Diablo 4 and Path of Exile 2 failed to live up to Last Epoch, but independent hack'n'slash has issues in Season 3

Last Thursday, the third season of Last Epoch kicked off, drawing a large number of players on Steam. Although the list of changes was extensive, the new features ultimately didn’t satisfy everyone (via Mein-MMO).

How did the third season do?

At the time of writing, more than 35,000 players are enjoying Last Epoch on Steam. At the season's peak, the game peaked at around 80,000 players online simultaneously (via SteamDB). This is very good, but it’s clearly lower than the peak reached in the previous season. Back then, more than 150,000 players were online at the same time.

The difference in player activity between the two seasons of Last Epoch. Source: SteamDB

Despite this, Last Epoch’s current player numbers are significantly higher than those of Path of Exile 2 and Diablo 4 combined. Of course, these figures only reflect Steam activity, while both competitors are also available on consoles, and Blizzard’s title can be played through the Battle.net platform. Additionally, these are seasonal games that players return to periodically, so a clearer comparison will be possible on Friday, when the new league in PoE 2 launches.

Mixed opinions

So far, the new season of Last Epoch has received a mixed reviews from players. Over the past 30 days, Last Epoch has received more than 1,200 reviews on Steam, with 68% of them being positive. Players’ criticisms have focused primarily on a few key elements.

Some players feel that Last Epoch offers too little variety in character builds. Although the game theoretically offers a wide range of builds, only a small portion are strong enough to tackle the more challenging content. Players who prefer more unconventional build combinations are often left unsatisfied.

Much of the criticism is also aimed at the new content. The third season seems to bring too little for players, and the main update mechanic feels too similar to previous ones. Some players feel that the third season of the game feels almost identical to the second.

Of course, there are also positive opinions, as at its core, Last Epoch remains a solid hack'n'slash game. It appears especially popular among players who find Path of Exile too complex, yet feel that Diablo IV oversimplifies the genre.

The question is whether this will be enough in the long run. Eleventh Hour Games will need to step up their game for the fourth season if they want it to surpass the third. This is especially true now that Krafton has taken over, leaving players viewing the studio with far more skepticism than before.

Last Epoch

February 21, 2024

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• Overview

• stats (games)
• action RPG
• Bluehole / Krafton
• hack'n'slash