Development Stories: Path of Exile 2 Narrative Design Philosophies

as much as i love the lore for POE and want it to be more flushed out in a more upfront way. i can only ask / give my criticism of PLEASE PLEASE for god sake, when making new/multiple characters per league that progressing through the story is efficient or even better offer a path that doesn't force you to go through the same EXACT STORY, EXACT ACTS, and everything again and again.


possible solutions could include: after reaching X-map teir you have the option to skip acts 1-4 at level 10-20 or something. (2) new game plus?: after reaching maps there is a slightly different campaign for next characters. (3) at least way points stay unlocked for next characters.

i do want to experience the story and everything POE1 & 2 have to offer but holy hell i burn out from the 10 acts after 2 characters

I want to see Sin and Innocence again.

For me its simple:
find a way to let us enjoy the story without being forced to do nothing And also feel that we are loosing time (in sens of speed run, or levelling). Staying in front of a guy listening to so many written text is dull. When there is so much "work" to do.
What reconnected me to some of the stories is simply the letter and parchments that when clicked let you hear a story while still moving and killing monsters.

I don't care if NPC start following us to still continue their stories. Or juste create a generalized telepathy system to keep listening /talking to NPC while still moving! if they can't always follow us :)

like "a continue discussion in telepathy mode" button
also if forced to skip some non engaging discussion (that will not impact the character quest or rewards etc.) just let us a way to reengage it while doing nothing in base or filtering items :) to still be able to enjoy the thing.

I guess I am describing the Netflix of POE. Story "also" on demand :)

"

Newer players might not realize this, but Path of Exile was written in stages.

Newer players who bother to read the text would almost certainly realize this.

Also, dig the ambitious usage of the pre-existing 'living world' term. Guild Wars 2 this ain't, but Guild Wars 2 this doesn't have to be. 'More action and less text' might sound like counter-intuitive as a request (and I just read it on like, page 2) but with an ARPG an inch wide and a mile deep, the player makes their own stories through the play. Impose too much narrative and they'll just feel like they're being dragged through a series of events with which they'd have no engagement but for the promise of loot. Plenty of people already see 'Path of Exile 1' this way. PoE is designed to be replayed a whole bunch of times; not many game stories are. Heck, not many novels stand up to repeat readings as an enriching process.

But eh, bully for you putting all that effort into making a great PoE 2 narrative (and I'm sure it'll be at least above average) most people will ignore after the first few times. 'Story through events' is, again, sort of GW2's shtick (and MMOs in general), but I'll be eager to see if you can pull it off in a genre that is less about interactive world building and more about individual character power building. Probably interesting to point out that Diablo 1 had more quest diversity per run than PoE...(and Diablo 2, for that matter), in that it actually had quest diversity per run.

Oh, and to answer the question: I'd love to see more of Kaom's Stronghold. We only get a glimpse of it in Act 4.

"

Mistform wrote:

and there's only... like... one weird, out of place superboss, similar to the whole Belly of the Beast area in PoE.

What boss do you talking about?

can't wait

Player that started playing recently after a 7 year break here!

As someone who had to watch a video on youtube to find out the story this time around, hearing possible changes to the way it's presented in poe2 certainly sounds promising. I don't skip dialogue, but when all interaction is an NPC giving you a wall of text while you're watching the lines slowly scroll through a window, it's hard not to eventually start skimming and scrolling through to get to the end faster. I played POE seven years ago back when the last boss was Dominus I believe and back then I had basically just gathered that 'yeah I've been exiled on an island and I'm stumbling upon bad guys and monsters'. Now after 7 years and with so much new content, I watched a video because even replaying didn't really help with fully understanding the world I was getting involved in.

I know for most players that doesn't matter but for me eventually I need to actually understand the story and world fully to stay motivated enough to play. I think more people would not be skipping the dialogue if the way it was 'fed' was different.

More dynamic ways of presenting that information would help with this, like have the dialogue actually be a dialogue instead of a monologue, with more breaking points during which your character asks a question or points something out (this happens in some conversations, but it's rare and again, after a wall of text where by the time I get a new dialogue option to pick I've basically forgotten what the point of the dialogue was in the first place). Dare I say, a unique camera zoom/angle would also help with immersion and to actually be able to see the character models up close without the text blocking their face if you zoom in, but that's secondary.

After I watched the video and understood the basics of the story and lore I had a much better time (though it could also be that I then started the gods storyline with sin and innocence which I found much more compelling than what was available 7 years ago). So maybe just a friendlier way to get everyone familiar with the story at first would help!

Variability in the quests can make racing events very interesting. Can't wait.

To echo what several others have said, I fell in love with this game because of the atmosphere and lore of the first 3-4 acts. It was original, superbly written, and deeply interesting. I always felt the need to know more. I love how the skill gems and monsters in Act 1 each had their own lore page and background. I loved that every unique monster I fought, even the "random" ones in the middle of a zone, had an important and detailed story behind it. I loved that I could read about the tragedy in the Crossroads, and then encounter one of the characters in the game, and that this was only a "minor" side story. I loved that I could read lore for hours, and always discover more.

When Acts 5-10 were released, I felt that they betrayed the story. There was a major shift in style, tone, and emphasis. It introduced the "kill the gods" storyline, which is not only unoriginal and vastly overdone (and kind of silly in the first place), but it doesn't fit at all with the established lore from the earlier acts. POE 3.0 rewrote the character backstories to make us the good guys. It got rid of the incredibly atmospheric opening screen, and replaced it with something utterly banal. Since then things have strayed more, with the introduction of more and more "comic relief," silliness, blatant pop culture references, a general lightening of the tone, and in some cases outright contradictions of previously-important pieces of lore.

I love GGG's original vision for the game:

"Wraeclast is a dark, brutal continent. Scarred by mysterious catastrophes of the past and inhabited by creatures of nightmare, the very environment challenges exiles who dare explore it.

"We're sick of the recent trend towards bright, cartoony RPGs. The art style we chose for Path of Exile is dark, gritty and realistic. Wraeclast is terrifying, and we've tried hard to do it justice."

I loved how harsh, gritty, and intensely visceral everything used to be. I loved the original opening with the ship, and the feeling of hopelessness. I loved that we weren't the good guys, just people trying to survive, fight for our place in the world, and get revenge on those who wronged us. I loved that we could see ourselves as ethical or monsters as we chose, not the "well-intentioned fuck-ups" the last 6 acts make us out to be. I loved how deep and detailed the story was, and how there was so much of it that could be read on the sidelines if one wanted to. These things made POE unique, and I wish so badly to have that POE back.

Going forward, I also think the game needs to get back to telling stories, not giving out lore in vague snippets and hints. Pre-3.0 we had longer stories, such as 6-7 environmental lore pieces that formed a long tale. We had the library, which has 20+ different lore bits to find, and which do an exceptional job of building the history of the world. Since 3.0, we've had a few sentences here and there, a vague comment by an NPC, and a phrase of flavour text on a unique item that may or may not be related. We also don't have any dates, and far too few specifics. It's a mush of vagueness.

Sorry for the rant. I'm just passionate about the lore of this game, what it is and what 3.0 could have been--and what 4.0 still could be.

Edit: P.S. I'd love to see the lore from the original master dialogues return. Some of it was incredible, and its removal has left a hole that sorely needs filling. Vorici's lore about Virtue Gems, Tora's explanation for why there are magic, rare and unique creatures, Catarina's descriptions of Nightmare and lore about minions, Vagan giving some of the history of the Ezomytes, etc. are an incredible loss.

As for people I'd like to see again: Zana, Nessa, Bandits.

As for the story, I would like to see all the various "parts' integrated into the story line. Delving, Betrayal, Temple, Heist, etc. even a few maps. By that I mean that the rewards of those side areas be made part of the ongoing game. Going under a mountain could be an alternative path to climbing over the pass into some new area. And depending upon ones level and perhaps even some mods on could select, you can get all the various delving rewards. Reaching some town could provide the opportunity for thieving and again, based on one's level and mod choices, you could carry out a heist or two and reap Tier 1 rewards.

Currently, we have to "leave the game" and one's progression to earn the various league rewards. It would be lovely to stumble upon a temple and a guide and then get to choose the difficultly level on the spot.

Such places found in the wild could have levels and rolled mods and selected add ons.

Tutorial
Normal
Magic
Rare
Corrupted

Once you choose a level, mods are rolled and players could add to them or reroll etc. I'd like to see the "I'm going to go Delve" for a while to boost my crafting all be integrated into the game progression like Eihnar and his beasts are now.

I guess that I'd like to see the "doing little missions to build a bigger mission" aspect of the game somehow worked into the game naturally.