Insane Loading Times!

As the time of this writing, I have 493 hours in this game. I absolutely love this game. I think it is a total masterpiece! However, there is one very large, glaring issue, that is loading times!

Some system info:

PoE 2 Minimum Requirements:
Intel i5-2500k
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960
8 GB RAM
125 GB Storage

PoE 2 Recommended:
Intel Core i9-9900K
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060
16 GB RAM
125 GB Storage

My System:
Intel Core i7-8700
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070
16 GB RAM
2 TB Storage (500GB free)

My internet connection to the game is only around 30ms. It's not a network issue.

So, my system exceeds the minimum requirements to run this game. Aside from CPU, it meets the recommended requirements to run this game. However, I'm experiencing ridiculous loading times in EVERY zone, and constant lag spikes in zones that have caused many character deaths and unlooted items, not to mention mountains of frustration.

My PC should have zero problems running this game.

To try and make things better on my end, I have done the following:
- Ensure my PC has all the latest updates and driver files.
- Perform general system maintenance to remove any system obstacles.
- Fresh restarts of PC.
- Reinstalled PoE 2.
- Turn ALL graphic settings to as low as possible, especially shaders.
- Went to Steam > Settings > Downloads and Disabled Shader Pre-caching.
- Limited my Framerate to 90.

If I can think of anything else to try and make my system perform better, then I will. But it's a shame that I'm having to do research through forums and threads, and perform hours of troubleshooting and maintenance on my PC, just to get a game to run FAIR on my PC, even though my PC should be able to run this game at max or near max settings with zero problems.

Is there something I am missing? Is there anything I can do on my end to not take 10 minutes just to load up the game? I try to conduct trades, and people try trading with me when my character shows up in their zone. The trade times out before my screen even gets loaded.

In maps, especially Delerium maps, I have no choice but to try and attack blindly as I load, because things hit me that I cannot even see. This is UNSATISFACTORY!

As much as I love this game, I absolutely cannot stand the principle behind having a PC that exceeds the minimum requirements, and almost meets every recommended requirement, but still has loading and lag issues. If there's something I can do on my end to fix it, please let me know. But, judging from the library of available posts about this same issue, I don't think it's on my end.

GGG, please address this GAMEPLAY issue! Currently, this is the only patch I care to see. We should not have to wait for release in order to get a stable game!

Do you have an SSD for your storage? It makes a huge difference in load times.

If you drop your framerate to 60 that will help also. The human eye can only pick up to about 24 FPS so much higher than that really doesn't do a whole lot.

Some of the things hitting you that you can't even see are not actually loading problems...it's an issue many players experience and hopefully will be fixed by the time Early Access is over.

Keep in mind that you are paying to play the Alpha version of the game...they're calling it Beta but a real beta test would be the actual full game being tested, not tiny parts they've finished so they can do a quick presale cash grab...

"

Tessderosa#0452 a écrit :

Do you have an SSD for your storage? It makes a huge difference in load times.

If you drop your framerate to 60 that will help also. The human eye can only pick up to about 24 FPS so much higher than that really doesn't do a whole lot.

Some of the things hitting you that you can't even see are not actually loading problems...it's an issue many players experience and hopefully will be fixed by the time Early Access is over.

Keep in mind that you are paying to play the Alpha version of the game...they're calling it Beta but a real beta test would be the actual full game being tested, not tiny parts they've finished so they can do a quick presale cash grab...

Thanks for your reply. I've considered getting an SSD, and intend to. I agree that it would probably help immensely. It also shouldn't be necessary, considering how I nearly meet the Recommended requirements for the game, not minimum. But I do agree that it would probably improve performance if I spent $100 on my PC to play a free game that I meet the Recommended specs for.

I'll try turning frame rate down to 60 and see if that helps any.

As for the alpha, yes I agree. I've been with the PoE franchise since the beta of PoE though, and I've never had this problem. Thanks again for the tips!

I have everything on NVME SSD (taking about 80% of space) and trust me, it's still path of loading screen.

Waypoint? loading screen

quest progress? loading screen

Map checkpoint! Loading screen!

The worst thing is when you trade with someone and they have a non-standard hideout...

It's faster with SSD but still .... loading...

I'd change "consider" to "need", you're one of the few remaining people that use a slow mecanical hard drive in 2025 for gaming. Switching to SSD will make a huge difference. The recommended setting should specify SSD, if it's not specifed it has to be an overlook (or assumed).

"

Tyrsonjsp#2390 a écrit :

I have everything on NVME SSD (taking about 80% of space) and trust me, it's still path of loading screen.

Waypoint? loading screen

quest progress? loading screen

Map checkpoint! Loading screen!

The worst thing is when you trade with someone and they have a non-standard hideout...

It's faster with SSD but still .... loading...

I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one!

"

Warrax#2850 a écrit :

I'd change "consider" to "need", you're one of the few remaining people that use a slow mecanical hard drive in 2025 for gaming. Switching to SSD will make a huge difference. The recommended setting should specify SSD, if it's not specifed it has to be an overlook (or assumed).

Or maybe they just don't think that it will require an SSD. I'm seeing that other new games are putting it as a requirement. Maybe they will do it to this one too, but at this time it's not listed. So I'm assuming they either don't plan on adding it as a requirement, or didn't anticipate that they would need to. But if it's going to be a requirement (ie they can't fix this loading lag), then they should certainly state it before release.

my game loads in 1-3seconds, full speed with a nvme ssd

that means,
if it was a path of exile 2 bug, we'd all have it

"

Darosius#3984 a écrit :

my game loads in 1-3seconds, full speed with a nvme ssd

that means,
if it was a path of exile 2 bug, we'd all have it

I have friends who have in-map lag on console. They don't have the absurd loading times, but they can still get hit by invisible enemies in maps.

On mine, when I press F1, it becomes obvious that there are two major factors in play - Shaders and CPU usage. I don't think its a bug as much as a lack of optimization due to the game being in the Alpha stage.

I don't buy your statement, given that there are many players on this forum, Reddit, and others, where they are complaining about this exact same issue, and have been for months. Players with rigs much better than mine, and much higher than all the Recommended requirements.

If there was something causing the issue on our end, I think that it effects enough players there would be information out on it by now. Some of the little "fixes" I've tried have worked for other players with the exact same problem. They have not worked for me. I do not have this problem with any other game. I've considered a full format of the hard drive, but that should be unnecessary. Any response from GGG on the matter would be wonderful.

Edit: I've even wondered if it has something to do with my stash, and have thought to completely empty most of my stash to see if it helps.

Update: I've spent the last 5 hours doing more maintenance on my PC.

- Cleaned out all old programs.
- Cleaned out all cache and temporary files.
- Recovered ~10 GB of hard drive space.
- 521 GB free of 1.81 TB hard drive space.
- Cleaned out old registry files.
- Double checked all driver files, including BIOS and chipset.
- Defragmented my hard drive, even though it was 0% fragmented.
- Fresh, cold restart.

My PC is as close to a fresh install of Windows as I can get it. The only other step for me to take would be to reinstall Windows. As my PC is having ZERO other problems with anything else, including newer games and even VR, I am hesitant to perform this action.

I logged into the game. It took me 10 minutes just to log into the game and into my Hideout!

At this point, I'm fed up with it. If the game requires a SSD to run properly, it needs to be added to the system requirements. This is false advertising. If not, then please fix the damn game.