In an interview with IGN, it was revealed that developers at Respawn Entertainment want to keep Apex Legends alive and running for twenty years. There’s a desire to keep the live service game functioning for two decades, and there was even a comparison made between Apex and traditional sports, which have ‘been around for 100 plus years’.
It’s an admirable goal, but Apex Legends is already a quarter of the way towards achieving it. Typically, battle royale games like Apex Legends, Fortnite, and PUBG don’t see sequels emerge – they simply upgrade and expand on what already exists. There’s a strong foundation supporting Apex Legends, but is it enough for the game to last another fifteen years in operation?
Build It And They Will Come
In the interview, published by IGN, the senior design director behind Apex Legends, Evan Nikolich, was quick to compare Apex Legends to Counter-Strike. That’s a franchise that has remained incredibly stable for almost twenty-three years, and recently, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive went so far as to beat its own peak concurrent player record on Steam.
Nikolich explained what he meant:
Where we want to get to is that Apex is going to last for 20 years like Counter-Strike. It has to be able to be self-sufficient and stand on its own. The systems have to be strong and interesting and good for players to play season over season, even if we’re not adding new bespoke content.
So, even if Respawn stops adding new content to Apex Legends and simply keeps the lights on, there’s a belief there that players would keep the platform abuzz with activity, year after year after year. It’s not so tough to imagine that it’s at least a possibility.
Recently, EA’s DICE – a sister studio to Respawn – prepared to action the shutting down of all existing Medal of Honor multiplayer servers, some of which are more than fifteen years old. It’s not dramatically far-fetched to picture a different EA-owned studio keeping a skeleton crew in place to run a two-decade-old battle royale title, right?
In social circles and on streaming and gaming platforms, Apex Legends is consistently one of the most popular games out there – and easily in the top three when it comes to battle royale games. It’s a strong esports title, it charts high on Twitch and YouTube, and it’s constantly seeing updates delivered by Respawn that revitalise the platform every time.
Even if it won’t last another fifteen years, it’s here for the foreseeable future.
For more Insider Gaming news, check out our coverage of the latest Fortnite update.
