As much as I love Path of Exile's skill grid, it's impossible to effectively navigate without lots of preparation, and I've come to completely rely on a third-party app to help me design my builds. My hope is for Diablo 4 to find a middle ground. This is not to say that Diablo 3 hasn't left me tweaking and testing to create the most devastating builds, but it always feels like I'm going down well-trodden paths instead of charting my own course. It will be hard for me to go back to anything less ambitious.Дiablo 4 shouldn't try to match the complexity of Path of Exile-it might be nice to play an ARPG that doesn't come with maths homework again-but it could certainly do with trying to capture some of the tantalising breadth of Path of Exile's possibilities. The trinity of active skills, passives and gear is absurdly elaborate, turning nurturing your character into an adventure that will take you all across the daunting map of passive skill nodes. If you're remotely interested in experimenting with character builds, theorycrafting and getting stuck into a lot of numbers, then there's no ARPG that can compete with Path of Exile. Make character progression its own adventure Just a few obstacles that can't be solved with a sword, and which encourage teamwork, would go a long way to making me want to play with other humans. These can be enjoyed entirely on your own, but I quite fancy the idea of solving some dungeon conundrums with my smarter friends. Path of Exile, for instance, features a few trap-infested puzzle areas. There are ways to make co-op more engaging outside of combat, too. That's also the place where people are more likely to make a real effort to work together.

Multiplayer features like camps and events suggest the possibility for encounters that demand communication and team tactics, but I hope that's also replicated in the less open multiplayer, where you're just on a trip into a dungeon with a few mates. If Diablo 4 wants to make multiplayer a big part of the experience, it will need to make working together more attractive, which could also give it a leg up on Path of Exile. Aside from that, it's never seemed like a distinct experience. I've never really felt encouraged to play with anyone else in either Diablo 3 or Path of Exile, and when I do, most of the fun comes from the simple fact that it's a laugh to carve a bloody swathe through a dungeon with your pals. If I can't escape the shared world, I certainly hope co-op is more memorable. Like a lot of the changes introduced in Diablo 3, maybe lots of players will learn to love the pseudo-MMO elements, but I suspect there will be plenty who will just find somewhere else to go on their solo adventures. Even if you're planning on ignoring that, Blizzard says you'll still have to put up with other people in your game.

Story quests and dungeons will still be just for you and your group, but Blizzard's also putting in lots of multiplayer diversions, including events, enemy camps, side quests and PvP. If I play Diablo 4 with anyone, it will probably be friends, and with that in mind I'd quite like the option to not see other people until I want to-which will probably be never. I won't beat around the bush here-this seems kinda shit.ДЇinding people to play Diablo 3 with wasn't a problem, so it feels like Diablo 4's shared worlds are trying to fix an issue that simply doesn't exist. Even when venturing into a dungeon with a few friends, Diablo has always evoked loneliness and isolation, but this time you're going to see randos running around, grabbing quests and slaughtering monsters right in front of you.

Diablo 4 vs path of exile 2