While Path of Exile 1’s Mirage league has one of the lowest player counts since Settlers, it is still one of the best leagues ever introduced
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Path of Exile 1’s new league always brings changes so massive that reading the patch notes feels like you’re reading a short novel. Unique items, skills, classes, and ascendancy reworks, a new league mechanic, quality of life improvements, and all that jazz get added or changed.
However, Path of Exile 1’s Mirage league brings something different to the table – massive endgame changes. Everyone wants a big shake-up when the endgame barely changes league after league. It gets a little stale. So, with positive changes to the overall endgame meta, the reception for Path of Exile 1’s Mirage league was higher than usual, but still failed to crack the Settlers of Kalguur’s peak concurrent player count.
Why PoE 1’s Mirage League isn’t booming as it should have
While it is hard to pinpoint the exact reason why PoE 1’s Mirage league isn’t flourishing as well as other leagues, it can still be narrowed down to a few objective reasons. But first, let’s compare Mirage League to the previous three leagues.
All the major league’s peak concurrent player count since the Settlers league based on SteamDB:
- Settlers of Kalguur League – 229,337
- Secrets of the Atlas League – 179,556
- Keepers of the Flame League – 185,970
- Mirage League – 190,653
While the peak concurrent player count has been slightly going up since Secrets of the Atlas, it is still far from the Settlers of Kalguur league peak. This doesn’t even account for player retention, where Settlers League has one of the best percentages, which is also a huge metric for a successful league.
The Mirage league has all the things you can ask for: new unique items, new skills, skill reworks, a new ascendancy, quality-of-life improvements, and massive endgame changes. The endgame additions alone made the community rejoice as maps have been streamlined even more, including the new Astrolabe mechanic, the Memory Vault, a new pinnacle boss, and a whopping 40+ exceptional support gems to play with.
You can even arguably say that this endgame change might be as good as the Settlers’ currency exchange system and a league mechanic that perfectly mixes an ARPG with base building and management mechanics. But why isn’t it translating to massive numbers as before?
The ARPG bubble burst
Objectively, one thing to consider is the genre itself. The ARPG looter genre hit an all-time peak thanks to Diablo, the genre’s biggest name for decades, releasing Diablo 4 back in 2023. The genre was dominated by Path of Exile beforehand, but it has always remained a top contender. In 2024, the genre as a whole skyrocketed. Games like Last Epoch reached unreal heights. Diablo 4 released its Vessel of Hatred expansion. Path of Exile, coincidentally, gets its biggest league ever in Settlers of Kalguur.
It is inevitable to sustain this level of success in the genre, as sharp declines followed soon after for every title. However, Path of Exile remained consistent and also launched Path of Exile 2 to end the year. The momentum remained through Path of Exile 2, but everything slowly declined again. Grinding Gear Games, the developer of the Path of Exile franchise, struggled to maintain the quality they were known for due to the PoE 2 launch. Diablo 4 failed to consistently release good seasons. With the two biggest players struggling, the genre experienced a prolonged decline.
With the decline, even a title like Path of Exile won’t be able to bring all the lost players during the decline back to playing ARPGs. Not alone.
The Path of Exile fatigue
While Grinding Gear Games’ goal is to keep players in a “forever loop,” releasing a new season every two months, alternating between PoE 1 and PoE 2 instead of your typical 3-month-long seasons, it can fatigue casual and semi-casual players quickly due to the nature of the game.
In every new league, the average player needs to thoroughly craft or research a build, finish the grueling campaign repeatedly, and farm enough items or currency to make the player’s build perform decently. Unlike other casual ARPG games, where you can do all these in a few hours, Path of Exile blows this out of proportion because of its complexity and continuous massive changes, making players sometimes do more research than play.
However, it is their identity. That’s what makes the game great. That’s Path of Exile. But it will take a toll on players eventually. This could be another reason for the decline, despite how amazing PoE 1’s Mirage league is so far.
Regardless of the slight and progressive decline, Path of Exile still remains as one of the best ARPGs, and if you are a player who disappeared for a few leagues like me, PoE 1’s Mirage league definitely deserves your attention… if you have the time for it.
