Apex Legends' Niche Movement Mechanics Become Widely Accessible This Season
The game developers have an exciting surprise prepared for the popular battle royale players, arriving just in time for the holidays. Enthusiasts of this game's highly fluid movement can rejoice to learn that an innovative traversal feature will be introduced when the Amped season launches on Nov. 4.
Introducing Mantle Boosting
Dubbed "Momentum Boosting" by Respawn, this feature gives players a surge of forward momentum when scaling ledges and walls. According to lead battle royale designer Eric Canavese, this technique was previously been a feature of the game for quite a while, usually referred to as "ledge boosting." However it's challenging for casual gamers, and typically employed by competitive players in competitive play or tournaments. This season, the team is making it easier for players of all skill levels to successfully perform these advanced movement boosts.
"This technique have been in the game for a while, but executing it isn't easy to pull off and a player would never know it [is in the game] without external guides," the designer explains. "We're adding a visual cue so players can easily see when and how to trigger the high-octane movement ability, opening up the feature and introducing new ways to play for more players."
The Reasoning Behind Opening Up Advanced Mechanics
Why make a once niche technique accessible to all players? Lead Legend designer the development lead explains the team wants players to experience empowerment — even those who are new.
"Our community performs advanced techniques like super-glides and tap-strafes, and we looked around at other games, looked at what the community are doing, and we said, 'How can we extend these capabilities to more players?'" the designer clarifies. "Since currently, some of these techniques are somewhat awkward to use — it requires to remap your keybinds and execute within precise timings. We proposed, 'How about we create a more official version?'"
Season 27 Movement Focus
Movement is primarily the name of the game in Season 27, with Legends the gravity mage, Rampart, and the aerial combatant all getting enhancements to maintain them in motion. Recovery time on her tactical ability is shorter, and the Gravity Lift will propel users upward faster than it used to. Rampart's Amped Cover feature a roof and the ability to grant speed boosts to those nearby. But it's the high-flying this Legend receiving the most attention now, with various adjustments implemented to enhance her as stronger, faster, and deadlier.
"In my opinion there's quite a consensus that her moment has arrived," states Legend designer the designer. "Certainly she was top-tier previously, but with the introduction of other characters, movement[-based] passives, and redeployment tools, it seemed like she's not very relevant in today's the game. It was a really great opportunity for us to reexamine a bunch of aspects in her abilities and essentially restore her to former prominence."
Enhancements to the Aerial Legend
To reclaim her competitive status in current strategies, the developer notes the team assessed all her skills and introduced significant modifications. Her jetpack have been upgraded, increasing velocity while airborne, and this equipment regenerates three times faster, enabling her to remain longer in the air. Now she won't take damage from her own Missile Swarm, which has also been upgraded to tag opponents who take damage from it. Her squad redeploy ability — which lifts her entire squad into the air for repositioning or escape — requires reduced delay to fire up. She's also getting recently added perk choices that users can choose to reduce fuel consumption, expand the spread of her Missile Swarm, or further speed up her Skyward Dive takeoff time.
"Valkyrie's equipment fulfills the pilot experience," he comments.
Map Changes
Even the game's lone airborne map, Olympus, is getting a mobility-focused facelift, with major changes that expands bottlenecks and makes securing elevated positions a bit less daunting. Respawn state the game this update focuses on providing gamers the tools they need to keep up with the competition.
"Really, we examined Apex's core identity as a fast-paced FPS," says principal designer Josh Mohan.
Apex Legends the Amped season launches November 4th at the specified times.