Apex Legends, the surprise battle royale title from Respawn Entertainment, broke records when it launched back in February. For a period, the game was beating out Fortnite in terms of viewers on Twitch. However, some of those views were not organic, with EA paying many streamers to push the game. Now, just a couple of months later, it seems that interest in Apex Legends is fading fast.
According to analysis from Seeking Alpha, the battle royale title is “wildly overvalued.” It pulls from search results on Google Trends as well as Twitch viewership. Of course, it’s possible to say that interest simply stabilized. However, Seeking Alpha compares this to Fortnite‘s launch, in which interest only increased as time went on. In fact, Apex viewership fell sharply just days after launch, once streamers left the game to head elsewhere. This isn’t to say Apex Legends is a failure. Not even close. But, the game, despite beating Fortnite out on Twitch for a couple of days, will never reach that level of popularity.
Around a week after launch, Apex broke Fortnite‘s record of single-day viewership. The former hit 8.28 million hours on Twitch, breaking the latter’s 6.6 million. This was largely due to a tournament held during that period in which players like Ninja participated.
At the time of release, we were on the Apex Legends bandwagon as well. Our review gave the title a 4.5/5, calling it a “direct response to criticisms of the battle royale genre.” For example, Apex has a ping system that allows you to call out any item, place, or enemy you see. This ensures you can play and communicate properly with your teammates even without voice chat. I’ve won many a game by relying solely on this pinging function, and I hope other games replicate this.
If you’re still playing Apex, check out our guide on the game’s recent “kite glitch.” Also, take note that Respawn doesn’t want to update the game like Fortnite. Instead of the former’s constant updates, Apex will see fewer, more “thoughtful” changes.
