Path of Exile PS4 release set for March 8

After a few delays and tons of tweaks, Path of Exile finally has a concrete PS4 launch date, and it's quite soon.

Path of Exile will arrive on PS4 on March 8, 2019 alongside the game's new Synthesis expansion, Grinding Gear Games today announced. The PlayStation 4 flavor will release with all previous expansions and content baked in alongside the Synthesis update, complete with console-friendly controls, chat systems, and everything else the previous games are known for (including excellent action RPG mechanics straight out of Diablo).

Like previous updates, the latest Synthesis expansion has a bunch of new additions including a fresh league for ladder-like competition, a new NPC called Cavas that opens up a unique questline, new skill gems, a ton of new items, and an interesting new Fractured item type that can be earned from synthesizing Cavas' memories. Just when I think GGG can't top their previous expansions they find new ways to re-invent the wheel.

Launching Path of Exile on Sony's PS4 should be absolutely huge for the community and the New Zealand developers. With a 91 million-strong install base the PS4 allows maximum exposure and accessibility for free-to-play games, and in turn offers tons of monetization opportunities. PoE's PS4 launch should bring in more revenues to help fund future updates and big expansions.

As for the rest of 2019, Grinding Gear Games plans to roll out three more updates across June, September, and December. The game's huge mega-expansion should drop sometime in 2020.

Path of Exile: Synthesis releases on March 8, 2019 on PS4, Xbox One and PC. Check below for more information on the update:

Path of Exile: Synthesis New Features Include:

• The Synthesis Challenge League: With a fresh economy and new mechanics, the Synthesis Challenge League is ideal for existing, returning, and brand-new players to experience the award-winning gameplay Path of Exile has to offer.
• A Mysterious New NPC: In Path of Exile: Synthesis, players will meet a new NPC called Cavas and help him recover his lost memories by fighting their way through them and then stabilising them to collect a fragment of that memory.
• Synthesize New Areas: Cavas' memories can be combined to synthesize dangerous and unstable new areas that players can run for valuable rewards. Players will discover many strategies for combining memories for maximum rewards, including challenging boss encounters and their valuable treasures.
• Fractured Items: While exploring Cavas' memories and areas synthesized from them, players can find Fractured Items, a new type of rare item that has some of its properties locked in place. These properties can't be modified by random crafting actions performed on the item, which makes them a powerful way to craft efficiently.
• Synthesized Items: Players can combine Fractured Items in a device to create a Synthesized Item - a special base type where the implicit properties are influenced by the properties on the Fractured Items consumed. These Synthesized Items offer very powerful crafting opportunities.
• Betrayal goes Core: Due to popular demand, December's Betrayal League is being integrated into the core game as evergreen content.
• Balance: Path of Exile: Synthesis includes a balance focus on spellcasting, especially around improving hand-casting (casting a spell naturally without using a totem/trap/mine to do it for you). This process includes a numerical balance pass over all offensive spells in the game.
• New Archetypes: With its emphasis on spellcasters, this expansion also introduces two new character archetypes - the Chaos and Holy casters. The new skill and support gems added for these archetypes also affect dozens of other Path of Exile builds that might find them useful.
• New Gems: Path of Exile: Synthesis contains 14 new Gems, including seven new Skill Gems, four new Support Gems and three complete revamps to existing Gems.
• New Items: Like any Path of Exile expansion, Synthesis contains masses of valuable new items to find and hoard. Alongside the new Fractured and Synthesized Items, players can discover 16 new Unique Items and 16 Divination Cards designed by Path of Exile's supporters.
• The Atlas has Shifted: The Atlas of Worlds (a chart of Path of Exile's end-game maps) has been updated, with new positions for existing maps, and many more secret player hideouts to discover attached to these maps.
• Available on PC, Xbox One and now PlayStation 4: Path of Exile: Synthesis is not just coming to its existing platforms of PC and Xbox One, but will also be available on PlayStation 4. All versions are, of course, 100% free to play.