Apex Legends’ newest replace broke controller assist on Xbox Collection consoles

Final week, EA’s battle royale shooter Apex Legends launched a “assortment occasion,” which is shorthand for a limited-time setup that’s largely about gamers shopping for a bunch of beauty gadgets from the in-game retailer. The one drawback is that this time, the large replace has made the sport almost unplayable for many individuals on consoles.

With out warning, the battle royale shooter’s normally tight and responsive controls — a recognized amount for Respawn Leisure video games since Titanfall and a mirrored image of its Name of Obligation heritage — have turn into sluggish, laggy, and regularly unresponsive. Even worse, merely enjoying the sport could make your management inputs really feel altered even within the dashboard and whereas utilizing different video games; restarting the console appears to repair this concern.

Gamers on Xbox Collection X consoles look like complaining essentially the most, particularly when paired with one in all Microsoft’s Elite gamepads. With none particular details about what the issue is, I can solely describe what I’ve skilled, which is a mixture of lag, in addition to failed enter detection that may make it exhausting to do issues like use burst hearth weapons, change instructions, and even decide up gadgets from the bottom. After making an attempt it out a bit over the weekend, I observed enter lag as a difficulty essentially the most whereas enjoying on Xbox Collection X and Collection S, utilizing each an Elite 2 gamepad, in addition to newer Xbox Collection gamepads that embody the share button.

Acknowledgment of the issue by builders has been restricted to a pair of reply tweets final week and one Monday afternoon saying the group is continuous to research. Nevertheless, not everybody who performs the sport follows its official Twitter account or dug into replies to search out the preliminary statements, leaving many gamers at nighttime about what may be happening whereas they attempt to play a aggressive shooter utilizing controls that simply don’t work.

As it’s, individuals who play the sport have been left to find the issue on their very own and move round doable options. I attempted a few of them, like updating the controller firmware or not updating it or plugging the pad in with USB as an alternative of enjoying wirelessly. One suggestion I haven’t been capable of strive is utilizing an older Xbox One controller. Of these, plugging the gamepad in appeared to assist a bit, but it surely nonetheless wasn’t as responsive because it was. What I noticed was in line with some experiences posted on Reddit, the place plugging in appeared to repair the failed enter detection concern with out resolving the lag and stuttering. This submit highlights how, after enjoying Apex, they skilled enter lag system-wide on the dashboard and in different video games, which I additionally observed.

Oddly, this is probably not the one recreation with this concern on Xbox, as MLB The Present 22 gamers have complained about related issues, but it surely was one which didn’t exist inside Apex Legends previous to final week’s replace.

The just-launched Awakening occasion contains a possibility to play the favored Management mode once more, which additionally serves as an opportunity for brand new, or new-ish, gamers to provide the sport’s characters a spin in a extra forgiving group deathmatch-style setting than the sport’s customary battle royale or 3v3 area choices.

Picture: Respawn Leisure

It additionally tweaked one of many recreation’s authentic characters, Lifeline, with higher therapeutic talents to associate with a particular part on the World’s Edge map devoted to her and, for many who gather all of its gadgets, entry to a particular heirloom merchandise for the Valkyrie character. The builders additionally laid out some much-anticipated modifications to the sport’s ranked system that may take impact quickly. It might all be nice if solely enjoying the sport on Xbox wasn’t such a painful expertise, which looks like insult added to damage after the replace final week additionally minimize off Xbox gamers for hours within the morning. For some motive, the brand new model of the sport began downloading to consoles early, and because the servers weren’t prepared, that meant you couldn’t play this online-only recreation in any respect, and even making an attempt to launch it on Xbox was sufficient to provoke the replace.

In the meantime, over on Apex Legends Cell (which is developed by a separate group), gamers have extra than simply working servers and controls. They’ve obtained entry to a mobile-exclusive legend, in addition to options gamers on the principle recreation have been asking for. That features talents added to characters just like the thief Loba, who is ready to seize respawn banners for vanquished teammates utilizing her Final means, or the “holographic trickster” Mirage sending out decoys that appear to be his teammates as an alternative of simply himself.

With Apex stricken on the platform I normally use (and the place I’ve unlocked many in-game gadgets), I gave the cell model a strive. It isn’t actually sufficient to hit the spot — even whereas utilizing an actual controller by way of Bluetooth — however I admire what the group behind it has been capable of accomplish. Proper now, it simply displays the place the bottom recreation is failing, each by way of usability and communication about no matter the issue is that’s happening.