Path of Exile 2 Steam Deck Impressions – Recommended settings so far, ROG Ally comparisons, and more

Path of Exile 2 from Grinding Gear Games finally launched into Early Access a week ago. I always planned on getting it, but after attending a preview event where I asked game director Jonathan Rogers about Steam Deck support, I knew I had to play it sooner than later. I've been playing it over the last week on my Steam Deck, ROG Ally, and Xbox Series X.

While I need more time to reach the endgame and try out the other classes for my full early access article, I wanted to cover how Path of Exile 2 feels on Steam Deck right now, recommended settings, ROG Ally impressions, and more. Note that this article will be updated as I play more across characters and get deeper into the game.

As of this writing, I've put in about 20 hours across characters and platforms, and this article includes impressions and screenshots based on patch 0.1.0d. I created a new character just to test out the recent updates and to see how performance has improved in the first act here.

Path of Exile 2 lag issues and gateway selection

Path of Exile 2's automatic server (gateway) selection is something you need to check right off the bat. Before getting into the settings, I noticed Path of Exile 2 was borderline unplayable with input lag and delay. I thought it might be a Steam Deck issue, but I also had it on Xbox Series X. I found out the automatic server selection put me into the Texas gateway instead of one near me.

When you change your gateway, it sometimes doesn't actually reflect until you log out and log back in, but make sure you choose a Path of Exile 2 location near you for the best possible experience when playing solo. You can view the ping when selecting as shown in my image below. If you're playing online with a friend in another country, I recommend selecting a server in the middle of both players. When I played with a friend in abroad, I joined their game and it was laggy for me while they had a smooth and responsive experience. 

Path of Exile 2 default graphics settings are not good

Path of Exile 2 uses NIS upscaling by default. This looks terrible not only on handhelds, but also on console. Path of Exile 2 also disables HDR by default. You can enable this and use it on Steam Deck OLED. I tested with it enabled and disabled. I turned it off temporarily to compare performance on the ROG Ally at similar settings.

Barring those settings, Path of Exile 2 has some useful options to tweak the interface like button prompts options and HUD scale. Path of Exile 2 has options for Xbox, DualShock 4, DualSense, and even Steam Deck button prompts. This isn't surprising since the team is working on the game for Steam Deck, but it is good to see in a brand-new release. I opted to use DualSense button prompts on both my handhelds. 

Path of Exile 2 graphics and display options on PC

On the graphics and display side, Path of Exile 2 lets you select renderer (DirectX 12, DirectX 11, and Vulkan), display to use, display mode, enable v-sync (on, adaptive, locked), toggle dynamic resolution, adjust resolution (with 16:10 and 800p support), upscale mode, image quality setting for upscale mode, sharpness, HDR, texture quality, texture filtering, lighting (shadows or shadows + global illumination), shadow quality, sun shadow quality, number of lights, bloom, water detail level, Nvidia Reflex, foreground fps cap, background fps cap, toggle triple buffering, toggle dynamic culling, adjust target frame rate, and toggle engine multithreading.

It is worth noting that Vulkan only lets you use NIS or FSR upscaling on Steam Deck. If you want to use XeSS, you need to use the DirectX12 renderer. I used DirectX 12 because I found myself flip flopping between FSR and XeSS. In some instances XeSS looked better, while I preferred FSR for certain effects. I didn't notice any major performance difference across both renderers. 

Path of Exile 2 Steam Deck recommended settings so far

Before getting into the recommended graphics options, you should go into the interface options and make sure the HUD Scale is turned up. I set it to maximum on Steam Deck and ROG Ally since the default option had the UI elements a bit too small. I also recommend turning off global chat. This option is near the bottom of the interface options.

With that out of the way, I have two recommended sets of options for Path of Exile 2 on Steam Deck so far. Don't expect a fantastic experience though. The performance in towns is not good. Path of Exile 2 can drop to the low 20s or even below that initially in towns. 

I recommend using fullscreen, XeSS or FSR upscaling set to performance, v-sync off, sharpness at around 60%, and all other settings set to their lowest aside from texture filtering. I used 8x and 16x here. I also used only shadow lighting rather than shadow + GI lighting which is the default. The important settings here are engine multithreading, dynamic culling, and dynamic resolution. 

If you want to play with a 30fps target, you can disable dynamic resolution, but you should expect drops below 30fps to the high 20s if you play with others online. I left it enabled when targeting 40fps, and it could still drop to the low 30s during some of the bosses indoors when playing with friends. I also want to note that the game had an issue with its 30fps cap a few days ago resulting in very bad frametimes. As of today, the 30fps cap works well. You see some bad frame times when you just load into a new area, but it settles down. 

So the key takeaway from my testing is to leave engine multithreading and dynamic culling enabled and then making sure to use the performance upscaling option for FSR or XeSS. Dynamic resolution should be enabled, but expect the resolution to drop quite a bit if you play with others who also use effect-heavy skills and spells. The resolution drops even more when playing online. 

As you can tell, you have to turn things down all the way, and even this isn't enough to guarantee a rock solid experience if you play with others online. 

Path of Exile 2 Steam Deck OLED HDR support

If you want to play with HDR on your Steam Deck OLED, you can only adjust the scene and UI brightness after enabling it in the display options. I ended up 

Path of Exile 2 Steam Deck gameplay impressions

I played a lot of Diablo IV on Steam Deck, but hadn't touched Path of Exile before playing Path of Exile 2 directly. So far, it is an amazing experience as a game, but it needs a lot of work before I can recommend it exclusively for Steam Deck play. Path of Exile 2 is a perfect fit for handheld play, and the Steam Deck's back buttons enhance the experience quite a bit, but you might want to hold off on buying early access just to play on Steam Deck until we see a few more updates and optimization.

The most surprising thing so far is how polished most of the game feels when it comes to visuals, sound design, music, combat feel, and I also love how fast the team is addressing major issues. Technical issues aside, this is an excellent game so far and I can't wait to play more. In fact, I'm going to go and play for a few hours today after finishing this article. 

Path of Exile 2 ROG Ally recommended settings and impressions so far

Path of Exile 2 on the ASUS ROG Ally (Z1 Extreme) with the GPU memory set to 5GB has been a much better experience than Steam Deck. I initially played at 720p since I wanted the best performance possible and also to see how it compares to the Steam Deck running the game with the same settings. At 720p, it ran above 60fps consistently in the first act when I tested with a friend and on my own running around, doing optional bosses, and just general combat. It also went to the 70s and 80s in some less busy areas. The town still drops to the 50s though. I can say that VRR definitely helps on the ROG Ally with minor drops here and there.

I then swapped to 1080p with the same settings and saw a drop of about 10-15fps on average. This meant the town was in the 40s and the open world still held its frame rate well. I saw drops to the 50s during effect-heavy boss battles with the same settings. I didn't enable dynamic resolution on the ROG Ally for my testing, and I also played using the 25W turbo mode unplugged from the wall adapter. I didn't test on 30W, but will do for my full early access article that covers later acts and more. 

Should you buy Path of Exile 2 early access on Steam Deck or ROG Ally right now?

Right now, Path of Exile 2 is only available through paid early access supporter packs. I cannot recommend it exclusively for playing on Steam Deck right now given how it performs in the early game. If you are playing Path of Exile 2 on your main PC or console and want a handheld companion to play on the go on and off, there is still a very big caveat to playing on Steam Deck with how the image quality drops to hit even a 30fps or 40fps target at the lowest settings. If you're ok with that, you will be fine early on, but consdier waiting for a few updates and Steam Deck-specific optimization. 

If you have an ASUS ROG Ally though, the answer is a bit different. Path of Exile 2 runs and looks a lot better across the board. I haven't had a chance to test out later areas yet, but based on the 20 hours I've played across platforms, it is good enough on the ROG Ally so far, but not ideal on Steam Deck. As I said above, I'll be revisiting it through every update to see if there is a noticeable improvement on both handhelds. 

Path of Exile 2 is currently available in Early Access on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC (Standalone, Steam, and Epic Games Store).