Apex Legends has found itself steadily declining in popularity since launch earlier this year.
The battle royale, which is often considered to be the best of its kind in terms of core gameplay, has struggled to retain its initial influx of players due, in large part, to its lack of meaningful content updates and unrewarding progressions systems. This mood reached its peak with the release of Season 1: Wild Frontier back in March, prompting fans to voice their disappointment and Respawn to respond in kind with the promise of a brighter future.
That time has finally arrived in the form of Season 2: Battle Charge, which looks set to reinvigorate one of 2019’s biggest releases with a generous helping of new gameplay modes, cosmetics and large-scale rebalancing of existing features. The developer spent a good chunk of time on stage at last weekend’s EA Play event summarizing its plans for Battle Charge, opting first to reveal a brand new Ranked mode.
For competitive-minded players especially, this revelation is a doozy. Many notable streamers have bemoaned the absence of such content in the past and Respawn providing an outlet aimed specifically toward players with a high skill level will undoubtedly be welcomed with open arms. Following on from that, several improvements for Season 2’s Battle Pass were outlined, first of all being the addition of daily and weekly challenges.
From the new season onwards, progression will now be tied to completing these tasks instead of gaining XP in matches which, as before, will go towards unlocking cosmetic customization options. Speaking of which, Respawn confirms that it will be removing stat trackers and other mundane rewards from the Battle Pass, replacing them instead, with more skins (at least four of which will be of legendary rarity) and special crafting materials.
The overall takeaway, then, is that Battle Pass 2 will be packed with far more meaningful content than its predecessor which, combined with a series of map changes and brand new character Wattson, should prove to be exactly what the doctor ordered for Apex Legends.