All three games are strong in this area, offering a broad range of colourful, satisfying abilities that are fun to discover and experiment with. But Lost Ark slightly edges out the other two. This is partly down to being the newer game. Both Path of Exile and Diablo 3 are approaching 10 years old, while Lost Ark released in Korea at the end of 2019, so has the benefit of greater graphical whizzbang POE currency trade .

But it's also because Lost Ark has zero restraint. Diablo 3 and Path of Exile both start out relatively low-key—the latter in particular is very understated in its opening hours, which fits with its grungy, grimdark style. In Lost Ark, every single power is dialled up to max from the first five minutes, with stellar audio/visual design baked into each skill. You move through the game's zones and dungeons like a traveling fireworks display, whacking hordes of enemies with apocalyptic spells and powers that punch like God's nightcap.

Winner: Lost Ark

(Image credit: Grinding Gear Games)Character progression
One of the main appeals of ARPGs is taking your character from being a naked, angry li'l guy and gradually building them into a walking fission reaction that obliterates anything in their path. At a basic level, this means unlocking bigger powers and acquiring better equipment. But a good ARPG will also let you tinker with your class, modifying active and passive abilities to maximise your character's murder metric.

All three games approach this in different ways. In Diablo 3, every power you unlock can be modified with a rune, while your character also acquires passive abilities that can be plugged into a set number of slots for further alteration. Lost Ark, meanwhile, has you spend ability points to level up individual combat skills through multiple tiers, each of which unlocks three potential modifiers that you can switch between at any time.

Both are perfectly good systems, but neither has the raw potential of Path of Exile's approach to progression. Here, skills are unbound from character classes, instead based around gems that you plug into items, letting you mix and match to create whatever ability loadout you fancy. Meanwhile, stat upgrades are based around the game's enormous passive ability tree, which is shared across starting classes. This means you can carve out an entirely unique destiny for your character, moving away from their intended pathways and creating Marauders that rely on summoning or Duellists who can avoid direct conflict entirely.

Winner: Path of Exile

(Image credit: Blizzard)Loot
No ARPG is complete without loot. While your character may be on a quest to save the world or kick God into a bin, the player's goal in most ARPGs is to net the sweetest swag in the realm cheap POE orbs . The promise of a better sword or a snazzier pair of pants is what pulls you through the game, whether that's for the stats or to dress your hero up in flash new kit. Either way, the design of an ARPG's loot system can have a significant impact on the core experience.