In case you were not fully aware of the massive popularity of Apex Legends or you’re simply living under a rock, developer Respawn announced yet another milestone for their battle royale sensation. Over 50 million players worldwide have so far played the unusually polished title in the much-contested genre and it has been just a month since the stealth release. This is an insane success.
And it’s not like Respawn is a foreigner when it comes to creating huge games. The studio founders’ previous notable work includes a little first-person shooter called Modern Warfare. You might have heard of it. An entire generation worth of games tried to either copy or at least were heavily influenced by the modern military shooter.
Of course, this time it’s a different story. Respawn didn’t invent or create battle royale games, but they notably managed to release a polished, high-fidelity one. Something the genre has been aching to see. Further, it’s again Respawn’s expertise in crafting awesome shooting mechanics which definitely helped Apex Legends stand out.
It’s not like Electronic Arts did any kind of promotion before the game came out, when Apex Legends stealthily and without any fanfare released exactly one month ago. This is probably the best argument in favor of the game, as it achieved all this success exclusively by its gameplay merits. No fancy or expensive marketing campaigns. No baseless hype. Just the game. And what a game it is. We immediately fell in love with Apex Legends and you can read more in detail why we think so in our review here.
Obviously, since it’s a battle royale game, comparisons to the two other juggernauts Fortnite and PUBG are inevitable. They all influence each other and vie for the same audience. Since PUBG is a paid title, it’s fairer to directly compete Apex Legends with Fortnite. The other F2P battle royale game.
Number of Apex Legends players after:
8 hours – 1m
1 day – 2.5m
3 days – 10m
1 week – 25m
4 weeks – 50mNumber of Fortnite BR players after:
2 weeks – 10m
6 weeks – 20m
11 weeks – 30m
16 weeks – 45m— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) March 4, 2019
Video game analyst Daniel Ahmad compared the time each game needed to reach a certain player count and Legends already blows out Fortnite out of the water. If Respawn and EA manage to keep up the momentum, things could be looking grim for Fortnite.
