Info about Last Epoch:

Official game description:
Editions Comparison
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Join Our Discord
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Join the Last Epoch Discord server to keep up with the latest updates, recruit some friends, and slay your way across Eterra!
About the Game
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Last Epoch combines time travel, exciting dungeon crawling, engrossing character customization and endless replayability to create an Action RPG for veterans and newcomers alike. Travel through the world of Eterra’s past and face dark empires, wrathful gods and untouched wilds – to find a way to save time itself from The Void.
Key Features
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*   **15 Mastery Classes**  
    Embark on your adventure as one of five powerful classes and, through your journey, ascend into a unique Mastery Class that unlocks more specialized abilities and build-options.
*   **120+ Skill Trees**  
    Every skill has its own augment tree that will allow you to control, alter, and empower your playstyle. Transform your skeletons into archers, your lightning blast into chain lightning, or make your serpent strike summon snakes to fight alongside you!  
*   **Hunt Rare & Powerful Loot**  
    Fill your arsenal with magic items that you may craft to perfection, change the rules of your build with powerful unique and set items, and always have that next upgrade just on the horizon with Last Epoch's deep and randomized loot system.
*   **Rewarding Crafting System**  
    The items you wield are yours to forge! Last Epoch’s community-revered crafting system allows you to control your character's power progression, featuring robust and deterministic upgrade mechanics.
*   **Uncover the Past, Reforge the Future**  
    Travel to different moments of time where you will discover the many factions and secrets that exist within the world of Eterra and fight to set the timeline onto a new path.
*   **Endless replayability**  
    With a wealth of classes and skills to customize, deep game systems, randomized loot, and continuing development, Last Epoch is a game that will keep you coming back for years to come.  
*   **Easy to Learn, Hard to Master**  
    We’re committed to making gameplay approachable for new and veteran players alike by allowing you to jump into the fray quickly and providing many in-game resources. Though don’t be fooled, Eterra has many dangers waiting for you that require a mastery of combat and build-crafting.
*   **Zero Pay-To-Win**  
    Last Epoch will never offer gameplay advantages by being able to spend real money. We believe in creating a fair environment for all players.

Release date: Feb 21, 2024

Categories: Action RPG, Dungeon Crawler, Character Progression, Crafting, Endgame Content, Skill Tree Progression, Time Travel Mechanics, Build Crafting

Feature scans:
- MTX: score 15; verdict: Fair; summary: Last Epoch monetization currently consists solely of a cosmetic real-money shop, which is non-predatory. The main controversy stems from the developer's decision to sell a new class as paid DLC, breaking earlier promises and raising concerns about future pay-to-win. However, according to the scoring rules, traditional DLC and cosmetic shops cannot push the score above 20, and no evidence of actual pay-to-win or predatory microtransactions was found in the reviews.
- Wiki: score 10; verdict: The Tourist; summary: User feedback indicates limited direct evidence of heavy wiki dependency. The main complaints revolve around insufficient in-game guidance (forcing googling) and a technical bug (crash requiring manual exit). No mentions of drop rates, inventory management, or complex build mechanics as a negative. The positive reviews highlight that the game avoids such dependencies, suggesting the Wiki Tax is low overall.
- Proton/Linux: score 10; verdict: Works Well; summary: Based on the provided review, no Linux-specific compatibility issues were reported. The reviewer discusses offline and online modes without mentioning Proton, Linux, or SteamOS problems, suggesting the game runs without friction on Linux platforms.
- Steam Deck: score 45; verdict: Tinkering Required; summary: The game suffers from buggy controller support, client crashes, and server instability, but offline mode offers a workaround. Controller issues and crashes require tinkering for a decent Steam Deck experience.

- Hardware Profile: No data
Feature extractions:
- Community Price:
  - Community fair range: $30.00 - $40.00
  - Reasoning: The review directly states that 34 euros (approximately 37 USD) is more than fair, indicating the community accepts this as a reasonable base price. The second review confirms the game's overall value. Considering this explicit acceptance and typical pricing in the genre, a fair USD range is estimated around 30-40 USD, accounting for currency variation and the 'more than fair' sentiment.
- Playtime Metrics:
  - Game completion: 62.0h
  - Story completion: N/A
  - Session length: N/A
  - Endgame: N/A
  - Reasoning: The first evidence directly states a total playtime of 62 hours to complete the game including all side content and one run of each endgame monolith, indicating typical game completion time. The second evidence from a Chinese review suggests approximately 70 hours to complete all quests and story without entering empowered timelines, reinforcing the game completion duration but not specifically the story-only time. No reliable evidence was found for pure story/campaign completion time, session length, or endgame-only playtime; therefore those fields are set to null.
- Time-to-fun:
  - Summary: Last Epoch starts slowly with a boring first hour due to limited skills and plain environments, but becomes engaging around the 2-hour mark as skill tree progression unlocks active abilities and the world opens up, leading to a highly positive experience for ARPG fans despite later repetitive endgame.
  - Stance: Clicks after
  - Anchor: Around the 2 hour mark, after the initial boring first hour
  - Time to anchor: 2h 0m
  - Friction: Limited skills early on; Boring initial landscape
  - Unlock drivers: Progression in skill trees unlocking active skills; Acquiring more skills as you level; Exploration of build options
  - Conditions: Willingness to learn and experiment; Playing solo (multiplayer not fully released); Accessible for newcomers to ARPGs; Deep theorycrafting for build optimization
- Player Archetypes:
  - Casual ARPG Refugee (sale)
    - Motivation: Enjoy deep ARPG mechanics without overwhelming complexity.
    - Playstyle: Solo, experimental, casual-friendly, prefers theorycrafting without needing guides.
    - Experience: mixed
    - Purchase stance: sale
    - Labels: PoE burnout; working dad; casual gamer; solo player
    - Reference games: Path of Exile; Diablo 4; Diablo 3; Grim Dawn
  - Theorycrafting Enthusiast (buy)
    - Motivation: Creating unique, non-meta builds through deep synergy exploration.
    - Playstyle: Deep theorycrafting, trying various skill combinations, pushing the limits of build viability.
    - Experience: veteran
    - Purchase stance: buy
    - Labels: theorycrafter; PoE veteran; old-school ARPG player; build experimenter
    - Reference games: Path of Exile; Grim Dawn; Diablo 2
  - Endgame & Multiplayer Critic (deep sale)
    - Motivation: Meaningful progression and cooperative play.
    - Playstyle: Endgame grinder, multiplayer-oriented, expects balanced boss mechanics and smooth performance.
    - Experience: familiar
    - Purchase stance: deep sale
    - Labels: ARPG veteran; multiplayer gamer; patient; endgame-focused
    - Reference games: Path of Exile; Diablo 4; Grim Dawn
  - Ethically Conscious Player (no buy)
    - Motivation: Supporting ethical developers and avoiding exploitative practices.
    - Playstyle: May not play or only plays after confirming fair practices; research-oriented before buying.
    - Experience: mixed
    - Purchase stance: no buy
    - Labels: informed buyer; consumer advocate; controversy-aware
    - Reference games: Subnautica


Below are summaries of things people say about the game per category.
Each point is assigned a weight that represents how often it is mentioned across all reviews.
What players like:
- Game is very fun (weight 0.34): Multiple reviewers describe the game as enjoyable and well-crafted, highlighting it as a good game overall with strong fun factor.
- Deep and engaging gameplay (weight 0.15): The gameplay is praised as deep, engaging, and a worthy alternative to Path of Exile 2 for ARPG fans.
- Excellent crafting and variety (weight 0.15): The crafting system is considered excellent, and there is great build variety to explore.
- Strong progression and farming (weight 0.14): Early game character growth and map-farming mechanics are comparable or superior to other loot games, providing satisfying progression.
- High recommendability (weight 0.14): A reviewer explicitly wanted to recommend the game to others, indicating strong positive sentiment.
- Affordable pricing (weight 0.14): The game's price is considered not expensive, making it accessible and good value for what it offers.
- Decent graphics for indie (weight 0.13): Graphics are noted as decent for an indie ARPG, meeting expectations for the game's scope.

Common complaints:
- Server and performance issues (weight 0.97): Severe lag, ping spikes, network instability, client crashes, and low framerate even on high-end hardware (e.g., single digits on RTX 3070 at lowest settings). Many cite no server stress testing and small server capacity (20k) as root causes.
- Broken endgame scaling and stats (weight 0.72): Adaptive damage reduction makes bosses resist damage from fast attacks, and player stats feel ignored, making gear upgrades pointless. Players report being oneshot even in full gear, and glass cannon meta leads to instant kills both ways.
- Terrible class balance and build diversity (weight 0.58): Only shield-focused builds or one or two specific builds are viable for endgame content like Super Abberoth. Weak classes (e.g., Blade Dancer) cannot beat the endgame boss even with perfect gear, and most builds are gimped.
- Aggressive monetization in paid game (weight 0.51): The game bombards players with cosmetic shop pop-ups, a permanent shop icon on the mana bar, a bright purple SHOP option in the escape menu, and a dedicated NPC only for the store. Players find this unacceptable in a 40 euro title.
- Broken promises and deceptive balancing (weight 0.34): The developer promised no mid-season balance changes but delivered nerfs disguised as bug fixes. A fake community vote (only 7k out of 20k players voted) was used to justify class nerfs, making player input meaningless.
- One-life boss fights and unclear mechanics (weight 0.32): Boss fights consume a ticket on death and cannot be retried, despite unclear mechanics and phase timings on first encounter. This creates frustration with repeated farming of the same boss.
- Coin duplication bug and economy ruined (weight 0.25): A coin duplication exploit existed for a month without official response, destroying the game's economy. The official forum admin blamed the player who exposed the bug, further damaging trust.
- High respec cost and punishing system (weight 0.24): Respeccing skills costs skill levels and requires grinding to recover, which players find punishing. The high cost discourages experimentation.
- Repetitive and boring endgame grind (weight 0.24): Endgame consists of repeatedly running the same random maps, killing random elites with loading screens, following a non-sensical timeline progression. Players find it extremely repetitive for an ARPG.
- Semi-finished auction house and crafting (weight 0.23): The auction house cannot search by affix tier range or numerical values, and some affixes are missing. Crafting requires entering a dungeon before merging items, adding unnecessary friction.
- Co-op bugs and missing features (weight 0.23): Co-op has bugs such as inability to resurrect, getting stuck after timeline, and slow party invites. There is no pause function, and dying in a map cannot be resumed.
- Incomplete translation and localization (weight 0.22): Despite promised polish, the game has incomplete machine translation in multiple languages. The promised Chinese localization still contains a large amount of untranslated content.
- Incomplete story at 1.0 release (weight 0.19): The story is incomplete at 1.0 release and considered boring and skippable by players.
- Player count dropped from 200k to 30k (weight 0.14): The player count has dropped dramatically from 200,000 concurrent to 30,000, indicating significant loss of trust and interest.
- Outdated game design needing alts (weight 0.12): The game is designed with outdated mechanics, such as needing alternate characters to beat endgame, which feels unmodern for an ARPG in 2024.
- Comparison with Diablo 4 unfavorable (weight 0.11): Multiple players compare Last Epoch unfavorably with Diablo 4, stating its endgame and overall design are worse.

Gameplay feedback:
- Endgame corruption and timeline system (weight 0.23): The endgame involves empowered timelines and a corruption system that alters gameplay. This feedback suggests a complex and potentially challenging endgame structure.
- Boss tickets consumed on death (weight 0.15): Boss fights require a ticket that is consumed upon death, creating a punishing system where players can lose access to repeated attempts. This may discourage experimentation.
- Damage over time ignores all resistances (weight 0.14): Damage over time effects are not reduced by any resistance or armor. This could make certain builds overpowered or frustrating.
- Respeccing reduces skill level and requires grinding (weight 0.14): Respeccing reduces the skill level of abilities and forces players to re-grind for upgrades. This discourages build experimentation and punishes respeccs harshly.
- Adaptive Damage Reduction from burst damage (weight 0.14): Bosses have Adaptive Damage Reduction that reduces incoming damage when players deal high burst damage. This counters one-shot strategies and extends fights.
- Crafting depends on forging potential and item bases (weight 0.13): Crafting uses a 'forging potential' system and relies on specific item bases. This adds depth but may require understanding of mechanics.
- Bosses scale damage resistance over time (weight 0.13): Bosses gradually gain Adaptive Damage Resistance as fights progress, making them harder the longer the battle lasts. This may force aggressive play.
- Bosses have phase-locked health bars (weight 0.12): Boss fights feature phase-locked health bars, meaning health is tied to specific phases rather than being continuous. This could affect pacing and strategy.
- Crafting requires specific dungeon location and forging potential (weight 0.12): Crafting not only needs forging potential but also must be performed in a specific dungeon area. This adds an extra layer of complexity and travel requirement.

Performance notes:
- Poor optimization causes low FPS (weight 0.33): The game is poorly optimized, leading to low framerates even on mid-range and high-end systems. Many players report this as a major issue.
- Server lag and high ping (weight 0.24): Players frequently experience server lag and high ping. It causes severe connection issues during gameplay.
- Endgame framerate drops critically (weight 0.15): At endgame, performance degrades severely, with framerate dropping to single digits on an RTX 3070. This makes the game almost unplayable.
- Network instability reported (weight 0.14): Players note general network instability beyond just high ping. The connection issues affect overall play experience.

Recommendations:
- Avoid purchasing currently (weight 0.24): Multiple reviews advise against purchasing the game at this time, citing unresolved issues or a lack of polish. The recommendation is to wait or skip the game entirely.
- Aggressive DLC advertising (weight 0.15): The game is criticized for aggressive DLC advertising within a paid title, which negatively impacts the player experience. This is seen as a poor practice for a game that already requires an upfront purchase.
- Adaptive Damage Reduction mechanic (weight 0.15): The Adaptive Damage Reduction mechanic is a major point of contention; players would recommend the game if this mechanic were removed. It is perceived as harmful to gameplay enjoyment.

Other player notes:
No miscpoints

Emotions:
- Frustration (weight 0.41): Players are frustrated by intrusive cosmetic shop pop-ups, one-shot deaths even with max gear, and repetitive endgame with severe framerate issues. The adaptive damage reduction system makes gear upgrades feel pointless, and the auction house, co-op bugs, crafting inconvenience, and lack of server stress testing add to the frustration.
- Anger (weight 0.27): Anger stems from a nerf to the Engraver passive node ruining farming progress and one-life boss mechanics that waste tickets. The coin duplication bug was not fixed in time, destroying the economy while the official response blamed players, and there is no pause function or recovery after death.
- Disappointment (weight 0.23): Disappointment arises from an endgame that forces glass cannon builds and unenjoyable grinding, an incomplete story in a 1.0 release, broken promises, poor translation, class balance issues, and severe lag despite hype.
- Powerlessness (weight 0.05): Players feel powerless because even fully optimized builds with perfect gear cannot defeat the endgame boss Super Abberoth, making all progression feel futile.
- Betrayal (weight 0.05): Betrayal stems from the perception that the developer intentionally made the refund system difficult due to long loading times, undermining trust.}