Apex Legends Escape preview: New Legend Ash, and the game’s largest map

That approach is seen most within Storm Point’s most noteworthy feature, the new Gravity Cannon flinging players practically from one end of the game’s largest map to another. According to Rodney Reece, the level designer, the cannon adapts to players’ preferences. Apex Legends’ redeploy balloons to get the drop on their opponents. His goal was to not only nerf and squash a meta tactic. But to also enhance the developer’s intentions that go all the back. Apex Legends’ original design.

“We always intended these to be methods to outrun the ring,” Reece said, “but players started using them as a tactical advantage. And so, we’re like, how can we get this original design intent through a different method?”

The Gravity Cannon is an alternative to the balloon that allows players to zip up onto a floating platform before gliding down into an area they choose. Reece explained that Gravity Cannon developers gave players the ability to use their guns and other tactical skills if their flight path took them past their opponent. On another map, a redeploy balloon may let players pick a landing spot, roughly speaking, but they can’t do anything else as they glide down.

“It needed to be more than just a binary thing,” Reece explained. “Early on, we knew that we wanted to give you your abilities when you’re going through the air. We started realizing that we can place these to help you outrun the ring, but we can actually put them over areas where you can’t land — but you can interact with it.”

Reece gave the example of Bangalore spotting a skirmish and dropping her Rolling Thunder ultimate — literally an air strike — as she passes overhead. “What that does is, one, it’s a cool feeling that you did; but it also allows [Respawn designers] to create an approach which helps the other team understand where their enemy is coming from, as opposed to a redeploy balloon where you have complete control, and you can land on any rooftop you want.”

Building a battle royale map with no redeploy balloons “was a sensitive subject,” Reece admitted. But Respawn designers grew confident that they could do this without upsetting the game’s balance as newer Legends were introduced, with skills more suited to a map with a lot of verticality but no glide points. Valkyrie joined the game during Season 9, which ended Aug. The Legend Ash joined the game in Nov. 2.

“We knew both of those Legends could introduce this,” he said. “You can sometimes see in the trailers where, like, [Ash is]Below is an area she can use [Phase Breach] ultimate to get up to that — those were made in concert with each other. It’s like, OK, we’re gonna make sure everybody can get to these locations, but we can be a little bit more bold to get into, essentially, the Legend meta.”

Grid View

Ash is a character by Titanfall 2Last week’s reveal of a playable Legend revealed that she is well-suited for Storm Point thanks to her passive skill, Marked for Death. It will show you where Legends are currently killed and highlight the locations. The Marked for Death can emit a helpful ping when Ash hovers over the Gravity Cannon. This alerts the player to an upcoming fight that might be missed under the jungle canopy.

As Storm Point complements her abilities, Ash can be brought into the world by Ash. Apex Legends in a way that honors both her narrative history and makes her appealing at the selection screen was a bit of a challenge, said lead writer Ashley Reed (and the character’s namesake, actually). You can read the rest of this article. Titanfall2, “you don’t really get a sense of her, internally, as a character,” Reed said. “Everything you see is from the outside looking in. People will know she’s very cruel and very manipulative, she likes to play with her victims.”

“But we also had to look at, OK, if we brought her into Apex, as a Legend, we need to have her look inward, we need to see who she is as a character,” Reed said, “and being an empathetic person, someone you’d actually want to play, while not being so fundamentally different from who she is now.” Ash is a simulacrum pilot, with warring personalities inside her cybernetic mind. Reed stated that lorehounds should pay close attention to each piece of dialogue during battles against Ash.

Preview trailers show Ash as a powerful and pious character who can play with her victims, before executing them. Balancing out a character with that kind of physical expression was also a delicate job, especially after last season’s new Legend, Seer, came out of the oven rather overpowered.

“We generally do try to launch characters on the strong side,” said Legend designer Devin Weise, “because we know we can always come back and balance them later on. We realized this, I believe. [Seer] was a bit too heavy handed there.” Launching Ash along with a new map, Weise said, means developers are trying to balance against two big variables that haven’t been tested out by the community. This also opens up the possibility of a character and a map being developed together for the first-time. This is how Ash, Storm Point and other maps were created.

“[Ash is] very confident, but sort of her weakness can be overconfidence, right?” Weise reasoned. “If you do try to use her ultimate to teleport into an enemy, or teleport and push enemies, you might realize, ‘Oh, crap, the whole team is right here, now I’m going to get shot in the face.’” Ash’s tactical ability, Arc Tether, can also present problems if used overconfidently or indiscriminately; sure, it restrains an enemy by lashing them to a spot, but they can still use their weapons, and their aiming isn’t slowed down, either. “That’s what we tried to go for, making sure that Ash felt like her abilities were powerful and interesting, but also, the enemies had some opportunity to counter them,” Weise said.

Apex Legends: Escape launches Nov. 2 on all platforms — Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Playstation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and iOS and Android. A new Battle Pass will be available for the new season, featuring new skins to Mirage, Gibraltar and Wraith, as well as 100 tiered unlocks. Ranked play will take place on Storm Point from Nov. 2 to Dec. 21, and World’s Edge from Dec. 21 to Feb. 8, 2022.