I really preferred the game duration of season 4

So... Yeah, here's my point.

Season 4 - I started Apex Legends due to a recommendation. I was hesitant at first because I previously avoided any kind of Battle Royale and PvP altogether, but decided to join either way. And since it was really fun I continued playing. What I enjoyed the most? The long matches that often took 12 minutes or more.

It was very common for the ring to shrink into the 4th of even 5th stage. Which was good! I loved this extended style. People actually focused on survival, and it became a cluster of chaos in ring 4 or ring 5 when 3+ squads fought each other. It was amazing, it was adrenaline-pumping in the later rings, you felt rewarded when you actually won.

It's a bit different in the recent seasons. The first ring has just finished forming, and the squads are usually already down to 4 squads or something like that. Which is honestly sad considering a game which was about survival ends before any significant events can even happen. People seek each other out almost excessively. Drawn out matches rarely exist

And I'm not even sure why that is. Nothing really changed about the game speed. The games gradually became shorter and shorter, and no doubt will we see matches ending before the first ring is even done shrinking.

What happened?