Path of Exile: The Awakening expansion out now

Path of Exile developers Grinding Gear Games are describing their game's free 'The Awakening' expansion as "Path of Exile 2.0.0", an important milestone when it comes to the business of updating games. True to that, the patch notes that accompanied The Awakening's awakening yesterday are absolutely mahoossive—if I posted the entire thing here the site would probably crumple under the sheer weight of balancing adjustments and skill tree changes.

Essentially, PoE's big expansion adds a fourth act—set in the mining town of Highgate—to the generously free-to-play action RPG, along with a new jewel system, divination cards, loadsa extra gems and other sundry items, and balancing changes out the wazoo. The following trailer offers a glimpse of all that:

Tom loves exploring in games, whether it’s going the wrong way in a platformer or burgling an apartment in Deus Ex. His favourite game worlds—Stalker, Dark Souls, Thief—have an atmosphere you could wallop with a blackjack. He enjoys horror, adventure, puzzle games and RPGs, and played the Japanese version of Final Fantasy VIII with a translated script he printed off from the internet. Tom has been writing about free games for PC Gamer since 2012. If he were packing for a desert island, he’d take his giant Columbo boxset and a laptop stuffed with PuzzleScript games.