so i've been playing roguelites now

poe2's melee/mace combat despite being the "worst" performer is actually quite solid as is. but since everything else is better by a huge margin it sucks so much ass by comparison.

dont get me wrong. its really the BEST melee feel in all arpgs in a long time. just that due to other things existing in a much better state it feels bad. like "why am i playing the worst version of the game, am i stupid?" (maybe i am lol).

it reminded me of the recent statement david brevik made (diablo1 dev who made no rest for the wicked), where he said something along the line of zoom zoom cheapens the experience.

i fully agree.

i thought about it long and hard and looked thru a huge list of arpgs. non of them will give me the melee satisfaction of poe2.

so i ventured into roguelites. i found one that was quite cheap. roughly what? 5 USD? had a lot of good steam reviews. so YOLO. bought it and played it.

been playing it for quite a while.

it really scratches my itch for satisfying melee combat. it can get fast but playing fast will usually result in your losing HP which in roguelites is precious.

theres a good mix of melee combat as well as ranged attacks tho. ranged attacks and huge aoes usually come at a cost that you have to WORK FOR or have to wait for a cooldown.

this is where i gained a big disdain towards modern arpgs, where i have to accept that melee combat in diablo-likes usually are poorly rewarded for going melee, while other playstyles are rewarded with no downsides.

if you play range. you blast from a distance. you usually will have movespeed.

if you play a mage, you're likely going to be playing from a distance too.

if you play a summoner, you might be forced into close ranged but you can focus on running around keeping away from damage as your minions do all the dirty work.

theres the argument of "but some mods are anti ranged". such as proximity shields.

which is true, but as a range character, you can overcome this by going close to the enemy and blasting them from close range.

in fact ANY benefit for being in close range can be reaped by all characters/builds.

this kinda takes away any benefit melee has. in fact, the opposite of "proximity shields" is "enemy has projectiles". melee players have to deal with projectiles and aoe but are forced to close the distance.

i've seen clips of people doing poe2's end game bosses. the screen is littered with danger areas that players are supposed to run around and navigate.

when are melee players expected to dash in and do damage? is running around all they are expected to do?

non melee-ers could easily take pot shots from a distance.

poe2's campaign has a lot of "designed with melee in mind" philosophy. but poe2's end game is as if they threw all of it out the window.

playing roguelites made me realize. with such a huge gap between playstyles theres no reason for me to play melee. a 20 usd roguelite can make melee fun. but modern arpgs simply cannot replicate that fun

melee is one playstyle out of many others.

melee is minority.

it makes marketing sense NOT to cater to melee. the only way to make melee feel good is to penalize other playstyles in a way that people from other playstyles might feel overly penalized and push them away.

i dont envy GGG. they're stuck in a very rough spot, they've already split the player base, and catering to melee might make a large portion of players quit. i m waiting to see if they can MMGA.

but in any case, as a melee enjoyer, roguelites satisfy my itch much more than diablo-likes.

for those curious. the game i m playing is a big titty anime roguelite called Nunholy. the characters have huge ass tittys and dont show anything else. the gameplay is peak tho. quite fun. i still havent killed the vampire queen, but i m working towards it.

so i just beat the game with a special condition which is the "harder" game mode.

a little sad that i didnt unlock any achievement for it.

but that said. coming from years of playing poe1 and now some experience playing poe2.

i like how in a roguelite if i fail it takes me 1 playthru (roughly 40 mins-1 hour) to get back to the last boss.

it definitely takes time but its something i can reliably do and i kinda appreciate it a huge lot compared to poe1's "farm 28 maps" or poe2's run a bunch of maps traveling across an endless atlas looking for citadels.

its weird. i prefer standard league in diablo likes because i can take my time amassing wealth over years.

i hate temp leagues, because i need to farm everything all over again.

but now i like rogue lites which are way shorter than temp leagues.

it took me just a total of 8 hours (should be shorter as i afk a lot) and i've completed the game. short and sweet.

i wonder how ggg will entice me back to poe2 with their next major update.