Season 9 may be one of the most important moments Apex Legends has had in quite some time. Kicking off in a few days, Apex Legends season 9 double down into its Titanfall legacy by introducing Valkyrie, the daughter of the Titanfall 2 antagonist Viper. As her trailer indicated, Valkyrie uses her fathers reclaimed custom Northstar Titan to build a suit that allows her to not only fly but call in a rocket barrage, mark enemies, and redeploy allies to escape trouble.
The biggest addition to Season 9, however, is a brand new and permanent game mode called Arenas. Run by another Titanfall 2 antagonist, Ash, the mode brings a major change of pace to the overall experience. Arenas is essentially a mix of the competitive PvP style of games like Counter Strike Go or Valorant and combining the hero ability combat of Overwatch. These 3v3 matches test player skill to see which team can survive. With such big changes coming, developer Respawn Entertainment hints at upcoming changes to safeguard the experience.
With the popularity of Apex Legends continuing to rise, the game has continued to have issues with those who attempt to ruin the experience for others, especially cheaters who use DDoS attacks to win high level matches. However, help may be on the way as Respawn’s Security Analyst Conor Ford recently hinted that the studio is preparing to roll out a lot of improvements very soon. The comment came during an Apex Legends stream from Christian ‘Nokokopuffs’ Feliciano, where Ford, who goes by the name Hideouts_ responded to a fan asking for an update.
Unfortunately, Ford's reply didn't have any specific details, though with DDoS attacks being a big topic of discussion lately for those in the community, many have naturally assumed Respawn will be able to better identify and punish those who abuse this technique. The DDoSing issue has become so bad recently that Respawn even announced that it is looking into possible legal action against the most serious cases.
Considering that Respawn has already posted the Apex Legends Season 9 patch notes, it doesn't appear that these changes are making it into the game in time for the start of the season on May 4. However, it's also more than likely that Respawn doesn't want to give players specifics on what it changed to prevent hackers and cheaters from developing counter measures. Regardless, players are getting major balance changes to a handful of Legends like Lifeline and Octane while the Hammerpoint hop up and Low Profile perk are being removed completely.
Apex Legends is available on Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
Source: Nokokopuffs