Apex Legends sequel a possibility as EA CEO changes stance on live-service shooter's future
"Meaningful update" on the way.
EA is working on a "bigger, more meaningful update" to its live-service shooter Apex Legends, suggesting some form of sequel will be on the way.
During the company's latest earnings call, CEO Andrew Wilson responded to a question about the future of Apex, calling the game "one of the great new launches in our industry over the last decade".
However, he admitted the game has "not been headed in the direction we have wanted for some time", before acknowledging the development team is working towards a "meaningful update".
This update, though, will not arrive "on top of a Battlefield launch" - the company's other major shooter - which is expected to release before April 2026.
"We do believe that there should be a more major update that will probably happen after a Battlefield launch just in terms of timing and the team is diligently working through what that would be," said Wilson. "And then longer term, our expectation is that we'll continue to expand what this franchise is and how we support a core community of highly competitive players and new communities that want to come and experience all the greatness that Apex has to offer."
The company's aim is for Apex to be a franchise that lasts for decades and for that, an "even bigger, more meaningful update" would be required - "an Apex 2.0, if you will".
In the short-term, though, the company is focused on supporting the game's community with strong anti-cheat and new content. "I would say we have seen some progress in that, but probably not as much as we would have liked," said Wilson.
Wilson's comments seemingly backtrack on a previous earnings call in October last year, where he discussed the possibility of an Apex Legends sequel.
"Typically, what we have seen in the context of live service driven games at scale, is the Version Two thing has almost never been as successful as the Version One thing,” he said at the time.
"Any time we cause a global player community to have to choose between the investments they've made to date and future innovation creativity, that's never a good place to put our community in, and so our objective will be to continue to innovate in the core experience, and you're seeing that from season to season now as our seasons get progressively bigger and we're changing kind of key modalities of play within those seasons."
Wilson's latest comments appear to be a slight backtrack with the mention of an Apex 2.0 in consideration, even if that remains some way off.
Elsewhere on the call, Wilson also backtracked on Dragon Age: The Veilguard, suggesting that perhaps it should've been a live-service game after all.