The reception to the Apex Legends Season 1 Battle Pass, titled Wild Frontier, has been a bit mixed. While new hero Octane is a whole bunch of fun, some players have been feeling distinctly underwhelmed by what’s on offer.
The pass features 100 levels, each with their own reward, but many of them are badges and stat trackers, which it’s difficult to get excited about. Fans were hoping for something a bit more substantial like a bunch of character and weapon skins, or perhaps some cool custom emotes or alternate executions. The iffy quality of what’s inside is a valid criticism, but fortunately, there’s at least one aspect of the pack that’s being received positively.
That’s the fact that if you complete it fully by the time the season concludes, you’ll earn 1000 Apex Coins (the game’s premium currency). If you don’t spend them in the meantime, this will allow you to unlock the Season 2 Battle Pass for no extra cost.
Now, I don’t want to get too far into the economic and psychological incentives that Respawn and EA are playing at here, but if you’re buying the Battle Pass regardless, and if you were always going to be spending a bunch of time with Apex Legends anyway, then this is at least a nice bonus.
If this does prove to be the case, it might mean that the game will continue to have a rolling monetization scheme, whereby players can always unlock the next piece content by completing the current one. Rewarding customers like this is very similar to what Fortnite did with their latest season and, if nothing else, helps maintain long-term player engagement with the game.
Either way, it’ll be interesting to see how Respawn and EA respond to criticism of this Battle Pass. Hopefully they’ll take it at face value and improve things for next time. After all, while Apex Legends is the new hotness right now, you never know when something newer and shinier is going to come along and steal your player base.
