Respawn's Apex Legends Laser Focus Puts Titanfall Sequel On Back Burner
Apex Legends seemingly came out of nowhere and took the gaming scene by storm, further underscoring how insanely popular the battle royale genre is right now. Even though there was some strategic planning to generate excitement around Apex Legends when it first came out—publisher Electronic Arts paid some notable streamers to play the game at the outset—developer Respawn Entertainment says the launch still exceeded its expectations. Continued success also means a full commitment of time and resources, and so plans to hash out another Titanfall game have now taken a backseat.
"Regarding other games in development at Respawn, it is important to understand that there are entirely separate development teams working on Apex Legends and Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. Additionally, in order to fully support Apex Legends, we are pushing out plans for future Titanfall games," Apex Legends Executive Producer Drew McCoy said.
In addition, McCoy said that no resources are being pulled from Apex Legends to work on other titles in development, Titanfall or otherwise, nor is the developer yanking any resources from the team that is working on Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.
Titanfall fans are understandably going to be bummed at the news, though it's not surprising that Respawn Entertainment is committing itself to Apex Legends. The popular battle royale shooter burst out of the gate with 50 million players in the first month, and more since then. As McCoy notes, that is a "staggering" number for any game, especially one "from a relatively small team" that took its "first swing at a free-to-play game."
"Rapid growth is a wonderful thing to achieve, and we’re thrilled with the response we’ve received since launch. However, that growth comes with some clear challenges, and we’ve hit a few bumps along the way, including missteps with our updates, not giving players enough visibility into future content, and not properly setting expectations on how we plan to support Apex Legends," McCoy said.
Some of the things Respawn Entertainment plan to focus on in the coming weeks and months include slow server performance at the start of matches, audio issues that some users have reported, dealing with cheaters, and hit registration issues.
The developer has also committed to seasonal updates, along with "thoughtful updates throughout the season." In other words, Apex Legends will see the same kind of ongoing attention that Epic Games gives Fortnite. While these are free-to-play games, there is a ton of money that is generated through in-game purchases.
Tons of things planned for @PlayApex in the future. We are also committed to listening to player feedback.
— Vince Zampella (@VinceZampella) February 5, 2019
We are also working on more Titanfall for later in the year (yes, I said the T word). We love being able to experiment in this crazy universe!
As for Titanfall, technically this not a delay of Titanfall 3, because that was never announced in the first place. However, Respawn Entertainment CEO Vince Zampella did say back in February that the developer was working on "more Titanfall" content for later in the year.
"We love being able to experiment in this crazy universe!," Zampella said.
Whatever that content was, it will have to wait.
