Recent updates are about taking risks with Apex says Respawn

Apex Legends has undergone some major changes over the last few months. The Season 23 update brought a huge shift to the games meta. Dubbed the "season of support" developers overhauled the Support Class, in particular giving significant power to Newcastle, as well as reworking Lifeline.

These changes have had a big impact on the game. Newcastle's pick rate peaked at almost 14%, with Lifeline reaching almost 21%. Lifeline has remained the single most popular Legend in the game, and is popular across all skill levels.

Now, the Season 23.5 update continues the season of support. Loba and Mirage are getting a big suite of upgrades, designed to make Loba a more aggressive Legend, and push Mirage towards a "jack of all trades" position in the meta.

esports.gg spoke to Lead Legend Designer, Devan McGuire ahead of the Season 23.5 update to get the inside scoop on the changes, and the game's health in general.

You can read full details about todays Apex Patch notes here.

Devan, says that the season of support has done what the Respawn team expected it to do so far.

"I think it's done what we expected it to do, which is disrupt the current state of the game and the meta and the way that you think about Apex. People take fights differently or they have to think about fights differently. They now have to slow down, you know where everyone is once you get into an engagement. You're playing off the different shields that are going up, and the better team has to come up with the strategy of when to push.

"So there's an interesting dynamic that has developed that we kind of expected to see take place. Has it been met with universal praise and applause? No, I think there's still folk who enjoy the kill rush feel of the previous structure and system. And we definitely over-tuned in a few different axis that have made certain revival loops and such frustrating.

"So that's why we saw the removal of the gold knock to kind of get away from getting the free 100 health on top of auto-regenning, because that was causing some frustration. In addition, that's why we saw the patch [before Christmas] with some of the early levers that we wanted to pull down on from Lifeline and Newcastle who were kind of dominating with their pick rate.

"But as a support season, as a way of pushing the game in this new direction that we wanted to try out, we're seeing it hit those marks and bring characters into the limelight that haven't seen that day on a global scale. So it's been pretty exciting overall, I think."

Some Apex fans have noticed that recent updates have been a lot more aggressive than previous seasons. Season 23 made sweeping changes to the Support Class, driving them firmly into the meta. Now, the Season 23.5 patch gives Mirage and Loba some serious buffs, and overhauls several different weapons. Is this a sign of a new approach to balance in Apex Legends?

"I wouldn't say that it's a sign of that being a structure that we want to follow. I think it's a sign that we are going to take more bold risks and changes with the game moving forward. We're going to go after more experimental things that try to shake up the game from its level of stillness.

"We've had a few seasons in the past where we've launched a new feature or we put some meta changes in and just because of the nature of the way that Apex is played or the current thing that is popular at the moment not being hit as hard or as heavy as it could have been, a lot of things kind of simmer.  They take a long time before people kind of grow into them and we wanted to experiment with injecting something that is a lot more in your face, something you can't ignore, something that's more disruptive.

"We want to be more disruptive with Apex and the changes we're doing going forward so that people take note. It doesn't mean that those things are permanent. It doesn't mean that they won't change, it just means that you will see something new and exciting in Apex that you get to try out. And we'll take the lessons learned from that and make adjustments moving forward to leave in the things that are successful and prominent and pull back on the things that aren't in favor of new changes in the future.

"So, it's  not a direction of the way that we're going after a cycle of meta to come. But, definitely something that we want to show that as a team, we're willing to take larger risks with the game to get more spark and find the next thing that's going to be exciting for Apex."

Loba is getting some big changes in the Season 23.5 update, in particular to her tactical ability. This will give her a lot more movement potential, helping Loba players be more aggressive and take more risks. What was on the developers minds when looking at what to change about Loba?

"There's a lot of [quality of life] changes that are going into this patch. There's a lot of things that are gone in there just to make her feel better and maneuver and handle better. Like faster deployment of her ultimate, it being quicker to activate, you can use the vaults more easily and more readily.

"Then there is lots of things around her passive being more useful to players, and her tac having lesser cooldowns and lesser VFX calling it out as it's moving through the air. Things like that that kind of just improve her general clunkiness and the quality to make her useful.

"Then we are also going after the two sort of angles that we feel we want to direct players into for her playstyle. There's the more supportive Loba, who can play off of the gathering of meds and items for her team. So really leaning into getting the support meds out of the black market, expanding the shopping spree upgrade to allow it to go to all teammates and giving everyone a bag so they can have more meds at their disposal.

"Then the other path is one is what I think the community has wanted for a long time. It's taking advantage of her teleport and her more potential for an aggressive, almost skirmisher style play style.  that is something that we wanted to drive home with the double tacical charges, the faster manipulation of the tactical, and then the two upgrades that kind of play into her assaulting and escaping aspects of playing off of that tactical.

"So we're really hoping that those play styles kind of resonate, shine, they kind of push her to her extremes and we see a stronger, more confident Loba in our games."

For Mirage, the developer team are experimenting with seeing if they can make Mirage the ultimate utility man. Allowing him to access all different types of things in the game usually limited to a single class.

"On the Mirage side, there are two angles there that we wanted to approach. One was that Mirage is constantly noted as having not enough team utility in his kit, especially to be viable in more ranked styles of play. And so the addition of the Renaissance Man upgrade that gives him access to all of the more strategic elements along the map is one of our attempts to go after that angle for Mirage.

"As a support player, he can play off his revive, but he also brings an angle to the team that allows them to play off the strategic elements and gives him more versatility and viability. And then the cloaking thing, that's for fun. That is to go after a style of Mirage that makes him feel like he's opening up a whole new angle to how to play that character and how to play off a situation that is normally very on the defensive.

"You're hurt, you're wounded. This is not a good time for you. Mirage spins that on his head and allows him to get away with more aggressive plays or get out of a sticky situation where he might not have been able to before. And it really opens up the field for how people can play off of Mirage in that role to be supportive or to be an interesting skirmishing flanker who takes a hit, manoeuvres, and then comes right back into the fight."

Devan notes that in their internal playtesting, Phoenix Kits were suddenly a lot more valuable for Mirage players. His cloaking lasts as long as the healing consumable, so the Phoenix Kit becomes a much more attractive option letting Mirage cloak for several seconds. You can use this to heal and move to safety, rather than having to find a very safe spot to use such a slow consumable.

Stay tuned to esports.gg for the latest Apex Legends Season 23 news.