and over again, features a cringeworthy garage band soundtrack and has no idea how physics work. And you can get it for about ten Dollars on the Switch. How garbage like Gear Club Unlimited managed to slip in there with such a stupidly high price tag is completely beyond me.

The Switch can do so much better than that!

There's other weird shit like Spot the Difference and Moorhuhn Castles & Knights (for 30 fucking Dollars!), where I can't help but wonder who this is even for. Not only is that shit ridiculously overpriced, but these are terrible mobile games on a device that plays Doom 2016. Granted, I'm more annoyed at some of the price tags than the actual quality of the games. Castles & Knights may just be yet another dumb Angry Birds clone, but for all intents and purposes it's complete and playable and at least resembles some sort of game. None of this is anywhere near as terrible as some of the garbage you get to buy in the PlayStation Store. I just hope that Nintendo can manage to keep it that way. A $60 Gear Club or a $30 Moorhuhn are easy enough to ignore, but let's not pile more and more shit on to the list of terrible, overpriced mobile conversions, please!

Game UK lists a Switch release of Pillars for Eternity 2. Fucking Dark Souls is coming to Switch. This console handles deep and complex titles for core gamers. I'm not sure shovelling dumbass one-click gameplay mobile phone garbage onto the Switch is a great idea. Besides, if you're really crazy about the next Angry Birds clone or some variation of Candy Crush, then you probably play that shit on your phone, anyway. You're not gonna buy a Switch for that shit. So let's not get too insane with all the mobile game garbage on there, mkay?