Apex Legends creators Respawn Entertainment have been adamant in the past about not bringing back a Solos mode with the reasoning being that it doesn’t fit into the current battle royale formula, but in the new Upheaval season, Apex Legends players will see that decision reversed. Respawn confirmed this week plans to bring back Apex‘s Solos mode for at least a couple of weeks to finally let players see how they’d perform against others without a team, though the Solos mode has been updated since the last time it was implemented to hopefully be a healthier experience.
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For context, Solos was last in the game way back in 2019 during the limited-time Iron Crown event from Season 2. To give an even better idea of how long it’s been since Solos was even an option, Wattson was the newest Legend in the game at the time, and Kings Canyon was the only playable map since World’s Edge wasn’t added until Season 3.ย
Apex players seemed to like Solos for the most part, but Respawn didn’t feel it fit. Trios, Duos, and other limited-time modes were added amid continued requests for a Solos mode to be brought back with those requests finally getting answered next season.
Apex Legends Brings Back Solos Mode
Before Apex players get their hopes up, Solos won’t be a permanent fixture in the game — at least not yet. Solos in Apex is considered a Takeover Event, though instead of taking over a POI, it’s taking over the Duos mode and will be replacing it from May 7th when the season starts until June 24th.
“Well, well, well…looks like Solos is coming back after all! Replacing Duos from the beginning of the season, take on the Outlands by yourself in this revamped variant,” the Upheaval season announcement said. “We’ve taken aspects of some of our most popular modes and integrated them to keep things interesting: use your Battle Sense to detect nearby enemies, tear things up with pre-kitted weapons and attachments, and keep the fight going with auto heal and Second Chance mechanics.”
During a preview event for Apex Legends: Upheaval, Respawn talked some more about these mechanics mentioned above that’ll be in place when Solos returns. The pre-kitted weapons are pretty self-explanatory with Solos players able to acquire fully kitted weapons to expedite the looting process. The “Second Chance mechanic” mentioned there consists of Respawn Tokens which give players one ticket back into the game so long as they’re used within the first four rounds of ring movements. If you have a Respawn Token left over once that happens, it gets converted to EVO charge.
The Battle Sense and the healing systems are two of the more interesting components we’ll see in this Solos mode when it returns this month. This new feature gives players an audio cue and a HUD alert whenever an enemy is within 50 meters of you since you don’t have a team to help you out. The auto healing works by giving players passive healing when they’re out of combat for a set amount of time or if they’ve just killed an opponent.ย
It was also clarified during the preview that this mode would house only 50 players this time as opposed to the 60 present in the previous iteration of Solos.
