As Respawn’s battle royale Apex Legends nears its sixth birthday, EA has stated it’s failing to do the enterprise for the corporate, and outlined plans for what it known as Apex Legends 2.0.
Speaking in a monetary name on its third quarter outcomes, EA stated that Apex Legends web bookings (income) have been down year-over-year, however carried out in-line with the corporate’s expectations.
During a query and solutions session with analysts, EA CEO Andrew Wilson was requested for an replace on the efficiency of Apex Legends, and his response was clear: Apex Legends is a large recreation with hundreds of thousands of gamers, nevertheless it’s merely not making sufficient cash for EA.
“Apex might be one of many nice new launches in our trade over the past decade and has been beloved by that core cohort and we have had over 200 million individuals play the sport,” Wilson started. “However, the trajectory of the enterprise of that franchise has not been headed within the course that we’ve got needed for a while. We have been attempting, tuning, and testing many issues within the context of the continued assist of the group.
“As we take into consideration Apex right this moment, I actually take into consideration the event taking place throughout three core vectors. The first is how can we proceed to assist this unbelievable group that performs the sport day-in and day-out, which numbers tens of hundreds of thousands of individuals, and that is each quality-of-life, anti-cheat, and the entire issues that make the core expertise nice in addition to the creation of recent content material for that group.
“And we proceed to try to check and develop extra and nice content material for that group. And I’d say we’ve got seen some progress in that, however most likely not as a lot as we’d have favored.”
So, what’s EA going to do to show Apex Legends round in monetary phrases? Wilson stated it’s engaged on a serious replace to the sport, what he known as Apex Legends 2.0, that sounds designed to reinvigorate the franchise, convey extra individuals into the sport, and, sure, make more cash.
However, Wilson stated he doesn’t need to launch Apex Legends 2.0 on prime of the subsequent Battlefield, which is due out earlier than April 2026. It’ll come out after that, so, most likely, sooner or later throughout EA’s 2027 fiscal yr ending March 2027.
“We do consider there can be a time the place we have to do a extra significant replace of Apex as a broad recreation expertise, and the workforce is diligently engaged on that,” Wilson stated. “You ought to think about we most likely would not drop that on prime of a Battlefield launch. And so from a timing standpoint, our pondering proper now could be that that will exist post-Battlefield.
“And then on a longer-term time horizon, once more, these franchises that exist at this degree and have this a lot fan love do not come alongside all that usually. What I believe we have demonstrated as an organization is a capability to construct franchises that final 10, 20, 30 years and rising.
“Our expectation is that Apex may even be a kind of franchises and that someday on a longer-term time horizon, there can be an excellent greater, extra significant replace to that broader recreation expertise, an Apex 2.0, if you’ll. This won’t be the ultimate incarnation of Apex.
“So the workforce stays extremely dedicated. We proceed to take a position behind the core group who continues to play, that numbers within the tens of hundreds of thousands of gamers. We do consider that there must be a extra main replace that can most likely occur after a Battlefield launch simply by way of timing, and the workforce is diligently working by what that will be.
“And then longer-term, our expectation is that we’ll proceed to increase what this franchise is and the way we assist a core group of extremely aggressive gamers and new communities that need to come and expertise all of the greatness that Apex has to supply.”
Apex Legends 2.0 sounds a bit like what Activision tried with Call of Duty battle royale Warzone, which rebooted considerably with a 2.0 model in 2022. The jury continues to be out on whether or not that was the correct transfer, with followers of the free-to-play shooter typically reminiscing about Warzone because it was within the first two years of its life. The scenario with Apex Legends is completely different, after all, however EA can be aware of how its rivals within the battle royale market have fared as they work to develop its participant base.
Speaking of which, Apex Legends stays one of many top-played video games on Steam by way of concurrent participant rely (Microsoft and Sony don’t make participant numbers public). However, it’s effectively previous its peak on Valve’s platform, and is on a trajectory to hit file lows.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can attain Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
