What happened to the best FPS in history
I've been playing apex legends since day 3 of release so I've seen it all. Playing the game as much as I do and coming from the peak of the games player base I just can't understand what's happened, to be perfectly honest. Coming from a terrible glitchy game like pubg Alpex was amazing. What I liked most about it is the only reason I still play it today: The movement. This is the key characteristic that made apex so great, but what about everything else? I understand that you want to retain your player base EA, however, that's not what's happening. If you don't start listening to your community this game will die.
The biggest issue facing apex today is weapon balance. In season zero, which brought the largest number of players the 'meta' weapons actually took skill to use. And there was variety. The spitfire was actually useable the R301 was an actual mid range assault rifle, like it was intended to be and the R99 was a higher recoil low magazine capacity high risk high reward weapon. In the current games meta high risk high reward has become no risk and high reward. As an example...The scout is disgustingly overpowered. It is a recoilless, no skill spam cannon that can be used effectively at close, medium, and long range. To this day I still haven't played a ranked game where I've lost to a gun except the scout. If this gun was in season zero I would of never gotten to this point in the game. I would probably still. E playing pubg.
One solution I have is one that's too obvious. Its apparent that apex was intended to be a close ranged fast paced game with the unrealistic slow muzzle velocity and high recoil weapons, however there's a problem with this. Since snipers have all been buffed so much there has been a huge gap in the game. What's that gap? Well... apex has no true medium range weapon. Every assault rifle is outclassed at medium ranges by a sniper. This is a massive problem due to the fact that assault rifles and smgs effective range is so small compared to snipers in this game. It's almost impossible to win a game without running a sniper now. Even in what should be considered close medium range there is no SMG or AR that can compete with the scout longbow or triple take. This leads to any automatic gun being effectively useless past about 50 meters which is utterly ridiculous, considering this is where they should shine.
Ranked has become a horrible experience now due to the current meta. 3 man teams of scouts and triple takes rule all. It's not even possible to push these players anymore considering just how overpowered these weapons have become.apex was once a game where the better team won no matter circle placement. That's what made it so great. Now the skill-less team that camps with caustic and Wattson traps wins effortlessly. I just don't see how it has gotten this bad...
Legends are at a complete imbalance. Mirage decoys haven't worked on anybody since season 2. Gibraltar doesn't lose with his double health. Octane is a worse version of pathfinder with abilities that get you less distance at the cost of health. Wattson has completely and utterly ruined ranked and high skill play with her abilities. The list just keeps going. The only balanced champions are probably caustic, Bangalore and, maybe wraith seeing how she's been nerfed 3 times now...
Another major issue is skill based matchmaking. Now keep in mind I'm a top 1% player so this effects me a lot more than it would effect the average player. In my perspective a battle royale is supposed to be a bunch of guys jumping out on an island and the better ones survive. In apex that's not the case. The better players have to play together and are forced to use about 3 meta guns or lose the game to an equally skilled player with better loot. At that point skill doesn't matter and apex just becomes a game where only better loot wins you the game. It's not a battle royale its 'loot' royals. Another issue is in these lobbies people group up with God like teammates in a party that random teammates stand no chance against. Something must be done about this. If I log into the game and press play I'll be matched with on average 800 kill teammates with no mics. But I'll be fighting teams of all 10,000+ kill players parted up together. How can I win even if I could beat them all 1v1??? Its just not fair. Skill based matchmaking is supposed to protect new and absolutely terrible players. Like it was originally intended on day 1 of the game. Not to match every good player together in a * show where only your loot luck matters. How is that even fun?
The only thing this game has going for it at this point is movement. Everything else has been destroyed over nerfed or overbuffed. The r301s recoil is to random now its just an inferior r99 with less range, dps and more recoil. Considering it's an AR it's quite ridiculous the r99 has more range.... Gibraltar is completely broken. His double health has killed the game. Red evo shields are too easy to obtain. The scout is busted as hell and is the best weapon at every range past maybe the 25 yards the r99 it is not possible to win a high tier ranked game without Watson which puts her in a place of being overpowered. It is not possible to push her and live. The weapon variation in the game has become to low. Only select guns are useable against equally skilled players. The havoc is obviously overpowered this season and is another low risk high reward no skill weapon. The the only weapon balance that has ever been implemented positively was the buffing of the RE45 and alternator. Past that all nerds have just made the game less playable and less enjoyable. The R301 once gave the game an assault rifle class. Now you might as well consider it an smg inferior in every way to the R99. THIS IS COMPLETELY RIDICULOUS in a balancing perspective...
As my going away all I have to say respawning entertainment/EA. Just keep in mind what brought so many players to this game. Movement, balanced weapons high skill gap play and balanced matchmaking
P.S. I really hope my voice matters to this company.
