Apex Legends will be marching into the next generation of gaming when the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X arrive later this year, according to a new job listing for the battle royale posted by Respawn Entertainment late last week.
With the new consoles from Sony and Microsoft set to hit shelves in 2020’s holiday season, the question on every gamers’ lips now is which of their favorite long-term titles are set to survive the next-gen switch-up that follows.
On that front, battle royales like Fortnite and PUBG have less to worry about as PC titles. Infinity Ward also recently confirmed Apex Legends rival Warzone will be making the leap. Now Respawn has locked in their PS5 and XSX plans too.
Respawn job listing confirms Apex’s PS5, XSX plans
At least, it looks like it’s full steam. Respawn has said nothing official yet. Instead, a job listing for a Senior Rendering Engineer to “push next-generation platforms and the PC to their limits on Apex” seems to have confirmed it for them.
While the listing, posted on EA’s internal hiring board, doesn’t specifically mention either the PlayStation 5 or the Xbox Series X by name, use of the term “next-gen” can only relate to the huge console releases coming later this year.
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Apex Legends could head to next-gen as soon as late 2020
The position called for skills in “shading,” “optimizing,” and “fixing tricky bugs”. That seems to confirm Apex’s next-gen port could also be bound for a late 2020 time frame. These kinds of roles are often end-development related, to add polish.
The listing — which has now closed — combined with EA’s promise last year that they are treating Apex Legends as a “major long-term franchise” all but confirms we could soon be battling across King’s Canyon on PS5 and the XSX.
As for smaller consoles — namely phones — there’s still been no word from EA or Respawn beyond their update last October, which suggested a late-2020 drop date. That does seem to line up with the next-gen release, however.
It may not be faster processors or updated graphics, but Apex also has other major updates coming a little sooner than late 2020 too — Loba is finally making her playable debut in-game next week with Season 5’s long-awaited release.
Everything for the battle royale’s big seasonal switch-up kicks off from May 5, when the new Season 5 Launch Trailer premieres on YouTube. The season itself will begin a week later. A major update will also be arriving for all consoles.