It's been a big month for Path of Exile 2, as its Dawn of the Hunt update dropped and saw huge swathes of players switch back over to the early access ARPG. One of its main rivals, Last Epoch, foresaw this and delayed its own Season 2 update to dodge it. It seems that this forward thinking, and the exciting contents of Season 2, have worked in perfect harmony, because its player count has just skyrocketed on Steam. So much so, in fact, that there are currently more people playing it than Path of Exile 2.
Titled Tombs of the Erased, Season 2 might well be its best update yet. It brings new content themed around The Woven, more endgame encounters and maps, improvements to its already exceptional crafting and loot optimizing tools, a rework to the Sentinel class, and so much more.
While news of its short delay was a touch disappointing at the time for players eager to dive back in, it was absolutely the right call. Eleventh Hour was incredibly transparent and candid about the move, saying at the time: "We've recently learned that our friends in the ARPG space have chosen a release date just a couple days after ours which would divide the player base and hinder the success of our Season 2 launch."
But even with lots of interest in Path of Exile 2 still remaining following its big update a couple of weeks ago, just take a look at Last Epoch's numbers today, April 17.
According to SteamDB, its player count has soared from just a few thousand players to a concurrent peak of over 150,000. At the time of writing, there are currently more people playing Last Epoch on Valve's platform than the likes of PUBG, Rust, Rainbow Six Siege, and (drumroll, please) Path of Exile 2.
The demand to jump back into the game was so high, that Eleventh Hour had to give an update on the Last Epoch server status due to the barrage of players trying to , but things appear to be running more smoothly now.
I'm stoked for Last Epoch that so many people have come back to the game. The quality of the update, and the smart decision to delay it, deserves to be rewarded with the kind of influx that we're seeing right now.
It's absolutely one of the co-op game to get stuck into together.
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