EA Feedback From A Casual Co-Op Player (PS5 w/Crossplay)

First and foremost, despite any and all feedback, myself and my cohorts enjoyed our time playing PoE2 EA. So - here's my 2 cents, and thank you to the team who values this, as we value the ability to connect with you here :)

- Cross play has been an absolutely flawless experience. My son and I are on PS5's, my brother-in-law on Xbox and my brother on PC. They're in Florida and we're in New York, and we have no issues gaming together except for some lag spikes when sorceresses are casting like crazy (to be expected for now lol)

- Removing the color/socket system from the gear, as a casual player of PoE1 and now 2EA, feels like you put the bottom rungs back on the ladder. No more having to choose between stats OR links, gear can be gear and skills can be skills. The bar to entry (at least from this aspect) is far more accessible.

- Everything looks and feels good. From the graphics, to the atmosphere, to the sound and music. Especially, hit detection in melee combat. This is by FAR one of the best improvements in PoE2 EA, I don't have to swing on a monster 7 times to hit them once lol.

- >90% of my time with PoE2 EA is in co-op. And throughout Act1 (remember, casual here!) it was a wonderful experience. We died plenty but we learned from each death. But then, we got to the final boss of Act1, and this is where we realized that there's a reason the majority of the player base is solo.

- Each one of us had to fight the boss solo in order to unlock Act2. No matter how much there was to learn - no education can stop one-shot deaths and constantly running out of potions. This was the first point where PoE2 felt like a chore.

- We re-grouped for the start of Act2, and now in order to not die consistently, an ARPG turned into a dungeon MMO. We had to pull/aggro enemies one and two at a time, and use "kite" mechanics to survive. We did it, but the game now on a fundamental level feels different, despite upgrading gear at vendors with every level, timing dodges, and managing elemental resistances.

- We made it to the final boss of Act2, and no amount of breaking up Voltron into 5 lions made a difference. It was all the same cheesy death/potion management issues from the Act 1 boss but worse. As a 45 year old gamer who's played almost every ARPG you can name, this is by far the most punishing an ARPG has ever felt. The difficulty curve reached a crescendo for us and we all stopped playing. This last point is the most important, IMHO, due to GGG's excitement at so many new players coming to check out this cool thing they've made. And new gamers are leaving in droves, but for the exact opposite reason they left Diablo 4...where the guys over at Blizzard made the experience too easy - GGG made the experience unbalanced, in favor of punishing gameplay without rewards to match. We didn't even want to try out other characters because we knew what was awaiting us was not a fun experience, but a chore-like challenge for little gain.

We're still optimistic to see how things develop with the continued work during EA, and I hope what I've taken the time to write here is truly looked into with consideration. You can absolutely tell that so much heart and soul went into the created of this game. Thanks again!

A key concern I left out of the OP...revive time. Not terrible during normal gameplay, but in those boss fights? An absolute nightmare, leaving us with option A - fight it out alone, or B - everyone restarts the fight.

We would love to see revive time reduced to match the stun time of the boss, so at least that give us a window to aim for revives.

Or - make it so the revive animation is no longer interruptible but at the risk of damage/death. At least this way we can risk/reward it.

Stuff like this makes a video game not fun to play for people who aren't in the 15-26 age range and don't exactly have hours on end to enjoy and invest in your game. Thanks again!