Grim Dawn review

Meh

by floormattress7

Grim Dawn is almost everything I ever wanted from a Diablo-like.

Grim Dawn's character customization is probably the best in the genre. There's 9 classes available, each with tons of passive and active skills and modifiers to choose from and upgrade with Skill Points awarded every level. You can choose a second class to combine with the first at level 10. There's 3 core stats (Physique, Cunning, Spirit) to upgrade with Attribute Points. Then there's my favorite, the Constellations, which you upgrade with Devotion Points gained by exploring and finding Shrines throughout the game world. Between these three customization options, there are literally hundreds of builds and ways to make your character unique. Unfortunately, the complexity of these three systems is one of Grim Dawn's weaknesses. It's pretty easy to create a bad build. (Don't worry, you can respec)

Grim Dawn's campaign, world, and levels are all linear and static. There's no randomly generated maps like Diablo. Enemy placement is somewhat random, and item drops are mostly random, but apart form that, Grim Dawn's replayability comes from its three difficulties (Normal, Elite, Ultimate), the Crucible arena mode, its Rogue-like dungeons, or the Shattered Realm (Diablo's Rifts). Once you reach lvl 100 and finish the game on Ultimate, there's not really many other challenges to overcome. The progression isn't endless like Diablo's Greater Rifts. Luckily, it takes a good 100+ hours to reach that point.

Grim Dawn's itemization is hit or miss. It's significantly more in depth than Diablo's, but that comes at a cost. There's 9 different damage types and resistances, attributes bonuses, cast speed, attack speed, skill bonuses, and skill modifiers that can all role as random affixes on all equipment. Even though gear is almost constantly dropping, this makes it pretty rare that you will find something that your character can actually use. Diablo's smart-loot system is a big improvement over this. The good part, though, is that non-legendary gear is significantly more interesting and useful, even for endgame characters. Grim Dawn's legendary items, while powerful and impactful when you find one you can use, are also less interesting. They rarely modify skills or open up unique gameplay opportunities like Diablo, and mostly just give large boosts to damage and skill levels.

Grim Dawn's systems can also be pretty cryptic at times. For example, life steal only applies to weapon damage, and damage conversion math can get tricky. Some other systems will take some getting used to if you come from games like Diablo, like damage scaling linearly instead of exponentially, or the importance of Defensive Ability and Offensive Ability. Many of the more intricate systems are not terribly well explained, so if you're not a veteran of the genre, it's easy to get lost and forget to shore up your resistances or armor absorption.

Would recommend to pretty much anyone remotely interested in Action RPG's. There's something for everyone here and, despite its shortcomings in endgame content, it's still one of the best in the genre. DLC isn't absolutely necessary, but Ashes of Malmouth and Forgotten Gods add tons of new items, 3 new classes, and 3 new Acts ontop of the existing 4. If you finish the main campaign and like it, definitely pick them up because they add a lot to the experience.

I'm an ARPG fan: Is there any Reason to buy Grim Dawn? -Probably there is a Reason not to do it! For Fans of the unofficial Predecessor Titan Quest, Grim Dawn is a Mandatory Program anyway: Despite the completely different Setting, you can immediately find your way around thanks to the almost identical Interface and all The features of the Predecessor. But not only that-Grim Dawn expands the Core Aspects that were already inspiring at Titan Quest To include numerous Elements: With Crafting, New Upgrades, Factions, Call system and much more, the Game got a huge Plus in Depth. But Fans of Scene Greats like Path of Exile or Diablo will also find what they're looking for here: The Setting has little to Do with the serene Greece of its Predecessor: Rape, Murder and underground Blood Temples of a crazy cult put the finishing Touches to the End-time theme. And Grim Dawn also looks much more serious than its Predecessor in terms of terms of playing technology: The Devotion system offers Space for Min-Maxing And (optional) elite opponents such as the Avatar of a Natural Deity players who have not extracted the Optimum from Their Character in Secrets across the Jordan River. Especially Annoying when the hardcore mode is activated, where the Death Of the Character is final. Once you have played the Main Game in all 3 Levels of difficulty, the Modding Tools offer potentially unlimited Gameplay-in Contrast to the Competition with Online Compulsion, what the Stuff can be made here. Numerous Modifications are Already available for Download in the Official Forum. TL: DR: Buy. Seriously. You will not regret it!

I haven't been drawn into writing a Review at any Game on Steam So far, but at Grim Dawn I want to make an Exception. The Game is, in my Opinion, currently the highest of The feelings the ARPG genre has to offer. At that time, the Developers already managed to create a Milestone with Titan Quest and want to build on that. This is an important Project, considering the Size of the developer team and its Budget. There are six Classes, two of which can be combined at Will. Each Class offers a Variety of active and passive Skills. In addition, so-called devotion points, which are distributed in the World, can be collected. This is used to learn more passive and active Skills in a third Talent tree. Hidden areas can be discovered again and again, with strong Enemies and Rewards. So Exploring the Game world is worth it. Last but not least because the Environments are beautifully designed by Hand (no randomly generated Levels). You also have a completely free Hand in terms of Equipment. There are no prescribed Rules to abide by when Developing your Character. For example, you want to play a Melee with Sword & Shild that causes Elementary Damage? Just too, it's possible. Or is it supposed to be a nimble Assassin with two One-handed Weapons, explosive Cocktails and Electricity Damage? That, too, can be implemented. All of this can be found at three Levels of difficulty (basically there are four, as the first Level of difficulty can be played into two Difficulties). At the highest Degree Of Difficulty, things are quite crisp. The Hero's Death is not very far away and you have to work a bit on the Skills and Equipment to avoid going down. Those who are not proficient in the English Language can download and use one of the Translations created by the community from the official Forum. New Setting, new Mechanics, untimely Look, but convincing art design. By and Large, the Game offers an extremely thoughtful System with a lot of Character Development options. Now all that is missing is the official modding toolkit, which the Developers say will be made available sometime after the Game is Released, in order to adapt the Game 100% to your own Needs. Clear Buy recommendation!