Respawn have confirmed they are considering their options for Apex Legends cross-platform progression ahead of the game’s launch on Steam on November 4.
After months of waiting, Apex Legends fans are finally getting ready for their favorite battle royale to be made playable on Steam. EA’s partnership with the company sees their EA Play service moving over to Steam, meaning a host of titles will become available.
The Apex Legends launch on Steam – confirmed to be coming on November 4 – will also coincide with the launch of cross-play. This means that lobbies will no longer be platform exclusive, but it has also raised some questions about cross-platform progression.
BREAKING: Apex Legends launches on Steam on November 4. pic.twitter.com/tOyndBy4gb
— Apex Legends News (@alphaINTEL) October 23, 2020
Players who have been playing on Origin will be able switch back and forth with ease: “If you’ve previously been playing on Origin,” the post in the Steam Community said, “you can easily switch back and forth with Steam—all your account progression and unlocks will carry over between the two platforms.”
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However, some players began to question the ability to switch between platforms and still maintain progression. In other words, if you play on multiple platforms, can you merge progression across them all under one account. Players who have purchased skins on one account, for example, may be forced to purchase them again if cross-progression is not enabled.
Respawn’s Game Director Chad Grenier was on hand to reply, saying: “It’s something we are very passionate about, and we’re looking at our options available. Much harder post-launch since users may have multiple accounts to merge or use. Easier with Steam because it’s at launch. We’ll give an update when we have something to talk about.”
In short, it seems like cross-progression between console and PC won’t be available as soon as the game’s Steam launch, but it certainly sounds fairly high on Respawn’s ‘to-do’ list.
As Grenier said, it is much harder to add a feature a couple of years down the line that it is to add the feature into the launch of the game on a new platform. Apex fans will have to wait and see how this one plays out.