Wormerine

ME2/3, Witcher3, Dragon Age2, Inquisiton are all story driven direct sequels asking you to import your safe if you have one. Perhaps, the import feature is a bit too indepth, but then again, someone would need to buy it to get to this point. I am sure there is a portion of players who played PoE1 and never finished, and decided it is not worth bothering with the sequel. I would imagine it would be more due to dislike of PoE1, rather then "Wow, PoE1 was awesome, but I never finished, so I will not try the new shiny sequel".

Maybe this is all a manufactured drama in order to boost sales of PoE3 #wishfulthinking

That is an interesting point. it does indeed seem, like streaming is a way for people to engage with games. I can’t imagine PoEs being very engaging streaming games - in-depth combat mechanics, lengthy conversations, somber tone, all seem like a horrible fit for a stream. I couldn’t imagine playing it with a friend, not to mention thousands of passive viewers waiting to be entertained. “YOLO!” Nature of something like D:OS2 might make for a better viewer experience, and invite more younger audience in. I can’t talk about Cohh’s streaming habits. Does he often do multiple playthroughs of the same game? that still however, doesn’t address discrepancy between PoE1 and PoE2 sales, and none of them seem very streamable.

Interesting, for me that was the reason I didn’t care for D:OS2. Without objectives and characters to cared for I was wondering aimlessly doing things, and completing quests but never caring one bit, about what was happening. It was a game about walking around, doing chores and stuffing meat into my elf’s mouth. It was a game with so many options, that nothing felt worth doing. I mean first quest, is to get out of the prison, which should be exciting, but whenever you move you stumble into so many easy ways out of prison. nothing felt earned, and made me wonder how this prison hold its prisoners with so many holes in its security. It was the first RPG where I dreaded entering a new city, as every NPC would have something to say, but none of it was interesting. You could kill an NPC but it would have no impact as ghost thing was there to still talk to him. but maybe it just my taste. It’s a bit like Skyrim to me: “You can climb every mountain!”. Yeah, but why would I, if there is nothing interesting on top. Give me one memorable quest line with couple interesting ways of progressing, instead of bunch of boring stuff. however, this game had an amazing marketing. Trailers for this game beam with fun, humor and character. I did find PoE trailers unappealing even to someone actively interested in the game.

Any of those points though (I agree with some, and strongly disagree with others), are relevant only to people who bought And played the game. none of the things you mentionEd a person who didn’t play the game could have an opinion about. there is also another thread on precisely the same topic already.

As someone who bought the game and spent 400h with it, I cannot say why would someone wouldn’t do that.

That’s a practical approach, which I approve of, though as I tend to replay RPGs, I don’t mind playing on day1, if the game is in good state, I have been waiting for it for a while, and I have a gap in my gaming schedule.

Cinematic trailer expressing ideas, not actual gameplay. I mean, I didn't even expected it to be in the game.

Aside from one clue registering (learned password which I couldnt use, until I learned it from a difference source), I had a pretty smooth experience. Oh, and at one point an NPC joined in on a conversation, even though she left the room.

Another article you mean? This one is from September 2019, while the development of PoE2 finished in May...

Thief didn't do many things right, but it's custom difficulty setting is something I would love to see more of.

That's true. I didn't really understand PoE1 mechanics, until I tackled Adra Dragon and got wiped without mercy. Only then I actualy reviewed my builds/equipment and learned basic stuff, like armor, item buffs not stacking and started to use more then three spells.

That is also how interaction with the world is. When I think of systemic games I think of Fallout1&2 and Arcanum. If doors are locked you can lockpick them. Or pickpocket/kill owner and take his key. Or use a disguise. Or talk your way through. Or blood the doors with an explosive. Deadfire moved slightly toward this direction, but it is very picky when you can use your skills. if I were a betting man I would bet that BG3 will be turn based. But we have no confirmation one way or another.

Well, under 2K to be precise for OW1. Third Person View and Mod support is something that was stated to be not supported for OW1 due to financial limitations, with hope to expand the scope of the game for the potential sequel. Modders can’t be given access to tools Obs is using, and creating mod support is an undertaking which seems unlikely. I don’t know how much a committed modded can do. According to Long War folk, quite a bit.

If PoE were to move to single character control system it would fundamentally change what kind of game it is. If Fallout1&2 you controlled only one character. PoE is group tactics game and those simply don’t work well without top down view. FPS fallout has still potential to be a fallout game, but PoE - not so. its not like top down games don’t sell. XCOMs were doing well. divinities did well. Disco Elysium seems to be doing. PoE1 did well. For some reason PoE2 didn’t.

I have managed to upgrade to lvl 35 all science weapons and my plasmanrifle (the last one costed me a fortune). Once your each science 100 paying 200 for an upgrade isn't much as long as you sell extra weapons, armor and mods.

Always target the weakest link. Good try.

Ah! Finally beat that one not so long ago. I must say, I didn't enjoy this one much. Hopefully DS3 will be better.

Beat Disco Elysium and Outer Worlds in a short time, one after another. Will be seriously slowing down now, before Phoenix Point releases in December. Meantime I finally installed Hollow Knight. Didnt' spend too much time with it, but I am liking it more then I expected. Metroidvania isn't always my thing, but I am really enjoying this one. It learned some good lessons from Dark Souls and has couple neat ideas of its own. And an excellent art style.

I don't know if you really want the game to be hard - there just isn't enough to it. I can see it become frustrating very easily if difficulty is tuned too high. The combat doesn't have enough depth to become interesting on harder settings.

That sounds like a really silly idea. I liked Mario Galaxy, in an RPG, running around a small planet sounds silly.

What @Boeroer said is very likely. Another thing might be, that Josh might simply not be telling all the truth. PoE3 hasn't been announced, and no individual will break the news before official announcement was made. Remember how Swen denied working on Baldur's Gate3, while someone pointed a finger at him? Turns out he wasn't truthful.

After completing Forgotten Sanctum you can ask Llengrath about joining the Circle, and she sais that you proved yourself and should would endorse you. So yes, maybe, sometime in the future.

I am curious as to what parts are deemed to be so challenging by OP. At level 20 outside megabosses, he shouldn't encounter much resistance, especialy on normal. If he refers to megabosses - then sure. Those are encounters that only people most interested in challenge should take on - they are purely optional. DLC certainly raise the difficulty as well, though not to a degree were one would need to specialise. Though considering how undertuned most encounters in the base game were on hard and POTD, I can assume one can sleepwalk through them on normal. DLCs do raise things to the level that one needs to pay attention to what is happening. I remember other people complaining about it as well, as some players never learned to deal with concentration and armor. One specific complaint sounds like it may refer to dragon fight in Beast of Winter - though most of the time I wasn't able to interupt her either, and it was fine. The difference between BG and Deadfire was that BG was really easy to cheese. That is how I beat the game in my first attempts when I was a teen. Deadfire still has cheese, though it is far harder to figure it out.