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Apex Legends Mobile - Battle Royale of the Year?

2K View2022-12-07

I'm assuming that pretty much anyone who's reading this are already familiar with Apex Legends. Either you've seen it or played the PC/console version. But if this is your first time into Apex Legends, here's a summary;

Apex Legends is battle royale that was developed by Respawn Entertainment for PC and consoles, and was first released by EA back in February, 2019. It set in the same universe as the Titanfall series, 30 years in the future after the ends of Titanfall 2 timeline. The mobile version of the game was just recently released in May this year, developed by Lightspeed Studio, a game studio under Tencent, published and co-developed by EA/Respawn Entertainment.

Many argue that the mobile version is just an inferior iteration of the main game , but some also believes (both PC/console and mobile players) that the mobile version is a better Apex game in some aspects. But both versions has their own strengths and weaknesses. It's one of my favorite games right now, especially in the battle royale genre.

I'm writing this specifically for people that are new to the game or players that already familiar with the PC/console Apex Legends and might be interested with the mobile version of the game, just like me.

CORE GAMEPLAY : BATTLE ROYALE

It has all the basic battle royale formula that you already are familiar with, but with little twist. Each match consists of 60 different players dropping in Duos or Trios, with a maximum amount of 8 rounds per match. Players are able to pick a character, that are called Legends, before entering the match.

Each Legends has their own unique abilities that can be use strategically to assist players throughout the game. That way makes the game more dynamic, less predictable, and way more fun. And all you need to do are just pick your Legends, drop off the ship, loot your stuff, got each other's back, survive each coming rounds and get kills, shoot your way to victory.

The Battle Royale is available in regular Public Matches and Ranked. Rank Tier starts with Iron to Apex Predators, and each tier starting from Bronze to Diamond has 5 Sub-tiers. The highest tier, Apex Predators, are given to top 750 Master Tier players on each servers, making it the highest tier in Ranked.

Free rewards are given to each players that has reached Diamond, Master, and Predators by the end of half seasons, some cool cosmetics such as; rank exclusive skins, rank badges, rank tier badge and profile picture frames, and rank tier exclusive skydive trails. Rank resets by the end of each half season, so if you're into Ranked Mode, make sure to rank up as high as possible to get the rank tier exclusive rewards before the season ends.

BASIC GAME MECHANICS

Now that you already know the basic stuff you need to know before you're jumping into the game, now let's talk about some of the mechanics. The core mechanics that sets Apex Legends Mobile apart from its competitors is obviously; the movement.

You can jump and slides downhill while also shooting at your enemies. It might seems like a difficult task to learn for beginners but with enough time, it'll be way easier to do. Once you have an understanding of basic jump-slides, the right momentum, and enough map understanding, you'll able to do cool things such as; wall jumps, bunny hopping, peek over walls and ledges, boost jumps and slides by using ziplines and map's topography, and many more.

Some Legends with movement abilities gives you speed boosts like Fade's Sliptream or Rhapsody's Tactical, or Octane's jump pads that shoots you up in the air, or Pathfinder's grappling hook that lets you swing around the maps and do some insane movements combos. There's pretty much nothing else out there that will treat you with such dynamic movement mechanics, other than Apex Legends. The sky is literally the limit.

There are 4 different types of classes in Apex Legends Mobile. Offensive, Defensive, Recon, and Support. Each Legends has passive abilities, a tactical ability, and an ultimate. Each has their own different uses, number of charges, durations, and cooldown time. Compared to the main game, some of Legends' abilities are slightly altered and adjusted, to be more accessible for mobile and touch screen inputs.

At the moment, only the Recon and Defensive Legends that has class-based passive ability. Recon Legends are the only class that are able to use Survey Beacons available across the maps to scan the next ring location. Defensive Legends has Fortified passive, that let them to take 15% less damage and they cannot be slowed by coming bullets.

I heard some news and rumors are saying that Respawn is planning to make a rework overhaul to the classes for Apex Legends PC/console, that might be coming to the Mobile version too in later updates.

EVO SHIELDS & ARMORS

Apex Legends has a different take on body armors, that are unique to the game compared to their competitors. They're called EVO Shield and Knockdown Shield. We starts off the match with a Level 1 EVO Shield that could absorb 100 damage, level 1 helmet and a level 1 Knockdown Shield.

Looting isn't the only way to gain beefier body armor, because the game encourages you to engage in combat and deal damage by letting you upgrades your EVO shield depending on how much damage you're dealing. Your damage number will convert into EVO points and gradually upgrades your EVO shield the more damage you're dealing, up to a level 4 maxed EVO Shield.

This way makes every gunfights more rewarding for players, but.. Depending on its level, EVO Shields could also makes time-to-kill longer than your average battle royale games. And it could be even longer and less predictable with the addition of Legends that has Healing and Shield Regen capabilities.

When you get knocked, you'd still able to protect your self with a Knockdown Shield that can absorb a certain amount of damage from whichever direction you're facing. Knock down shield with higher rarity absorbs more damage, with the Gold Knockdown Shield being the only one that lets you have the ability to self-revive.

Once you're dead/eliminated, your team mates are still able to pick up your banner from your Deathbox and deliver it to a Respawn Beacon to get you back into the game. Respawn Beacons can only be used one time for bringing back eliminated players, but there are a couple of available Beacons through out the maps or you can use a deployable Mobile Respawn Beacons that you can find by looting or inside a Care Package.

WEAPONS & ORDNANCE

There are plenty of guns available in Apex Legends Mobile that can fit to any of your play style. Guns are classified by their types and which ammo they're using. All the weapons available on Apex Legends Mobile are the same guns that exist in the main PC/console version.

Currently, the only weapons from the main game that hasn't been added into the mobile version are C.A.R. SMG and Bocek Compound Bow.

You can customize your weapons to fits your needs and preferred play style with different types of attachments you can get by looting, like barrel stabilizer, extended mags, weapon stocks, and different ranges of optical and digital scopes.

Depending on their qualities, some attachments lets your guns to have perks, like better recoil controls, faster handling and aim drifts reduction, reduces muzzle flash, more rounds per magazine, reduces reload time, thermal imaging that lets you see and highlight enemies through gas cloud or smoke screens.

There are also special attachments called Hop Ups that could alter the way you use a certain type of weapons. Such as; faster firing rates for shotguns, removing initial charge time for certain Energy ammo based guns, dual shells reloading capabilities for certain types of guns, a hop up that lets you deal more headshot or unshielded damage, modify some guns' firing modes from burst/rapid fire to single fire, and more.

With so many ammo types, attachments, and items with different range of quality, you might think it'll be so overwhelmingly confusing.. But no need to worry, because every items are color coded accordingly to show you their types or rarity.

During a battle royale match, 4 Care Packages will spawn at random locations as the players move through ring closures and will be announced to all surviving players to be contested for. Each Care Packages contains 3 random obtainable items and is the only possible way to get your hands on Care Package Weapons. These weapons are fully kitted, and often considered as game changer.

There 3 type of weapons that you can get from Care Packages; 2 fully kitted weapons and the all mighty Kraber. These 2 fully kitted weapons are taken from ground loot and will be temporarily not available to find anywhere during seasonal rotation, except the Care Packages.

And Kraber being one of the most powerful weapon in the game that has one shot, instant death capability, if you managed to land a direct headshot. These weapons will be highlighted in Red, showing its fully-kitted superiority.

There are also several ordnances and deployable items, available all over the map as you loot while rotating the map. There are a couple explosives in the game, like Frag Grenades, Termite Grenades, and Arc Star. And deployable devices such as Heat Shield to prevent you from ring damage and Mobile Respawn Beacon to quickly respawn your eliminated team mates without needing to find Respawn Beacon that stationed through out the maps.

I'm also going to mention a couple of special weapons that has their own unique mechanics, that further adds layers of possible different play styles. Currently, there are 2 types of weapons that you're able to charge with certain ordnances, that could alter the way we use itu and modify some of their their base attributes. They're Rampage and Sentinel.

You're able to modify each regular ground loot Rampage LMG and Sentinel with certain items, that further improving its effectiveness and damage dealing capabilities.

Rampage could be charged with a Termite Grenades to significantly upgrades its firing rate and gives them the ability to break doors. Similar to Rampage, Sentinel is also able to be charged with Shield Cells to gives it a boost to its bullet travel time and longer travel distance. Once their charges depleted, you'll need another Termites and Shield Cells to give it another charges.

And don't forget about your melee attacks! It's surprisingly powerful in close range and also effective for breaking doors that are blocked by enemies hiding behind it.

REVOLUTIONARY PING SYSTEM

Apex Legends has one of the most comprehensive and full-featured Ping systems. It introduced us to a completely different way of communication without needing to open up your mic. Apex Legends was was the first game that introduced this ping systems back in 2019 when the game was released.

Despite the fact that EA holds the patent of Ping System, they still lets other games and developers to adopt this system into their game It was widely praised as one the most innovative and influential game features that later adopted into so many modern shooter games.

With only a touch of button, you're able to communicate with your team mates instantly with specific sets of functions. Your Legends will speak with their own in-game voicelines for your self whenever you're using the Ping button. Tap the ping button once to suggest a location to go, double tap to ping at locations wherever you spot enemies.

Tap and hold ping button to bring up the Ping Wheels, it lets you to ping with more contextual voice lines to let your other team mates knows what you see or your next area rotation plans. It also lets you ping any items in the game that you or your team mates might needs. You can also use Ping Functions to let your other team mates know what Items need that you don't have or lacking.

SIGNATURE WEAPONS

Signature Weapons is a mobile exclusive feature and basically different take on Heirlooms from the main game. If you don't know or never heard about Heirlooms, here's a simple explanation for it; they're functioning as a substitute of your melee attacks, it does not gives you any advantages in any form (except to looks cool) since they're only for cosmetic purpose.

Unlike in the main game's Heirloom, you can upgrade and customize your Signature Weapons with skins and visual effects. You also able to unlock custom kill feed banner after leveling up your Signature Weapon. You can obtain 4 Signature Merits from Daily Missions each day and 200 Signature Merits from Free Tier Battle Pass. I've managed to get mine just by playing the regularly enough for an entire season update, and I'm only a casual.

But, if you have the money and not the patience, you can buy it directly with in-game currency. There's another item called Signature Tributes, that similar to main game's Heirloom Shards. You'll need 40 Signature Tributes to be able to unlock a Signature Weapon. But unlike in the main game, you can directly buy Signature Tributes in bundles for a way cheaper price tag compared to getting 150 Heirloom Shards randomly from loot boxes in the main game.

PROGRESSION & CUSTOMIZATIONS

Some of the game modes, features, and Legends in this game are locked behind level progression. You can level up your accounts just by playing the game. Each level will gives you free rewards such as loot boxes, weapon skins, and in-game currency called Flux Coin, that can be use to buy skins and other stuff in the Crafting section on the Store.

As you level up your account, you're also leveling up your Legends' Mastery by that lets you to unlock Legends' Perks. For now, Perks System is an exclusive feature to Apex Legends Mobile only. Perks lets you do many things, that could alter certain mechanics of abilities, to improve existing passive abilities, some even are considered as a total game changer.

You can equip skins ranging from Common to Eternal rarity. You can also equip stats trackers to your banner, showing off badges that you received from completing a certain task or achievements, banner frames, and Legends' pose.

One of the coolest cosmetic features that Apex Legends has are Finisher and Skydive Emote. You can use your equipped Finisher to finish your knocked down enemies and send them straight into their Deathbox. But looking cool isn't the only purpose of Finishers..

By using it, not just dealing damage, but also you're gaining points for your EVO Shield and restoring a certain amount of shield you've lost during combat. Some perks are also able to let your Finisher grants you a better attachments quality that you're currently using, faster mag reload for a certain amount of time, or 100 extra EVO points.

Apex Legends Mobile regularly releasing new Legends on each updates, coming from the main game and some newer mobile-exclusive Legends, like Fade and Rhapsody. Obtaining new Legends in the mobile version is a bit different compared to the main game.

In the mobile version, you're able to obtain 10 Legend Tokens through out thre first 25 levels of free tier battle pass. As long as you able to get to battle pass level 25, you don't need to worry about missing out all the fun.

Season Updates are split split into 2 parts, and each half will last for 6 weeks. Each half season has their own battle passes with a maximum of 50 levels. No need to explain any further, because battle passes are basically the norm nowadays.. But I gotta admit, for roughly $5, Apex Legends Mobile Premium battle passes are totally worth the value.

It costs 799 Syndicate Golds and has a couple of season limited Legendary and Eternal tier skins for weapons and Legends, weapon charms, and a couple of limited stats trackers. And if you're able to max it out before the season ends, it'll give you back 800 Syndicate Golds. So basically, you'll only need to have a single purchase and get your self an infinite battle pass.

MOBILE EXCLUSIVE CONTENTS

Other than Third-person mode, Mobile-exclusive Legends, Perks System, and Signature Weapons, there are a couple of mobile-exclusive contents and features that set itself apart from the main game. That includes mobile-exclusive game modes, limited skins, seasonal events, world chat and recruitment channel, and also, a way way better Firing Range compared to what the main game has.

Apex Legends Mobile has a some of the main game's LTM (limited time modes) like Arena, Gun Game, and Solo, but it also offers a tons of its own mobile-exclusive modes, such as; Team Deathmatch, Second Shot Blitz, Quick Battle, Mastery Missions, and many more are planned to be be added in the future.

But for me, the main star here is the mobile's Firing Range. It's sooo much better than what we have in the main game. Mobile's Firing Range has an actual aim training feature that you can customize, from its difficulty, range of targets, you can make the dummies the ability to move around and even to shoot you back, there are built-in damage counter and distance indicator.

And the best part of all is.. It lets you to have infinite ammo and removes ability cool downs! It's nothing like the one we have in the main game, and it's heavenly. It's a million times better than what the main game have, it's sooo good I really want it to be in the main game.

PROS & CONS

No games are perfect. There will always be some things that they did right but also some let downs, ranging from occurring issues such as bugs and glitches, to several mild annoyance like server issues, random ping spikes, etc.

PROS :

¬ Intense and fast paced matches

¬ Unmatched movements and team combos

¬ Innovative and comprehensive Ping systems

¬ Mobile-exclusive game modes and contents

¬ Has a better take on Apex Legend's Heirloom

¬ Improved clubs system, better incentives

¬ Customizable external Controller supports

¬ Affordable battle pass that has good value

CONS :

¬ Movements might a little difficult for new players

¬ Skill Base Match Making (SBMM) that often broken

¬ Existing bugs, audio bugs, and random lags

¬ Invisible gas trap, Loba's tactical glitch, and other exploits

¬ Some lobbies are plagued by hackers and cheaters

And... That's all! Go check the game to see it yourself :) Be sure to leave a like and save this post if you find this post useful. Tho, it's not an actual review.. It's just me saying random bs trying to explain what is the game about.

Mentioned games

Apex Legends Mobile

8.8

ActionStrategyCasualTactical ShooterMultiplayerShooter

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Apex Legends™

8.7

Fast-pacedSci-fiBattle RoyaleFPSActionMultiplayerShooter

Get

Comments

Noxcope

Last time i played, they were hardly any enemies to kill in the lobbies. Might be a good game but for mobile there isn't a large enough player base. You left that part out.

2022-12-08

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Buttermilkk

what rank u were playing at?

2022-12-08

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Buttermilkk

Definitely br of the year, very smooth global launch, overall they did outstanding job of porting this game. Even though I prefer more cod style br, with no futuristic weapons, and human like operators. I really enjoyed this game, and played for two seasons. Now am waiting on warzone

2022-12-08

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Gakstr福 Author

Well it's the opposite for me. I came from playing Apex on PC, and since the rising popularity of PUBG, the realistic-style kind of shooters got overly saturated. Especially on mobile platform, they're mostly are copycats with their own little twist and gimmicks but nothing that significant to differentiate them apart Apex is kind of unique, but not just because their futuristic-theme, but some game changing mechanics like their satisfying and complex movements and ping systems that no games out there has. Those are some reasonw that keeps me coming back for more

2022-12-08

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WASGIJ ¿

mean bro hit the nail square with this bang on description 👌 I've never played on PC or Console too poor to spend on that stuff but have the S22 Ultra so lol 😆 loving this game atm played CoDM since season 2 it's bit sh!t these days everything so expensive too just to look cool 😎 yea nah.... I've got some cool af skins unlocked all the Legends so cracking on with this shiz man mean game I voted game if the year too so chur 👌🏽🤙🏾

2022-12-07

Author liked

Gakstr福 Author

Good to know that you're enjoying the game. As an Apex PC players, I'm actually really surprised that my experience with ApexM gameplay could almost feel the same as the main game

2022-12-07

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