Popular multiplayer games sooner or later get mobile versions – either similar to the PC, or reduced. PUBG Mobile, League of Legends: Wild Rift, and soon the mobile Valorant will follow. Apex Legends Mobile has burst into the market of pocket entertainment, designed to take away all your free time.
Same, but not the same.
The first thing offered is a tutorial from which players of the usual Apex Legends learn nothing new. You can run, you can jump, slide, open containers of supplies, carry two guns and attach attach attachments to them, aim and shoot from the hip, and so on. One of the main differences of the mobile version is the third-person mode, which probably should appeal to fans of PUBG Mobile and its clones. To avoid imbalance, first- and third-person view players don’t get into each other’s matches – the choice must be made before finding the lobby.
In terms of content, mobile Apex in some ways inferior to the original, and in some ways it is richer. Characters, for example, markedly less – available only the starting roster of eight heroes plus Octane and exclusive to “mobile” Fade. Map in the battle royal only one – “the edge of the world. But the modes are more diverse: in addition to the standard (and ranking), there are two types of team deathmatch, arena and firing range with a weekly challenge. In the future it is planned to add not only new modes, but also exclusive maps.
The essence of the battle royal at the transfer to phones and tablets has not changed. Teams of three jump out of the plane, search the neighborhood and destroy each other, escaping inside a narrowing ring. The main change, of course, has to do with the touch controls. I don’t play a lot of mobile shooters, but I somehow got used to them relatively quickly, although the screen is studded with a huge number of buttons, which sometimes accidentally clicked. Aiming, shooting, jumping, crouching, rolling, reloading, abilities… Fortunately, the scheme can be changed.
Another good news is full gamepad support. I connected a DualSense controller to my iPad via Bluetooth, and it’s easier to play because I have more experience with the controller. The control is not perfect – for example, when the character is lifted after being wounded, he starts firing non-stop, and this can only be corrected by tapping the screen. But in general, there are no serious inconveniences. Another option for those who did not learn to aim at the sensor is the gyroscope, which is included here in the settings and also works well. There are a huge number of settings related to sensitivity.
Something new.
Regardless of the control chosen, players can take advantage of exclusive features that the console Apex Legends does not have. In particular, there are visual cues for the hearing impaired – you can tell where there is shooting or someone walking loudly. And there’s also automatic loot pickup – both from the floor and from crates left behind by dead match participants. You just interact with the crate – and all matching high quality ammo to your weapon is hooked automatically. Because of this you sometimes equip scopes you don’t want to use, but that’s the only drawback. And if it annoys you, you can turn off the autoswitching by one click, without going into the menu.
Another curious feature of Apex Legends Mobile is the presence of a progression tree for each character. The more you play as a character, the higher the skill becomes, and along with this are given points to buy upgrades. Lifeline will restore more health when picking up a wounded person or start adding 100 shield points when executing an execution. Bangalore will see enemies through smoke when aiming. It’s dangerous to get used to such bonuses – then you’ll go back to the regular Apex Legends, and there’s nothing like that there. But the idea is fun and encourages newcomers to play as different characters.
The game runs more or less stable. On my eighth-generation iPad (released in 2020) the default setting is medium graphics settings, but they were allowed to increase, including increasing the frame rate. The same maximum settings on this device can not choose for obvious reasons.
Extra data the game does not load without permission – the voice in any language other than English, it is necessary to download separately, as well as maps for additional modes. So, if you’re only interested in the battle royal, you can save space.
Not without bugs – a character, for example, can randomly make remarks. It happened that Lifeline reported on the summoning of the healing drone five times per game, although I did not press the appropriate button at all.