Well, this leads to the âQuestionâ in terms of what âEndgameâ truly are in ARPG / HackânâSlay , because for me âEndgameâ is part of the âafter you hit Level 100â swap focus from leveling up to farming for Endgame & BiS Gear plus which and how many ways it offers to do so. Iâd argue most People would say that âcrucibleâ and âSRâ, but also doing bountyâs for Faction-Rep, Nemesis, Rogulike / Challenge Dungeons, specific Farming Runs and than do Secret Boss / Secret Sidequests and such⌠and from listed above most of this things you can do without being fully equiped Legendary, or BiS / Endgame Gear. Sure you wonât be able to go that far in Crucible and SR like BiS or Full Equiped (Legendary) Gear, but you can do enough to atleast farm decently for this. Otherwise your Argument would make absolute no sense, because if you are incapable to farm for Endgame-Gear because you donât have said Endgame Gear, than to do alts / twinks and play them or spent 1000 Hours would do absolutely nothing. (Which is an contradiction on your side).
Also letâs not forget, that Grim Dawn has besides that fact, that (like listed above) many ways to do endgame, itâs much easier today to get or look out for good gear. You have atleast two(?) specific legendary Gear to farm for with a Set like Kriegs-Set. Also the Transmutation Feature; and thanks to the new Loot-Filter itâs also easiert to filter out Rare, MIâS and double Rare (MIâs) which is already a decent gear if you donât have this âPurple is suprerior in all aspects and all Greens, MIâS and such are absolute trashâ mentallity. Sure, major Legendary Items are an Upgrade for Greens(except you are really lucky and get one of the insane ones) however good / proper Endgame doesnât mean once you hit max. level you jump from crap gear directly to BiS and strong Endgame Gear, but rather build upon it. This âjumpâ is something which is more for twinks and altâs.
Though is it tho? Because if we argue about âmost peopleâ than we already have the conclusion that most people wouldâve stopped after the first playthrough anyway. Because a majority of this people are more like âcasualsâ who want only to enjoy the campaign and than move on, and another huge Portion of it needs a carrot which keeps them entertained like Season and Ladders with specific rewards and stuff.
And than i would go so far, and claim that a huge Portion of People who keeps playing wouldâve started over with an different character anyway, to see new skills and stuff instead of keep playing for hours, even if it would require way less time, with that one specific main character. And the Core-Portion of People who farm for stuff iâd argue(myself included) enjoy it that unlike some other Games, that they have something to do for they stuff (which also higher the replaybility and longterm playbility) instead of get thrown at with good stuff. (overexaggerating to picture my argument). And than again i would say compared to majority of other ARPGâs they nailed it anyway, because itâs not as some other examples, never see any kind of the Legendaryâs in the majority of your time but also not thrown at stuff⌠they found the middle.
Which again i disagree with you, because smooth progression and transition isnât that much time-related, but rather HOW it works out. If i look at Diablo 3(which i still love by the way), itâs not only that you get easily get your gear so there isnât an smooth transition between bad gear and good gear, due there are almost no different shades of grey in the middle, but also once youâve gotten your Gears, which is basically BiS, you only do farming to get the same Items as Ancient or better Rolls / Stats.(Though Iâve to point out, i didnât play the game much the past two or three years so there mightâve some changes made about bis). Within ONE week playing with my friends i had BiS Gear, and the only thing left to do was to get an better variant of it, and unlike Grim Dawn thanks to the Smartloot System there was not much use of some other leggys due they etiher have specific stats roled for my class or not even acquire them because the focus is to get items for the character i play instead of get good loot overall. Grim Dawn however is smoother, if you open up to greens and blues you can get decent gear for the early and middle part of Endgame.
Also as some people mentioned already, whats the bigger Part of this whole âEndgameâ thing is, isnât the Gear but the Game-Mechanics and such. Know how to build your class with Skilltrees and Devotion, know how Stats work, DA and OA etc etc. Know how to handle Augments and Components which is also a huge part of the freedom and possibilites in building your Character up. So i would argue the most Players leave even before hit the âwallâ you claim, because the Game is way to complex for them. How often do we have rantâs about constantly dying because people donât know how to work on Survivalbility, and think that 60% Res is more than enough and an âSolidâ Build, or get one shotted because they donât understand the Enemy mechanics or how the Armor-Concept works and so on. Compared to an Game like PoE, Grim Dawn isnât an Game which gets you troubles because of the quantity(like have an insanely huge skilltree as example) but rather while it overall is more compact and overseeable, the Mechanics itself can get sometimes pretty complex for an ARPG / HackânâSlay like this.
However, and thatâs the Question, should Crate cater an Audience which would leave anyway, and simplify the Game and the Gear-Progression for that, or wouldnât it better to focus on the Core-Audience which supported them so much over the years, are most likely the ones who buy another Games and / or their newest expansion / loyality packs, whlie said early leaver crowd with the attention span of an Fly. Than again i hope Crate focus to ânotâ cater most of the time any crowds anyway but rather stick truth to themself and their vision and implement things which they see as fitting.
Last but not Least iâve to point out, and it seems it bothers way to much People than it should; one of the biggest strenght of Grim Dawn is how open it is! Which means âmoddingâ, and if progression is for your taste an huge issue, you simply can mod / creat different progression System (Infact there is even one which gets developed by Ceno. Link: [Mod] Augury ) or use a n tool alternatively if itâs wonky.
I for one with my 800h into the Game are happy to get nowdays still an Game where i can put time and energy in it, and not having after 60 Hours BiS for my first CharacterâŚ
/Edit:
I might add, thatâs how i look at things, so my viewpoint and not meant (overall) as facts.
/Edit2: And sorry for so many typoâs and also if there are some gramatical issues. I try to fix them if i see themâŚ
