I love class systems, building my character however I want, being able to synergize several effects into one devastating result, and having this all in action game system. Well... be careful for what you wish for.

Ok ok, it's not as bad as that comment may imply. This game is... Diablo. It's a isometric action RPG with random loot drops, tens of hundreds of hours of increasing difficulties to allow for stronger loot to appear, facing against hundreds of enemies a minute (I got an achievement for killing 25,000 enemies, it's that crazy), as well having four-player co-op. Hell it even shares a designer who actually worked on Diablo itself. This whole game, as well as its expansions, were created by a relatively small team, about 13 people or so. That's honestly really impressive considering how content filled this game is.
You have six classes in the base game, and three more added with DLC. Unlike in Diablo (as far as I'm aware, I've not played them) you can multiclass once you reach level 10. That doesn't take long to reach, and when that happens your options get borderline overwhelming. Each class is distinct enough from one another, and with how earning class skills works in Grim Dawn you need to carefully distribute points earned from leveling up. So maybe you only want the second class for a few specific skills and stat ups, or maybe you'd rather distribute points more evenly. Do you want a lot of different types of skills, or only have a select few but invest more points in the existing ones to make them stronger? But you also have attribute points to distribute which gives basic stat ups to your character, however higher level equipment is locked via attribute stats. You could simply increase that stats you need, but perhaps your armor will make the difference depending on the random modifiers they have. Is your armor not enough? Then add components to them which gives small bonuses including brand new skills exclusive to equipment and added components only. Still not enough?! Find and restore devotion shrines to add points into one massive, yet open ended skill tree that, yet again, can earn you exclusive abilities and stat ups.
This is why I said "...be careful for what you wish for". It is so much to take in, not helping how one piece of equipment can have a laundry list of modifiers. It can be difficult comparing different types of equipment to the point that they have an in-game search system where, say, you want more fire damage equipped; so simply type in "fire" and it'll narrow down the list. It's a really helpful tool, but you're still doing a lot of comparing since it may have more fire damage, but it has less armor or maybe your helmet you have on now gives you a fireball spell. There's so much time spend on menus, doubly so if you're as compulsive as I am when it comes to wanting to do as much damage as possible but then "Oh this benefits my lightning spell but now my chaos attack is weaker. Oh god what do I do?"
What you do is say "fuck it". You got to fight the urge to be as perfectly optimized as possible. It's a game based on randomness, at least in terms of equipment. The challenges aren't designed around one build, it's designed for every build. I started to relax more when I came to grips with that. Maybe I'd have an easier time if I continued to pay stricter attention to what I was wearing, but veteran difficulty is perfectly fine with a "good enough" attitude. I then came to realize something else about Grim Dawn, it is a fantastic "podcast game". The act of fighting is simple, but you won't make it far if you aren't moving your character out of harms way. You have to do just enough maneuvering that it isn't a mindless game, but it's no fighting game that requires your undivided attention. It became nice to wind down with Grim Dawn after work while listening to a video in the background.
To go into some of my last scattered thoughts on this game: it actually doesn't do random dungeons for the most part. At least for its main campaign. It came as a surprise since I've heard that random dungeons is a staple for the Diablo franchise. I'm honestly unsure if that's a point in Grim Dawn's favor or not. In case you were curious, I rocked a dual pistol build where my character was upgrading their shooting skills till it got to the point that every shot had, like, five separate 15% to 60% chances of a different effect occurring ranging from lighting to knockdowns to splitting into fragments to piercing straight through enemies. Sometimes they happen all at once. And lastly, don't be like me and not knowing that there's a storage area where you can have a universal box that is shared by all your characters. This helps a lot when making a new character as you can provide some starter gear, maybe give them components or materials, or maybe you found rifle that is useless for your solider but your demolitionist would more then appreciate it.

So to summarize: it sure is a loot-based RPG. I'm definitely more of a Monster Hunter person when it comes to how to create a compelling loot system while not going too crazy with a shopping list of modifiers. Then again, I can't create a army of skeletons, rotting flesh golems and demons in Monster Hunter now can I

[Just a few thoughts after coming back to this again a few years after my initial playthrough. This is less about the content of the game, and more on the co-op experience, which is what I played for.]

My original opinion of the game is that it was a solid, classic-style ARPG with some interesting experimental expansions on the formula the dev team originally established with Titan Quest. Unfortunately my experience at the time was marred by a fatal flaw in the multiplayer: loot level was set to the average of all players in the lobby, thereby making co-op between players at mismatched levels a practice in frustration as one half of the party gets stuff they can't use and the other half gets stuff they won't use.

This was a problem I felt acutely having recently graduated college at the time and having all of my friends on different schedules. One missed session for a player (me) meant all proceeding sessions would be fruitless, painful endeavors stuck behind the power curve. Sure, if I played solo maybe I could catch up, but there was a reason I was the one missing sessions.

So despite all of the elements of the game I liked, my memory of the game was only pain for years.

Recently I got the urge to give it another go. The game has been updating for years, got a few major expansions, and I made sure my co-op partner this time was disciplined to only play their character with me so we could keep exact pace through the whole base campaign.

And hey, would you look at that, when you're at the right point in the power curve, the game is a lot of fun. A little stiff feeling, but satisfying overall.

For kicks and giggles, we had a few friends join for the finale with overlevelled characters. While our builds were min-maxed well enough that it caused no issue with combat balance, I noticed something rather disappointing given that the game is still being maintained.

"Oh look, I can't use any of the gear drops now. Yaaaaayyyy...."

This is not a unique problem, historically, in the ARPG space. From Diablo II to Borderlands 2, party levelling had always been one of the most common pain points with trying to play co-op in those games. But while those titles we made it work beause that was the best we had, I can't excuse Grim Dawn as it came out in 2016 when the solutions to this problem had already been found and implemented. Destiny being the shining example for this particular area of design.

Yet even 7 years of active development later, Grim Dawn shows no sign of budging. They have instanced loot and other modernized elements, but co-op quest progression is still janked up and loot levelling is still an active detriment to the experience.

So if you plan to play singleplayer or have a very disciplined co-op group, this is a good hit of classic ARPG fun. But, I cannot recommend this game for casual sessions. The game will shoot itself in the foot then shoot you for asking.

Having now played a second ARPG in Grim Dawn, as well as having checked out this Path of Exile biz, I can now say that this genre might eventually someday turn out as one of my favourites.

Grim Dawn in particular is amazing: the pacing is almost immaculate, the story and worldbuilding is fun videogame shlock, and the gameplay is cool at how it insentivizes experimentation. The two-class system, specifically, was great. I thought it was a dumb gimmick at first, but as I moved through the two skill trees I developed a playstyle that seemed unique to what I've seen people do with other classes, and it helped me immerse myself in the world, where I was a grenadier-spellcaster freeze-shocking chtonic demons, cultists and outlaws into stunlocked hell. I also loved the customizability of your character, being able to tweek almost every aspect of your guy to perfection, from resistances to how your gear looks (the latter thanks to a DLC, but still). Probably the biggest stand-out feature of this one has got to be the Constitution system, whereby moving out of the way and not attacking for a bit restores lost HP up to a certain point. That made my biggest issue with other games of this kind - the fact that they're potion-chugging simulators without a foot in either offensive or defensive gameplay - gone entirely. Now I can just kite around the trolls and the demons, continuously dealing damage and actually paying attention to the micro gameplay, not just looking at the skills' cooldowns.

Of course it all doesn't help too much that the art-direction is bland and that the final boss (an emissary of a dark cosmic deity here to consume the world) is easy as shit, but the game is still fun. Definitely doing another playthrough after the DLC is done

I forgot to review this because I was like "I haven't played enough to form any thoughts about it." Turns out, I have over 10 hours in it and I guess I just don't have anything interesting to say about it.
My friend loves this game, can't get enough of it, has started 3 different characters just to play more of it, I was like "hey man don't burn out before we all get to play together" and he was like "I promise that would never happen." Then Helldivers 2 came out and they ditched the campaign even though we were gonna wait to play HD2 all together and they didn't even tell me they'd bought it. That doesn't really matter, but maybe it says something about the half life on this game, as it doesn't really seem like my friend has made it past the 11 hour mark on any of his 3 campaigns even though he says its one of his favorite games of all time. I can collect that the progression reaches a plateau around this point, when the loot becomes little more than an inconvenience, and all you're doing anymore is spamming hotkeys to decimate crowds of enemies until you get to level up again.

It's the first ARPG game I have ever played and I'm somewhat ambivalent about this game.

Positives:
[+] Has a nice dark lore
[+] The most immersive game I have ever played
[+] Lots of enemy & boss variations
[+] Can choose any two class among the six classes
[+] Huge skill tree
[+] Difficulty feels balanced in veteran mode (Not easy, not too hard... just the way I want a game to be)
[+] Teleportation from anywhere
[+] Can rotate and zoom camera
[+] Painless auto save

Negatives:
[-] I feel like the game does not punish enough for dying. So most of the time I'm reckless and don't even care whether I die or not, I can teleport there in no time anyways.
[-] Locations and enemies are filled with so much textures and details, sometimes my eyes hurt. Nothing is conspicuous.
[-] Had problems memorizing locations and NPCs names. An obstacle between me and my enjoyment of the story.
[-] Soundtrack becomes repetitious and irritating after certain time
[-] Multiplayer is painful and does not always work.
[-] After 20 or so hours it felt a little repetitive.

Overall, it was a good experience.

Nunca tive contato aprofundado com os primeiros diablo, o meu primeiro foi o 3 , comecei a jogar no xbox do meu tio que tinha pegado o jogo emprestado de um amigo, é o tanto que o jogo tinha me prendido foi absurdo, eu tinha minha apaixonado pelo seu estilo de jogo, nunca tinha visto nada parecido, mas infelizmente fui obrigado a parar de joga-lo , então tinha um desejo de conseguir jogar novamente , mas o seu preço para pc chegava longe de eu conseguir compra-lo , tentei baixar pirata , mas não tinha nenhum link funcional ou nada do tipo, então fui procurando jogos parecidos por anos e nunca achava nada que me remetesse aquele game que me apaixonei a primeira vista, até que recentemente eu descobrir grim dawn, muitos diziam que era sequencia espiritual do 2 , que era melhor que o 3 , então não podia perde a oportunidade, coloquei na lista de desejos e esperei uma promo, quando chegou o momento eu peguei e já de inicio conseguiu me pegar também e eu joguei por boas e varias horas, mas infelizmente tive que parar por um tempo de jogar e o game ficou um bom tempo no meu backlogd, então resolvi pega-lo de vez e jogar até terminar, foi o que eu fiz, mesmo após muito tempo de hiato quando voltei e me acostumei a joga-lo novamente eu já fiquei preso, explorando todos os cantos do mapa que não tinha sido explorado, deixando completinho sendo uma sensação muito boa,até chegar no boss final, joguei o game inteiro no veterano, mas no final simplesmente estava tomando hit kill , meu personagem não passava de um peso de papel, coloquei no normal para ver se o desafio conseguira se balancear um pouco, já que meu personagem não estava bem buildado e nem nada do tipo, foi o mesmo personagem de anos atrás que eu apenas jogava, mas a discrepância de dificuldade é absurda o boss que eu estava sofrendo , foi facilmente vencido sem precisar se mover em segundos, o que me broxou um pouco, então para compensar resolvi voltar pro veterano e fazer um outro boss, é foi divertido fica minha recomendação se tu deseja um desafio maior jogue no veterano, no geral é um bom arpg, que se tu se dedicar consegue te prender bem e te levar por várias horas , sendo para min o ponto mais negativo e o que corroborou a demora para ser terminado e a separação da classe necromante em uma dlc, não sou de compra jogos esperei um bom tempo para pega-lo em promoção e quando fui começar não tinha a classe que eu mais almejava, mas ainda consegui fazer uma classe que me diverti bastante, não chegou na sensação que senti quando joguei diablo na época, mas de inicio foi próxima, uma pena que teve vários empecilhos que afetou minha experiência, agora me despeço de grim dawn, é um jogo com possibilidades de replay, mas que não me motivou tanto a esse ponto, conquanto conseguiu ser um bom game no que eu vivi com ele.