Respawn Entertainment developed a battle royale-hero free-to-play shooter video game called Apex Legends, and Electronic Arts released it. It was published in March 2021 for the Nintendo Switch, in February 2019 for the Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Microsoft Windows, and in March 2022 for the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5. In May 2022, Apex Legends Mobileāa touchscreen-optimized smartphone version of the gameāwas made available on Android and iOS. Except for the aforementioned mobile devices, the game enables cross-platform play.
Players divide into two or three-player squads before the game and choose "Legends," pre-made characters with unique skills. There are two different game modes. In "Battle Royale," up to twenty; three-person squads or thirty; two-person pairs arrive on an island, look for food and weapons, and then engage in combat with each other.
The amount of playable space on the island steadily gets less, so players must stay active or run the danger of getting murdered if they venture outside it. The final team standing wins the round. In "Arenas," players divide into three-player squads and engage in a 3v3 squad deathmatch against an opposing team over several rounds to decide who will win the match. That team wins when a team is ahead by two points and has at least three points.
Several Titanfall franchise characters feature in Apex Legends as playable Legends or as minor characters in the game's shared sci-fi setting with Respawn Entertainment's Titanfall series. The game's development got underway in late 2016, but it was kept a secret until its release. Respawn Entertainment's surprise 2019 release of the game was unexpected since, up until that moment, it was believed that the company was working on a third game in the Titanfall franchise, which was their last big-budget project. Critics gave Apex Legends largely favourable reviews and commended its gameplay, advancement system, and blending of aspects from other genres. Some see it as a solid rival to current battle royale video games. By the end of the first week, Apex Legends had more than 25 million players, and by the end of the first month, it had 50 million. It was one of the most popular video games ever in terms of player count by April 2021, with almost 100 million players.
Online multiplayer battle royale game Apex Legends uses groups of three players to control pre-made "Legends" with remarkable skills similar to those seen in hero shooters. Since the video game's launch, different modes have been added to allow for solo and two-player teams. In addition, loot boxes and Microtransactions, which let the user use in-game cash and real money to buy cosmetic items such as clothes for the Legends and different colours for weapons, are used to commercialize the game, which is free to play.
20 three-player teams compete in each match on average. Players can form a squad with friends or get paired arbitrarily with other players. Each squad member chooses one of the 21 available characters (as of series 13) before the game, with the restriction that no hero character may be selected by the same squad more than once.
Each squad member has a distinctive appearance, personality, and set of skills that provide the team access to various playstyles. Then, every team is loaded onto a plane that flies above the playing field. Each squad has a jumpmaster who, with the consent of the other team members, decides when the squad must jump from the plane and where to land. Players, though, are allowed to veer from the team's course.
As soon as they are on the surface, the team can scavenge for guns, armour, and other supplies hidden in boxes or dotted about the map's buildings while looking out for enemy squads. Players may use the game controller to use the "ping system" in Apex Legends to communicate with their team about specific areas, weapons, adversaries, and proposed strategies. The game contains several gameplay features from previous Titanfall video games, such as the capability to climb over small walls, roll down slanted inclined surfaces, and utilize zip-lines to explore an area rapidly, even though it gives mobility choices comparable to other shooters.
Players outside the safe zone incur damage and might perish if they do not enter the safe zone on time. The safe zone in the game shrinks in size over time around a randomly chosen spot on the map. To force interactions also limits units to limited areas. The battle's winner is the "Apex Champion" team with the most members still alive.
During a game, players who are knocked down can be resurrected by their team. Provided a player dies fully, they can still be revived if one or more of their teammates retrieve their respawn flag from where they died and carry it to one of the island's beacons. However, the banner has to be obtained before it expires and completely eliminates the player.
"Arena" is a brand-new permanent mode that debuted in Season 9. In this mode, gamers split into three-player teams and engage in a 3v3 squad deathmatch with the other squad over several rounds to decide the match's victor. That team wins when a team is ahead by two points and has at least three points. Additionally, a last sudden death round starts if a game goes into round 9 (when both sides have 4 points). This scoring system, according to Respawn, "allows more competitive games to keep the excitement going for longer" and "prevents outright knockout games from stretching on for too long."
Players spawn at a "store" where they may buy gear and charges for their Legend's powers using materials acquired in the previous matches to be ready for the upcoming battle, as opposed to skydiving into the area and acquiring stuff as in the battle royale mode. This version of the game incorporates gameplay elements from Counter-Strike and Valorant. The game mode is the first sustained departure from the battle royale model.
Like other battle royale games, Apex Legends uses a seasons system to divide the available rewards and playable modes.
Each season lasts around three months and brings new balance adjustments, a new battle pass, and a new legend. In addition, new cosmetics, weapons, maps, and other things are frequently added with each season.
Quests entered the game with season five, which was launched in 2020. Players may earn points for the battle pass, which rewards every level completed by completing these weekly and daily objectives. In addition, quests may be linked to narrative or collection events and may have different trackers from the combat pass for that season.
On 9 August 2022, the most current season, Hunted, debuted. It introduced the new legend Vantage, underwent significant alterations to Kings Canyon, raised the level cap, and made various new content and balancing adjustments.
All Apex Legends seasons' starting and ending dates are shown here.
| Season | Title | Start Date | End Date |
| 1 | Wild Frontier | 19 March 2019 | 18 June 2019 |
| 2 | Battle Charge | 2 July 2019 | 1 October 2019 |
| 3 | Meltdown | 1 October 2019 | 4 February 2020 |
| 4 | Assimilation | 4 February 2020 | 12 May 2020 |
| 5 | Fortuneās Favor | 12 May 2020 | 18 August 2020 |
| 6 | Boosted | 18 August 2020 | 4 November 2020 |
| 7 | Ascension | 4 November 2020 | 2 February 2021 |
| 8 | Mayhem | 2 February 2021 | 4 May 2021 |
| 9 | Legacy | 4 May 2021 | 3 August 2021 |
| 10 | Emergence | 3 August 2021 | 2 November 2021 |
| 11 | Escape | 2 November 2021 | 8 February 2022 |
| 12 | Defiance | 8 February 2022 | 10 May 2022 |
| 13 | Saviors | 10 May 2022 | 9 August 2022 |
| 14 | Hunted | 9 August 2022 | 8 November 2022 |
There are 22 characters in the eclectic cast of Apex Legends. So naturally, the Titanfall video game dramatically influences the character designs.
Before Electronic Arts (EA) acquired Respawn Entertainment in 2017, the developer Respawn Entertainment created Titanfall (2014) and Titanfall 2 (2016), which were both released by EA.
Before Titanfall 2 was released in 2016 and as of 2018, the entire Titanfall crew at Respawn Entertainment was involved with the project, according to the design director Mackey McCandlish. However, according to executive producer Drew McCoy, the game's development did not start until spring 2017. Approximately 115 developers were working on the game, making it the most labour-intensive project of the studio, he added. Comparatively, Titanfall 2 had about 85 developers.
After finishing the post-release service for Titanfall 2, McCoy claims that the company was unsure of their next project, even though they were confident they wanted to continue developing Titanfall games. Similar to how Titanfall 2 was created, the company split up into numerous small teams to produce "action blocks," which are little game prototypes that show off a gameplay mechanic, a weapon, or another feature that would be present in a Titanfall sequel. One such "action block" was motivated by the popularity of the battle royale game genre, which was popularised by PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds. The studio decided to expand this concept after testing a prototype that combined gameplay elements from previous Titanfall games with a battle royale format. Instead of focusing on developing great character classes that felt right for the Titanfall brand, the designers determined that featuring the pilotable Titans (huge mecha) from their past video games would not perform well in a battle-royale environment. Additionally, they discovered that several mobility mechanics from earlier Titanfall games, such as wall-running, would make gaming in a battle royale model extremely tough since it would be too hard to determine the direction of threats.
Reviews for Apex Legends have been "generally positive" across most platforms; according to to review aggregate Metacritic, There were "mixed or mediocre" reviews for the Nintendo Switch edition. Nevertheless, several publications, such as Game Informer, PC Gamer, Destructoid, and GamesRadar+, referred to it as one of the greatest battle royale games to date and a legitimate conflict to Fortnite Battle Royale's hegemony in the genre.
Critics praised Apex Legends' fighting. Destructoid hailed the gunplay as the greatest they had seen in a battle royale to date, although they expressed disappointment that some of the elements from the earlier Titanfall games were missing. The absence of the Titans and some other components from earlier Respawn titles, on the other hand, was not an issue, according to Game Informer's Javy Gwaltney, who also considered the fighting to be enjoyable and the gunplay to be potent. He continued by saying that, compared to other battle royale games, the inclusion of heroes can allow for more thrilling warfare.
The number of unique players in Apex Legends has topped one million eight hours after its debut and, within 24 hours, had 2.5 million distinct players. With more than 2 million peak concurrent users, it reached a maximum of 25 million players in a single week and had amassed 50 million overall by the end of the first month.
The most incredible sum produced by a free-to-play game the month after its debut was $92 million, which Apex Legends generated in its first month of release across all platforms.
Four days after the video game's debut on 8 February 2019, EA had its most significant increase in stock valuation since 2014 as a result of the quick success of Apex Legends. In addition, analysts recognized the game as a potential rival to Fortnite Battle Royale as news of and popularity for its spread.
The game failed to maintain the excitement produced by its introduction, and it was reported to have made 24 million U.S. dollars in revenue during April, which is 74% less than the sum it made during its first month.
The game has between 8 million and 10 million users each week; EA informed investors in July 2019 and mentioned Apex Legends as a contributing factor in the business' recent increase in live services revenue as its Q1 2020 financial outcomes are above forecasts.
As of October 2019, when season 3 was released, Apex Legends has 70 million players worldwide and is estimated to have made 45 million U.S. dollars in that month.
Apex Legends has topped $1 billion in sales, according to Blake Jorgensen, EA's CFO, who announced in February 2021.
Before the launch of the game's ninth season in April 2021, Respawn declared that the Apex Legends had amassed a player base of more than 100 million users and was projected to generate $500 million in revenue that year.
According to the stat-tracking website Steamcharts, the game's record for the number of concurrent players on Steam was broken on 11 August 2022, with 510,286.
