APEX Legends has been around for a few years now, and the game has found it’s niche in the oversaturated battle royale market. Along with Call of Duty Warzone, and Fortnite, APEX is one of the top free to play battle royale shooters. APEX is developed by Respawn and takes place in the Titanfall universe.
This week, APEX kicked off its 14th season, Hunted. Hunted introduces a new character, Vantage, lots of balancing, and brings King’s Canyon back to the map rotation Reforged. There is also some additional story content in the form of videos and lore entries, but let’s be honest, no one plays APEX for the story.
Vantage is a sniper recon style character, combing quick mobility using her pet bat, with a custom sniper rifle that allows her to gather information from a far as well as pin down teams and provide support to her squad. Having played a few hours of Vantage, I think this is the first time in a few seasons that the new legend is actually really good. Newcastle in season 13 had everyone hoping, but he turned out to be average at best (although he has received some buffs this season). Vantage provides excellent support in a way players haven’t had access to prior to her release. She can alert her team of an enemy threat including their shield status and most importantly their team status. No longer will the player be wondering if the enemy they are engaging is in a full squad or if they are alone. That is extremely valuable information.
A multitude of other legends have received changes, but I will only comment on the few that I have experienced so far. Most notably, Valkyrie was heavily nerfed. Valk was one of the top-picked legends and Respawn felt the need to nerf her a bit because of it. The nerf is as bad as players think though, as playing her felt much the same as it did last season. I don’t think her pick rate will drop much, if at all. The third (changed) character I had some time with was Mad Maggie. She is one of the recent legends who has felt rather lacklustre since her release in season 12. This season she received multiple buffs, and now feels rather great to play. Her ultimate is much more useful given its double distance, and seemingly added tendency to fly around the map wildly.
Having King’s Canyon back is a breath of fresh air, especially now that it is Reforged. The biggest change is one that players have been asking for, Skull Town has returned after a long hiatus, bringing chaotic hot drops back to the Southwest corner of the map. A bunch of smaller changes have also made firefights feel fresh. Previous pathways have been blocked, and new pathways opened. Some players seemingly haven’t figured out all the changes yet and tend to get stuck in areas they think still have exits, even though they no longer exist.
The other change many players are excited about is the weapon rotation. Fan favourites the Volt and the G7 Scout are back on the ground, which is going to play into the meta greatly given they are both extremely powerful weapons.
There are many more changes that don’t necessarily warrant a paragraph, but all in all, APEX Legends Hunted hits the nail on the head in terms of great balancing and gameplay additions.