Path of Exile 2 has been in early access a lot longer than developer Grinding Gear Games said it would be. The ARPG has had a number of ups and downs since its early access launch, but game co-director Mark Roberts is adamant that a true 1.0 release isn’t far away.
For the Path of Exile 2 full release, Grinding Gear Games has to deliver five new classes, two entire acts for the game’s campaign as well as their associated skills and bosses. It’s a lot of work, but Roberts claims that the team would be “beyond, beyond shocked” if the game doesn’t release sometime next year.
Speaking to PC Gamer in a recent interview, the ARPG’s co-director explained that Grinding Gear Games isn’t a “long-term planning company”. While Path of Exile 2 was set to see its full release after launch, the team instead pivoted to fix major issues in the early access experience and then pivoted again in the wake of aggressive DDoS attacks.
“As soon as we started pivoting to being like let’s fix the things that players actually care about and address the things that players care about, all of sudden now you’ve got less focus, less work going into the campaign and stuff like that,” Rogers told the outlet. “At the end of the day, your long term plans go a little bit out the window the moment you have a live service game—even one in early access—to have to manage and maintain.”
This has continued ever since with a major patch now in the works for December that will rework the endgame, something Roberts says “wasn’t part of our initial scope”. Nevertheless, these updates—which are distractions from new content—should “result in the game being the best it can possible be”.
Nevertheless, at the end of everything, Roberts admits that the game was not supposed to be in early access for as long as it has been. Additionally, although the co-director would be so very “shocked” if the game doesn’t release in 2026, it could always be pushed even further depending on what the game needs.
“I can’t ever really say with any certainty because there are just so many variables that keep changing,” Roberts told the outlet. “It certainly is the case that we never intended to be in early access this long. So already we’re kind of like, OK we need to get there, we need to push, we need to get to this released.”
Nevertheless, new content for Path of Exile 2 is on the way—and there’s a new expansion for the original launching on Halloween—so there’s a lot to tide fans over with. As someone who doesn’t play PoE2 every day, I’m happy waiting for the final two acts, as long as they actually launch in a decent state.
