Path of Exile 2

Steam Reviews

Read all reviews on Steam

• Recommended Posted March 22, 2026 on Steam I’m 55. At that age you’re actualy more likely to buy things for your back than games that test your patience. Path of Exile 2 smiled at me politely, handed me a few skills, and then made it very clear that friendliness is not a game system here. At first I thought: alright then, ARPG stuff. A bit of running around, a bit of looting, a few monsters exploding, done for the day. What I got instead was a game that feels like Diablo had a rough childhood and decided it was time to get serious. What makes PoE 2 so strong for me: it doesn’t just want you to get stronger. It wants you to get better. Not on paper. Not in the tooltip. Actually better. Positioning matters. Timing matters. The wrong decision doesn’t just cost you time, sometimes it costs you your entire dignity. Especialy when, like me, you tend to play as if life experience automaticly makes you wise in games too. It doesn’t. The game tests that theory on a regular basis. I ended up on a minion build, because at my age I like delegating. So Infernal Hound with Fire Exposure, plus Skeletal Arsonists, Storm Mages and Clerics. At first that sounds like a medium-sized company party with a serious fire hazard. But once it works, it works beautifully. And that is exactly the point: once it works. Because before that, you spend a surprising amount of time asking yourself why your build is not working. Why your minions clear everything in one area and then in the next one suddenly look like unpaid volunteers on disaster duty. You start thinking about support gems, synergies, Spirit, resistances and item mods, even though you actualy just wanted to play for a little while. Of course, “a little while” turned into nothing of the sort. I really like the atmosphere. Everything has weight. Everything feels dark, broken, and like nobody there has had a proper good day in years. Even when you do get stronger, the world never feels like it has given up. More like: good for you. Keep moving, the next problem is already waiting up ahead. What I especially like is that fights are not just a fireworks show. Sure, things explode, burn and go off everywhere, but underneath that there is substance. Enemies are allowed to be dangerous. Bosses have presence. And you cannot just half-sleep your way through it if your build or your movement is a mess. Looting is its own thing too. PoE 2 manages something only a few games manage: an item on the ground can make you happy and suspicious at the same time. You pick something up and immediately think: maybe this is strong. Maybe it’s trash. Maybe this exact item is about to ruin the next 40 minutes of my evening because now I suddenly want to rebuild everything around it. And yes, the crafting and theorycrafting have that classic Path of Exile feeling again: fascinating, motivating, and slightly insane. A quick reality check: You say: I’m just going to test one more little change to the build. The game says: Nice. Here are three hours of your life gone. You say: My minions will handle it. The game says: Then maybe explain to them why they are falling over right now. You say: I’m only picking this item up for a second. Five minutes later you’re sitting there like a jeweler with tax problems. What I especially like about PoE 2: it takes the player seriously. No constant hand-holding, no soft, watered-down conveyor belt gameplay, no feeling of meaningless loot-parking-lot action. When something works, it feels earned. When something goes wrong, unfortunatly that usually feels earned too. Verdict: Path of Exile 2 is not a game that wants to please you. It is a game that expects you to meet it halfway. And that is exactly why it got me. I only wanted to take a quick look. Now I’m sitting there optimizing a minion build with Infernal Hound, arguing with myself about Fire Exposure, and getting excited about boots like I’m 12 again. Absolutely great stuff. Just with more death.
• Recommended Posted June 3, 2026 on Steam Path of Exile 2 delivers deep character customization, challenging combat, and a much stronger campaign experience than most action RPGs. The visuals, boss fights, and skill system are impressive and rewarding for players who enjoy experimenting with builds. However, the game can feel overwhelming for newcomers, and some progression and balance issues are still noticeable during early access. Overall, it’s a very promising ARPG with excellent gameplay depth, but it may require patience and a willingness to learn its complex systems.
• Recommended Posted May 15, 2026 on Steam Installed the game: “Wow, this looks incredible.” Reached first boss: “Okay, cool mechanics.” Died 14 times: “Fair enough.” Opened the passive tree: “What in the doctoral thesis is this?” Found a new weapon: +5% stun duration against enemies that are on fire during a lunar eclipse My current build: * emotionally compromised * rolling constantly * surviving on vibes * somehow scaling poison, lightning, and regret simultaneously Meanwhile the game: “You have insufficient spirit.” Brother I have insufficient will to live. Loot system: * kill ancient horror from beyond reality * receive: sandals Every boss fight feels personal. Every respec costs the GDP of a small nation. Every veteran player explains mechanics like they’re teaching quantum physics. And yet … After 6 straight hours of suffering: * boss finally dies * health bar at 1 pixel * hands shaking * garbage loot drops 10/10. See you tomorrow.
• Not recommended Posted May 31, 2026 on Steam I don't recommend this game purely because of the support that is GGG. Bought the game a few months ago, but didn't really enjoy it at the time and refunded it. I only played for 48 minutes at that time. Bought it again at 50% off this weekend, tried to log in and my account was locked. Contacted GGG support, they said it's locked because of an unauthorized refund and apparently this counts as stealing from them. I contact steam support, they confirm that the refund was legitimate and since the ban was a outside of steam and through GGG's system, they can't do much. I contacted GGG support yet again and am met with silence. If refunds through steam are counted as "unauthorized refunds" then perhaps you shouldn't have steam be able to issue refunds on your behalf. If people are exploiting premium currency by buying the game and then refunding, maybe YOU should have some exploit fix in place and not punish innocent/unknowing players for this. I am glad Steam has decent refund policies for instances like this.
• Recommended Posted December 30, 2025 on Steam Review time at 380ish hours, 0.4 patch In spite of it being one of my personal all-time favorites, this is a tough game to truly "recommend" because it's so specific and there are so many caveats. I am a huge ARPG fan, and I tend to play all the releases, all the seasonal updates, etc. but at heart I am more of a "casual" gamer. In its current state, PoE2 has (for my taste) the best look and combat feel, plus build depth and skill/class system versatility. Add to that (finally) an excellent trade system, and you have yourself a top tier ARPG. The campaign is currently not finished, but even with the existing 4+ chapters, is fairly well done (major kudos for Act 4 which I really enjoy) and there's a complex endgame in place that gives tons of content that essentially lasts forever for the more casual player. Not to mention there are plenty of classes and different build potentials within each class. So why do I hesitate to give this a more glowing review? While the devs have made numerous improvements over the first few releases, they seem to still be oblivious to the casual gaming audience and potential new players who aren't experienced with the way they do things. The absolute worst part of the game is still the very beginning, and I imagine they lose or turn off a large chunk of potential players with the current design philosophy. Even the very opening sequence/boss can be hard enough to turn someone sour on the game. While Act I is generally well regarded, it can be very frustrating and difficult if you are playing alone, aren't lucky with drops or aren't good with dodging, or simply want to experiment with skills and builds instead of religiously following a guide. I really can't wholeheartedly endorse this game to most of my friends without a revamp of the way Act 1 feels. Now if you know enough "tricks of the trade" and/or are lucky or patient enough to get your character really going, the game does get better and better, and surprisingly gets easier as you go along. If you follow a meta guide, you can generally start coasting through the campaign at some point. And if you are lucky enough to get a lucky currency drop, it can be a total game changer. Probably the biggest problem I'd say with the game currently (again from a casual standpoint) is the weird stinginess of uncut skill gems, especially the support ones. It starts out stingy and pretty much stays that way until you finish the campaign. I suspect they want the reward of an uncut gem to be more meaningful during the campaign, and I kind of understand that, but at the same time, it really stymies any opportunity to be more creative or experimental. This coupled with the gold cost of refunding passive points make the early game a choice of either playing the exact "correct" way (generally using a guide) or being consistently frustrated to make progress. It's basically a casual player's nightmare, and this is why the majority of my casual gamer friends steer clear from this game. Speaking of item drops, this is one of those odd phenomena which constantly amazes me. Throughout both Poe 1 and 2, I probably have played close to a thousand hours, and in all that time, the number of truly good rare drops I've had (ones that are distinctly better than what I could buy through trade) is probably close to ZERO. I often laugh at just how bad the mods are on the items I get, it's almost like a bad joke. I know, I know - RNG. But something is just off with this game in particular. I can search in trade and find dozens of options with, for example, +100 to maximum life, while in the mean time my drops are getting like +7 or something pathetic like that. How is this possible throughout so many hours of play? The flip side is if you can make it past these annoyances, there is a lot of fun to be had in the content. If you are lucky enough to get even ONE divine orb (I actually did this league!!!) the entire game opens up. You can suddenly afford all sorts of decent gear, plus buy skill gems and orbs, which open the door to experimentation. You'll start to get plenty of gold so passive respecs are also no longer an issue. Basically the whole game just opens up, but it's completely dependent on the RNG of getting a *currency* drop. I guess my ultimate question is this what the developers really envisioned?
• Not recommended Posted May 29, 2026 on Steam Putting this negative review in response to GGG's Path of Exile 2 "sale" as I feel as though it's incredibly deceptive. For the entire period of Early Access, this game requires a paid access (or a friend code). You need to basically purchase $30 worth of microtransactions to get access to this game. Today they finally put the game on 50% off but very sneakily swapped out $30 pack for a $15 pack, called it the exact same thing, and marked it at $30 with a 50% discount. No, this is not a 50% discount on a $30 package, this is a new $15 package at full price.