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The game developers has a special treat prepared for the popular battle royale gamers, arriving just in time for the holidays. Enthusiasts of the battle royale's highly fluid movement can rejoice to learn that an innovative traversal feature will be introduced when the Amped season goes live on November 4th.

Introducing Mantle Boosting

Named "Mantle Boosting" by Respawn, this ability provides gamers a burst of forward momentum when scaling obstacles. According to key developer Eric Canavese, this technique was previously existed of Apex Legends for quite a while, usually referred to as "mantle jumping." But it's challenging for casual gamers, and typically employed by competitive players in competitive play or esports competitions. This season, Respawn is making it easier for everyone to successfully perform these advanced speed-boosts.

"This technique existed in Apex for some time, but executing it isn't easy to perform and gamers might not realize it [is in the game] without external guides," Canavese explains. "We're adding a visual cue so players can easily see when and how to activate the high-octane movement ability, making accessible the feature and adding new ways to compete for a much wider base."

The Reasoning Behind Opening Up Advanced Mechanics

Why make a once niche movement quirk available to all players? Principal designer the development lead says the team aims for players to experience empowerment — even those who are new.

"Our community performs other crazy stuff like super-glides and tap-strafing, and we examined at other games, observed what the community are doing, and we said, 'How can we provide these capabilities to more players?'" Mohan explains. "Because currently, some of these advanced [movement] mechanics are kind of janky to use — it requires to change controls and hit one-frame windows. So we said, 'What if we make a more official implementation?'"

Season 27 Movement Focus

Movement is largely the name of the game in this season, with Legends Horizon, the defensive specialist, and Valkyrie all getting enhancements to maintain them mobile. Recovery time on Horizon's Gravity Lift has been decreased, and the Gravity Lift will boost users upward faster than it used to. Her defensive walls now include a roof and capability to grant speed boosts to those nearby. But it's aerial this Legend receiving the most attention this season, with multiple tweaks implemented to make her stronger, quicker, and deadlier.

"I think there's quite a consensus that Valkyrie's time has arrived," states character developer the designer. "Certainly that she's been dominant in the past, but due to the addition of new Legends, mobility perks, and Evac Towers, it felt like she's not very relevant in current Apex. It was an ideal chance for the team to revisit a bunch of aspects [of her kit] and sort of bring her back to her glory days."

Enhancements to the Aerial Legend

To reclaim her competitive status in current strategies, Holstead notes Respawn assessed each of her abilities and implemented significant changes. Her jetpack received improvements, increasing velocity while airborne, and this equipment now recharge three times faster, enabling the player to remain longer in the air. Now she won't take damage from her own Missile Swarm, which was enhanced to mark opponents who are hit from the missiles. Her Skyward Dive ability — which lifts teammates skyward for repositioning or retreat — requires much less time to fire up. She's also getting some new perk choices that users can choose to conserve resources, expand the spread of her Missile Swarm, or accelerate her ultimate takeoff time.

"Her jet pack now delivers on that jet-fighter fantasy," Holstead says.

Olympus Improvements

Even the game's only floating arena, Olympus, receives a movement-friendly facelift, with an extensive redesign that opens up choke points and renders securing elevated positions a bit less daunting. The developers state Apex Legends Season 27 focuses on giving players the tools required to compete in the competition.

"Essentially, we were looking at the game's core identity as a fast-paced FPS," explains principal designer Josh Mohan.

The battle royale the Amped season releases November 4th at the specified times.