That leaves only Anthem , whose global February 22 launch will mark the only proper live-service competitor to Apex Legends . Though Anthem is unquestionably beautiful and has thrilling combat and movement that Crackdown developers ought to take note of, there is the unavoidable fact that it is EA's answer to Destiny , and the online loot-shooter genre Anthem 's obvious source material spawned is marred by a series of hard-to-avoid caveats. It does more to ensure that players won't be locked out of certain time-limited content by providing matchmaking in areas that the Destiny franchise neglects, but (as EA has clearly done its homework) it's difficult to not fear that launch content will prove much more sparse than initially expected, much as it was in both Destiny entr

It's clear that the game is generating an enormous audience, and as such, more and more people are flocking to it. But this isn't like most games. Yes, it has a tutorial, but that is very brief and hardly goes into the mechanics and complexities of the game, its controls, and its various strategies. This obviously results in many ignorant players, many of whom could probably be better players if they knew the intricate mechanics of the game rather than just the base contr

Eradicating duplicates is just one of the for-the-player quality of life improvements Apex Legends offers. When starting a match, there's virtually no load time, nor is there a lobby waiting area. Players get into matches almost immediately. During gameplay players can mark and highlight enemies, loot, or any point of interest on the map (a version of the marking system from Rainbow Six Siege mixed with enemy marking from Battlefield ) for very welcome in-Slg game News intel sharing/communication. When picking up mods and armor, items are automatically equipped where they should be instantaneously and there's already ammo in the weapon. Every thing a player would want or imagine should happen with fundamental game mechanics, simply does in Apex Legends and it just goes to show how other shooters and battle royale games are missing out on some key featu

It's not a bad weapon after you've obtained a few upgrades for it, but getting there is going to be a slog. The locked burst fire really drags it down in terms of DPS, limiting its ability to maintain pressure and remain useful inside of mid-range. There are definitely better ways to make use of the heavy ammo it consu

New players may feel the need to pick up everything - after all, you never know when a Skullpiercer will come in handy! The only thing is that certain items are only applicable with certain weapons, and that Skullpiercer is useless if you're using a Devotion and Peacekeeper. Picking up random items is a good way to needlessly clog your backpack, and worse, you could be inhibiting your teammate who DOES have a gun compatible with the Skullpiercer. Pay attention to what does w

Pathfinder is an often overlooked Legend, mainly because the majority of people sleep on his tactical and ultimate abilities. Why shoot zip lines when you can rain down missiles, you know? However, his grapple is actually very effective in the right hands and can be utilized offensively. Pathfinder can grapple enemy players, which of course swiftly closes the gap between their respective locations. Follow this up with a quick shotgun blast, and you can see how useful it can

Another unique element to Apex Legends is the ability to revive downed allies. Like other battle royale titles, a player is downed before being killed off and they can hold a shield item in their inventory to prevent players from shooting them to finish them off. Enemies can however, get up close an employ a lethal execution animation (these are also battler royale fists). But even then, players can recover the tags of their downed ally and bring them to a revive point where they can then re-enter the match via a dropship, but without any of their loot. These layers upon layers add so much to the dynamic of the usual die and go back to the menu style of more punishing battle royale experien

But it's not just about improving what already works from the battle royale genre since Apex Legends adds many all-new features too. Matches are fast and usually completed in less than 20 minutes. At the beginning of a given match there's a dropship players jump from, like any other battle royale, but in this one players jump together as a squad and one player is designated the "Jumpmaster" to keep them together. Players can manually separate from the pack of course, but it's a smart change to enforce the idea that Apex Legends is a truly a squad-based game. There currently are no solo or duo mo

The Hot Zone is the initial area on the map with incredible loot. Naturally, teams flock to it in the hopes of obtaining high tier armor and weapons. And there's nothing worse than a new player going to it and getting downed in the first thirty seconds while their teammates are on the other side of the map. We understand that dropping there makes for a good learning experience, but if you want to train, play with friends and not with rand