Apex Legends needs “large systematic change” according to EA

EA have acknowledged that Apex Legends has been falling short of expectations. EA CEO Andrew Wilson commented on the games performance and future plans during EA's second quarter earnings call on Tuesday.

Apex Legends has been suffering from a steady decline in the player numbers on Steam over the last few months. There are a lot of eyes on Season 23, releasing next week, to see how much of an impact that will have on player numbers.

As it stands, player numbers on Steam are lower than they have been in years. It is not clear what the player numbers are like on XBOX and Playstation.

Apex Legends Season 22, which launched in early August, fell short of expectations according to Andrew Wilson. A big change from a financial point of view for EA was to the Battle Pass. EA were forced to U-turn on no longer allowing Battle Passes to be bought with Apex Coins. The initial plan would have seen players paying out of pocket twice per season.

"Following changes to the battle pass construct, we did not see the lift in monetisation we had expected.

"Two things have become clear in the free-to-play FPS category. First, in the competitive landscape where brand, a strong core player base and high quality mechanics matter more than ever, Apex has proven to be a compelling franchise for us and an industry stalwart.

“Second, to drive significant growth and re-engagement, large systematic change is required. We will continue to focus on retention and breadth of content in service of our global community as we work towards more significant, innovative changes in the future.”

This comment reveals that Apex Legends will see a lot of changes over the next few seasons. There has already been a lot of overhaul in recent seasons. The evo system was changed, Legend Upgrades were introduced and a new map, E-District, was added to the game.

However, Apex Legends has always delivered content at a slower pace than other big competitors. Apex drops two major updates every 90 days roughly, with a season and mid-season patch. A season generally contains a couple of events, that are usually focused around unlocking the latest Heirloom Cosmetic.

This can sometimes make the game feel stale, with a lack of "new" content to keep players engaged and coming back. If you don't enjoy a certain LTM for instance, it could be in rotation for several weeks.

That "significant change" won't be an Apex Legends 2 it seems. It's reported that during a Q&A session EA were asked about launching "something like an Apex 2.0" rather than overhauling the existing game. This is an approach adopted by Overwatch.

“It’s a really good question and probably beyond the scope of this conversation, but what I would say is that typically, what we have seen in the context of live service driven games at scale, is the Version 2 thing has almost never been as successful as the Version 1 thing" Wilson said in response.

He added that "the objective right now is to ensure that we are continuing to support the global player base that we have, and deliver them new innovative, creative content on a season by season basis, as well as build these other things, but build them in a way that players don’t have to give up the progress that they’ve made or the investment that they’ve put into the existing ecosystem."

That systematic change could be set to start next Tuesday, when Apex Legends Season 23 releases. Stay tuned to esports.gg for more Apex Legends news and updates.