As the Apex Legends Global Series heads to the Winter Circuit on January 29, we spoke with ALGS commissioner John Nelson about the future of Respawn Entertainment’s real battle as a sport.
Looking back over the past year and disregarding obstacles beyond your control, how do you feel about the growth of Apex Legends as a sport?
I think Apex Legends sports are in a great place. Obviously, we planned earlier this year to have an Apex Legends Global Series very different from the one we just finished, one that was set to have at least 12 live events – and the world said “you can’t have any, everything must be online. ”But we really hit a beat now with the online circuits and found a formula for Apex Legends electronic sports (while it needs to be online).
And it’s really working: working for the players who are participating and we’ve seen the number of views grow over time as well. We had to overcome a lot of adversity this year, but we are very excited about where we ended and we are ready to return to live events as soon as it is safe to do so.
Apex Legends enjoys an avid casual fan base and much of the game’s content is geared towards this group. Is there a lag in the growth of electronic sports compared to casual growth?
I definitely didn’t notice anything like that. In some ways, the opposite is true. Each season, we see more and more players engaging in the game’s ranked leagues, which is really where many players start competing: they evaluate themselves within the ranked leagues and then graduate, to some extent, in the Legends of the Apex Global Series.
So really, the greatest excitement around the game’s rating system and seeing ALGS players like ImperialHal being influencers in the game really shows how, from an audience’s point of view, even if it’s not ALGS content all the time, how enthusiastic the spectators are about watching some of the best players in the world.
Apex Legends Season 7 was released with some new spicy skins.
Considering the content drops mentioned above, how much dialogue is there between Respawn sports and casual teams to ensure that new additions meet competitive goals? Essentially, how much focus is on ensuring that things that are great on a competitive level don’t get tacky on the professional level?
I think there are a few different angles for this one. First of all, I can say that the Respawn development team listens to feedback from across the spectrum of skills, but, in particular when talking about electronic sports, they listen to the professional community and their thoughts on how to improve the game in certain ways. .
Although I cannot speak in detail, I think that in 2021, we will see things coming into the game that are improvements based specifically on feedback from professional players.
18 hours and I still don’t miss pic.twitter.com/bRB5Txs8Yn
– ImperialHal (@TSM_ImperialHal) December 31, 2020
What we see a lot in games that have legends with particular abilities is that, based on the skill level, we can see the use of different weapons and different legends on a Gold level, a Diamond level or an ALGS Final level. There are differences there.
And I think it contributes to a healthy game, with weapons or legends that are prevalent or useful at some skill levels, but perhaps not at others. The community can enjoy these things in different ways.
At what point does a division occur, where, for example, attachments are allowed in the base game, but prohibited in ALGS?
We take these things, legend by legend and item by item, but I have a lot of faith in the Respawn development team to be able to design things that are balanced with each other and receive feedback from the community when necessary to continue to make the game balanced moving forward . But there are even cases now where we’ve made changes to remove things from the competitive game, the Gold Knockdown Shield is a good example of that – which hasn’t been part of ALGS since this summer.
Gold Knockdown Shields proved to be worthy of exclusion from the professional game.
With regard to legends and skills, other electronic sports like League of Legends and Overwatch introduced hero bans (or selection restrictions). Is this something that ALGS is considering as the game’s legend portfolio grows?
This is. I don’t know if this is really going to be part of Apex Legends electronic sports, but it’s definitely something we consider. It also brings another interesting dynamic to the sport itself. This spurs conversation between fans and game analysts, just trying to predict what a team’s bans will be and how they will strategize based on the bans that have arisen and the set of legends that are available to them.
There are definitely some good points there. Obviously, we are not yet in a place where we need to implement something like this, but it is definitely a thought that we consider for the future.
Horizon is the last Legend added to the growing Apex cast.
Speaking of RNG-based issues, there have been concerns about the logic of the ring and how it affects the game on a competitive level. Have you seen and considered the community’s suggestions for introducing predefined ring movements?
We certainly saw this kind of suggestion, or at least the suggestion that there should be a little more regularity to end the circles in the ALGS game. And again, I can’t talk about specific things that could happen in the game in the future, but I can say that we heard that feedback and discussed possible solutions for it.
What you mentioned earlier – having more regularity in final circles or more predictability – is one of the things we’ve been discussing.
Compared to autumn, what wrinkles should fans expect from the Winter Circuit?
We made some adjustments to how points are awarded in the playoffs. We changed our broadcast from Mondays to Sundays, so I think our Winter Circuit broadcast will benefit from being on weekends and all of our fans who have a little more time to dedicate themselves to watching ALGS on the weekend than on weekdays.
As I said before, we really found a rhythm with these circuits, so there was a lot to change between fall and winter. One of the great things is that we have increased the prize pool, which is now $ 750,000. What this really represents is the growth of the Apex Legends Global Series. This reflects this growth and should be seen as an expectation of at least as large awards.
In addition to the prize, what are the plans for the ALGS placement points earned by the teams during each circuit?
It has always been our intention, ever since we launched the Apex Legends Global Series, that ALGS points were a determining factor in qualifying for live events. As soon as we are able to return to live events, we intend to fix that.
During most of this year and as we had to rotate the ALGS, many players asked themselves, outside this independent circuit, ‘what are my points for?’ and we intend to use them as intended as a qualification for live events, once they are physically possible again.
The ALGS Winter Circuit is the biggest Apex sporting event on the horizon.
And am I assuming that part of this will involve interregional events?
When I say return to live events, I’m talking about returning to global live events. Since September last year at Preseason Invitational since we were able to crown a global champion and we are really looking forward to the day when we can do that again.
At the regional level, is a different approach to the goal for each region something that viewers should expect to see?
It is true. From APAC North to APAC South, Europe, North America and South America, each region really has its own goal.
Each region mixes the Legend’s skills differently at the professional level.
In the summer circuit playoffs, for example, we saw, at APAC Norte, a Revenant in each team – and I’m not sure if we saw a single in the Americas playoffs. And again, throughout the Autumn Circuit, we have seen this kind of thing happen, where each region has its own goal.
So, from the point of view of just wanting to be able to crown a global champion, I can’t wait for the live events. but I also can’t wait for those regions, which have had their competitions isolated for a long time, to mix goals and see what happens when these different combinations of legends come together again.
After a delay, the ALGS Winter Circuit will begin on 29 January. He will be followed by the Apex Legends Global Series Championship, which will receive the top 60 teams and a $ 1 million prize.