After fans rejected the proposed major changes to Apex Legends’ battle pass earlier this month, developer Respawn Entertainment has gone back to the drawing board. Now, we have the result, and while these changes will appease some, it’s ultimately still just the latest example of a company complicating the once simple act of getting the most out of a video game.
In a tweet on July 24, Respawn addressed fans directly and walked back on its most controversial changes: players will still be allowed to purchase the battle pass using in-game currency, a feature that Respawn was ready to axe.
“You’ve spoken, and we’ve listened,” the statement reads. “With the release of Season 22 we will restore the ability to get the Premium Battle Pass for 950 Apex Coins. We recognize that we could have handled the Battle Pass changes better—that’s on us.”
Previously, on July 8, Respawn announced that players would have to purchase two $10 battle passes per three-month-long season instead of one if they want to max out their quarterly rewards. Each battle pass would have a level cap of 60 instead of the 110 level cap of the single battle pass. The battle passes would also only be purchasable with real money, meaning players couldn’t roll over Apex Coins to cover its recurring cost.
While Respawn says the new battle pass structure will provide more value and rewards than before, the change is still asking players to spend double what they were before to keep up with the intended pace of the game’s seasonal content. More than 82,000 players submitted overwhelmingly negative reviews on Steam over the last two weeks in response to the changes.
Respawn is reinstating the ability to buy battle passes with Apex Coins, but in an extremely cumbersome way. Rather than providing an alternative way to buy the existing battle passes using Apex Coins, the game is rebranding all its battle pass tiers once again. Players who buy the pass with in-game currency will have access to the Premium tier. Those who pay cash will have access to the Ultimate tier. The only difference between “Premium” and “Ultimate” is Ultimate players instantly get eight additional Apex Packs and 1200 additional crafting metals.
What was known as “Premium +” before will now be called “Ultimate+.” Its benefits will remain the same as before. I think.
“Moving forward, we recognize that we need to be more timely, transparent, and consistent in our communications with you,” Wednesday’s reads. The new changes are still planned for the start of Season 22, which begins August 6.
Now I don’t know about you. But I find all of this to be a bit insane. Apex Legends is widely considered a great game that has kept players engaged for over five years. And yet, it's the latest game tripping over itself trying to make sense of a business model more and more players are growing weary of.
Even if you make peace with the two-battle pass structure, Respawn’s latest impenetrable breakdown of what any of this means to the average player is literally fun-repellent for anyone not fully immersed in all things Apex Legends.
Apex isn’t the only one guilty of this. Xbox recently rebranded all of its Game Pass tiers, changing most of these tiers for the worse. Earlier this week, Windows Central reported that Microsoft may introduce even more tiers to the four that already exist. Games like Overwatch 2, Halo Infinite and Fortnite have all had to navigate the nightmare of changing their battle passes, to varying degrees of success not confusing their respective player bases. And God help you if you’re still trying to make sense of all the PlayStation Plus tiers introduced last year.
Just this week, the developers behind the upcoming PlayStation live service game Concord announced that there won’t be seasonal battle passes to buy. Concord may have an uphill battle gaining a foothold in the crowded service game market, but knowing I won’t have to pay for the privilege to watch an in-game meter fill up slightly faster is very appealing in today’s messy live service landscape. It’s even cooler knowing Concord won’t have a bunch of confusing charts, graphs, and awkward apologies explaining which hat and pointless in-game resource I’ll get for buying in.
Wirecutter’s Arthur Gies put it best in his tweet earlier this week. Battle passes and gaming subscriptions have officially hit the point of looking more like “picking a cell plan” than an optimal way of getting more value for your dollar. I liked gaming better when I could focus entirely on the hobby, not on which recurring bill is the right one for me.
