The universe of Titanfall has been enriched by a Free-to-play spin-off published in the last few hours by the boys of Respawn Entertainment e Electronic Arts. His name is Apex Legends and represents a Battle Royale incarnation of the brand. Without Titans.
Aware of the fact that distorting the saga, impoverishing it of the Titans and re-proposing it in a Battle Royale key will surely make those who look suspiciously at the BR panorama turn up their noses, seeing only emulators of emulators and will make the lovers of Titanfall praise the disaster, we at Epic Videogames Guide have stripped ourselves of all prejudices and dressed in the role of the legends of Apex we have launched into the fray.
In Apex Legends the Battle Royale mode is offered through a first-person view, where 60 players divided into groups of 3 must be able to survive by fighting and taking refuge from a safe area in a safe area, in order to be the only survivors. In proposing the basic rules of the genre, Apex Legends does not fail to introduce substantial news, between reworkings of mechanics present in already known titles and real innovations.
Before diving into the game we will have to face the selection of the character, where we will choose our hero alternating with teammates who will be randomly assigned or invited through their friends list. We had already seen the ability to select a class with dedicated mechanics in Realm Royale, the third-person Battle Royale of Hi-Rez Studios.
Although the similarity is undeniable, the difference is considerable: in Apex Legends we are going to choose real heroes with peculiar abilities, which differ from each other not for the usable weapons but for the enormous synergistic potential proposed.
Each hero grants access to unique abilities: a passive, an active with relatively short cooldown and an ultimate with a very long recharge, to be used in key moments of the game. Most abilities aren't meant to damage enemies, but to create environmental interactions that you can use to your advantage: we have Gibraltar capable of summoning a defensive dome immune to bullets, Wraith engaged in creating teleportation portals, the robotic Pathfinder completely focused on the game of grappling and able to create a zipline usable by the companions, Bangalore able to provide concealment to area evoking smoke screens and so on.
These hallmarks are able to provide characters with an important identity, where the selection of team members opens the door to specific group gameplay, without however making the skills the protagonists of the experience at all times, as happens for example in Overwatch.
There are currently 8 heroes to choose from, including 2 to unlock via real or in-game currency, along with a good dose of cosmetic content, ranging from character skins to weapon recolors.
Unfortunately we cannot yet express ourselves with certainty about the actual difficulty of grinding the in-game currency, which is randomly given through the opening of the Apex Packs, crates that can be purchased with real currency or unlocked by leveling up. Anyhow Respawn Entertainment has promised a good amount of post-launch content, such as new skins and new characters, we'll see.
Once the character has been selected we will be ready to catapult ourselves onto the game map, a clever idea of the developers intervenes in this juncture: to avoid uncooperative behavior by randomly assigned teammates, in each session the player in charge of deciding when to drop the team will be chosen randomly, which until then the allies will have to follow.
Once on the field, naturally unarmed as the genre dictates, the arms race will begin: Although it is undeniable that luck plays an important role in this situation, the most daring can choose to land on large floating ships that promise first-rate weapons and armor. Given the exquisite workmanship of the loot, these places are very coveted and therefore not recommended for less experienced teams or to those who prefer a calmer and more reasoned game, given that these places are the scene of furious clashes from the very first moments of the game.
The flavor of the Gunfight is exquisitely arcade, the weapons have an excellent seal and the recoil is very contained, we are very far from titles that wink at simulation such as PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS, in fact we have noted with enormous regret the absence of the possibility of lean left and right to reduce exposure to enemy fire during combat, which would surely add depth to the stall mechanics. The gameplay (perhaps thanks to this absence which limits the functional camping options) is fresh and dynamic and the loot dynamics are optimized, taking inspiration from Tencent's Ring of Elysium, which already proposed an intelligent inventory that can optimize the selection of weapon attachments.
Important news introduced by Apex Legends is the possibility of taking his "identity" from the corpse of a recently deceased ally and bringing him back to life completely in one of the resuscitation centers arranged along the game map. These power plants play a key role in the late stages of the game, where to compete with the other teams in late, a lone survivor will often want to aim to recall their allies, as well as keeping the power plants at gunpoint will provide greedy loot to the teams positioned waiting for the unfortunate on duty.
With the desire to overcome the prejudices that echo the Battle Royale genre and forgetting the Titans of the homonymous series, Apex Legends offers a fun and dynamic gameplay, introducing interesting new features and successfully reworking many of the ideas seen in other titles. This mix generates a gameplay with a strong identity able to give hours of fun, especially in the company of a couple of friends with whom to develop tactics and strategies thanks to the interlocking of the characters' skills. Apex Legends is available on PC via Origin, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in a completely free formula, it should be said that trying it costs nothing.
