My Labyrinth Impressions

Preface: I've never really had a problem with design decisions by GGG, so understand that this isn't just someone routinely negative person flippantly complaining about whatever the issue of the day is.

Ok, so that's out of the way, I'll say that I really genuinely wanted to like the labyrinth. It seemed like such a cool idea, this fun diversion from your regularly scheduled leveling process that you can dip into, give it a crack, maybe gain some levels in the process and get some sweet sweet ascendancy perks to boot if you manage to finish it. And the first several times I attempted and failed the labyrinth I didn't really mind. The first several times were certainly due to user error. I'd get dead-ended, frustrated and would eat a bunch of traps trying to rush through without managing my flasks well. This is good. I don't want the labyrinth to be an absolute snooze-fest where the traps hurt about as much as a gentle bunny fart. But...I would say about half of the attempts were cut short by disconnecting or my ping flatlinining for a couple seconds where, again, I eat several traps and die. And i'm by no means blaming GGG, my ISP is not that great, but when you're in an environment that requires you to basically "eat the whole frog" in one go while constantly worrying about an errant disconnect is just plain stressful. What was once (maybe the first 5 attempts or so) a pleasant romp through some challenging content with some mobs and treasure along the way became an exercise in running the same 5-6 rooms over and over again, maybe dying along the way due to sloppiness/impatience. Once you get a feel for the layout/how to use the location markers to your advantage, it does start to get a but smoother, I admit. But still, it really didn't take long before it started feeling like a chore. My primary issue, however, is with Izaro.
So I'm open to the possibility that this is, at the very least, partially a case of user error, but the Izaro fight in normal is just a nightmare. The fight is kind of cool in some ways, the shifting mechanics, the variety of traps, etc, but without proper ground coverage(area dps) you will find yourself in a world of trouble. For example you need to be able to down statues and portals while simultaneously dodging traps and trying to damage izaro. If you don't do this, not only will you be taking quite substantial damage, but the ground will be pretty much completely occluded with particle effects from his attacks, his minions, the statues, bearer effects, his spirit's attacks(and perhaps other things I haven't noticed). I've never really been a fan of boss-fights where you can't find a square inch of space wherein you won't be taking life-endangering damage, but in act 4 I never really minded because if i really wanted to make it through, I could just die a few times and be ok with it. I'm not even sure how to fix this, because it would definitely fly in the face of the rogue-like aspect of the experience to let you die in the lab, or to allow checkpoints, but right now it just feels like kind of a miss to me. Regardless though, I'm still grateful for GGG, I can tell they put a lot of really hard work into this, regardless of my feelings about it, and I'm glad to see that some people seem to genuinely enjoy the experience as an alternative to regular gameplay.


TLDR: I don't like that the labyrinth almost feels punitive. Like i feel like i *have* to do it to get my class distinction, rather than thinking "oh cool, i get to do this fun thing and then i get points at the end!" It definitely hurts a lot to navigate this colossal area and then either get disconnected, destroyed by trap damage during latency spikes, or make it all the way to the end just to be merced by izaro while you're not really sure what's even happening on your screen. The prospect of starting all over after seeing that "resurrect in town" button pop up for the 20th time trying to get those sweet sweet points is just about the only thing i've experienced since way back in closed beta that made me really just not want to play anymore.