Following a damning report earlier this week into the human cost of Epic Games’ gruelling, “endless” Fortnite update and crunch schedule, Respawn Entertainment has reiterated that it’s sticking to its original plans for more measured seasonal updates to its own free-to-play battle royale game Apex Legends – because “We don’t want to overwork the team”.
Apex Legends was an instant smash when it launched in February, and has, to date, acquired over 50 million players – with many of those (especially players used to Epic’s breakneck Fortnite update schedule) eager to see more new content on a regular basis.
However, speaking at the GameBeat Summit earlier this week (as reported by Gamasutra), Respawn Entertainment CEO Vince Zampella explained why that won’t be the case, and why the studio is sticking to its seasonal plans: “The thought was, ‘Hey we kind of have something that’s blowing up here, do we want to start trying to drop more content?’ But I think you look at quality of life for the team. We don’t want to overwork the team, and drop the quality of the assets we’re putting out. We want to try and raise that.”
