I flinched as a white pufferfish man attacked me by hurling blood, and it wasn't even its own. Moments before, it had sprinted past me to munch on a pile of zombie corpses I'd left in my wake, and then it came back to drown me in their entrails. I'd seen hints of it before, but this grotesque creature and its legion of cohorts served as the first definitive indicator that I was venturing into far darker territory than I'd seen in other contemporary action-RPGs like Diablo III and Torchlight 2. I realized then, too, that I wished to end the existence of such vile things, and I was pleased to find that Path of Exile

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Had I not looked it up, I'm not sure I could have told you where all this was taking place. Path of Exile has an overarching story, but its lush graphics and grisly combat overshadow it so thoroughly that you'll only pick it up by paying close attention to quest givers and lore objects. This is Wraeclast, a dumping ground of sorts for criminals and other unsavory types, namely the seven unfortunately gender-locked starter classes you see trapped on a prison ship on the title screen. (I like to think of it as Robert E. Howard's take on Australia.) Even so, key moments manage to assert themselves. The voice acting is up to par, and one interlude that plunges the otherwise sunny world into darkness seems like a delightfully cheeky rebuke to players who click on objects without bothering to learn about their significance first.

Many, I suspect, will do so anyway. Combat is rightly king here, and Path of Exile captures the spirit of the early days of the ARPG through the primal pleasures of carving through swarms of enemies with the help of the left, right, and middle mouse buttons. Most of the time it plays like a spiritual successor to Diablo II, shunning much in the way combat innovation in favor of the thrill of wading through piles of loot so thick that you'll have to turn off item names to see the enemies. Visually, it's at its best when you venture into damp ruins and caverns under the weak guidance of what looks like a lone warehouse lamp; it's at its worst in the way your character appears to be wearing dumpster couture for most of the leveling path.

Its innovations lie elsewhere. You'll find them partly in the way it handles its abilities, in that it dispenses them in the form of socketable gems that drop from monsters or as occasional quest rewards. Such a system grants meaning to the torrent of loot by forcing you to match abilities with correctly colored sockets, with the upshot that you could find yourself conflicted about using an otherwise-awesome axe if it doesn't have enough red slots to allow you to use all seven of your active abilities. It's seldom a problem, however, since materials for orbs that convert common items into rares or rearrange the color of an item's sockets drop almost as frequently as the loot itself. Loading

If there is a problem, it's that even novice dungeon crawlers will likely find both of the first two difficulty modes in the "Standard" league too easy. My opening hour may have been fraught with moments when I was afraid to take on more than two enemies at a time, but by the second of the three acts, I was slashing my way through minibosses with the same savage abandon I meted out to the rabble. I can't say it wasn't fun; Path of Exile's animations may lack the fluidity you'll find in Diablo III, but they do much to remedy that shortcoming with copious blood and sound design that deftly evokes the shattering of giant arachnid carapaces.

In time, however, the ease of combat betrayed the simplicity of its flow. With only a few exceptions (and a memorable final boss fight), Path of Exile's battle strategy consists of little more than beating back swarms who threaten to overwhelm you. The boss fights that round off each of the three acts struck some caution in me for a while until I realized I could toss up a portal to town - and thus the respawn point – before even leaping into battle.

In fact, the greatest foe in Path of Exile is not a beast of the dark or of the dungeons, but rather the lingering desynchronization issues that sometimes trigger potentially lethal blows long after you thought you were in the clear. Their rarity in the Standard league renders them mere annoyances, but they're infuriating in the Hardcore league that forces you to face Wraeclast's horrors with only one life.

I've tried to convince myself that what I see as the ease of Path of Exile springs merely from the smart placement of my passive skills. This skill tree is a sprawling, intimidating beast, and it looks somewhat like a circuit board when zoomed out. It's here where developer Grinding Gear Games best reveals that it cares little for modern talk of accessibility and streamlining, and that labyrinthine setup does allow for some fascinating builds. Loading

Seven starter classes are but starting points on the grid, and given enough time and experience points, even the wispy Witch could end up swinging two-handed axes with all the force of the hulking Marauder. Beat the campaign for the first time and you'll also unlock the Scion, who can freely snake out from the center of the grid as she pleases. As great as all that may sound, it's also unforgiving, as there's no way to reset the entire tree aside from rare one-point refunds you'll occasionally find through side quests. If you botched your leveling path, you're essentially stuck with it.

Then again, Path of Exile's smart multiplayer design means that you could just ask for help. You'll find other players in the hubs picking up quests and bartering items with vendors, and you'll see them clogging the trade channel with offers for weapons that'll be out of reach for days to come. That, in fact, seems to be why they're around, as Path of Exile boasts a unique bartering economy that fits its castaway milieu. Gone is the staggering inflation you find in games that rely on gold and auction houses; in their place, I found players asking for what they actually needed, chiefly in the form of the aforementioned orbs that alter an item's qualities.

It's also easy enough to bring others along on adventures through the notice boards in town, but even in my character's late 30s I felt no need to enlist help. Instead, Path of Exile finds other ways to employ the folks around you. You could battle them in PvP, for instance, but you only have a small window to sample it in the 20s before the option's unlocked again two playthroughs later on the Merciless difficulty. Even then, leaving town breaks the agonizingly long queues, and battle itself involves laughably imbalanced matches on account of the skill system. Loading

It's more fun to scrounge with others for the lootable new maps that serve as endgame content past level 60, or to participate in leaderboards for "leagues" with their own rulesets that refresh every four months (and retire the associated characters to the normal, "Standard" league). Still, it's hard to escape the impression that you're just performing the same grind in different settings and under different circumstances, but Grinding Gears' design ensures that such a setup is usually fun.

It all works so well, in fact, that I'm still reeling from the knowledge that Path of Exile offers all this for free. Forget about experience boosts and skill resets; the usual suspects for microtransactions just don't exist here. What you'll find instead are offers for fluff such as dances and companion pets, revealing a design that clearly hopes players will donate cash out of appreciation for playing a game that's as good as a $60 off-the-shelf adventure for free. As it is, I admit I felt a little dirty while playing Path of Exile at times, almost as if I'd pirated it.