Although many let Titanfall & Titanfall 2 fly over their heads for majority of this past console generation, players caught wind of the talent from Respawn Entertainment with the release of Apex Legends in early 2019. While the battle royale is certainly not the most popular by any means, the number of activity that the game receives YoY is certainly eye-opening to say the least.
In January 2020, Electronic Arts acknowledged to outstanding performance from the Titanfall developer with the release of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order alongside Apex Legends Season 3: Meltdown simultaneously. However, the content season was swiftly overshadowed by the latest Apex Legends Season 5: Fortune’s Favor as popularity for the game exceeded already pushed expectations.
In a more recent financial report this past winter, Electronic Arts record player turnout for Apex Legends increases roughly 30 percent annually, the momentum is to carry through pushing ahead. In the latest Q4 FY21 report, the publisher now remarks that Apex Legends is said to overcome now $1 billion in profits.
Apex delivered its largest net bookings quarter on record. It also delivered the best day, the best 24- hour period, the best week, the best month and best in-game event. We suggested it would deliver over $1 billion in life-to-date net bookings by the end of the quarter; it actually passed that milestone with half of the quarter to go. Apex Legends delivered over $600 million for the year, well above our original expectation of $300 million to $400 million.
Importantly, Apex Legends steadily grew through the last year. While Apex surely benefited from a stay-at-home tailwind, the upwards trajectory is driven by the games team and the content they are delivering. That is, this strength is structural. To this point, Season 8 was the first season built by a new content team we’ve put together in Vancouver, proving our ability to scale resources on our fastest-growing franchise.
Blake Jorgensen, Electronic Arts COO & CFO
Elsewhere in the Financial Results documentation submitted by Electronic Arts, the firm further elaborates on the impact by Apex Legends primarily for the entire fiscal year. “EA delivered a strong quarter, driven by live services and Apex Legends’ extraordinary performance. Apex steadily grew through the last year, driven by the games team and the content they are delivering.
“Looking forward, the momentum in our existing live services provides a solid foundation for FY22. Combined with a new Battlefield and our recent acquisitions, we expect net bookings growth in the high teens.” Even more, Apex Legends is suggested to be the most popular to how it performed originally at launch more than two years ago.
“Apex Legends has more than 100 million players life to date on console/PC, and Season 8 had more than 12 million weekly average players,” the document adds. Of course, plenty of this is to blame for the anticipation built leading up to the new ‘Arenas’ mode for Apex Legends which was delivered at the start of Season 9 earlier this month.
However, Electronic Arts anticipates the forthcoming mobile release for Apex Legends to be the largest yet for the series and the publisher overall. Currently, the project is in a regional beta for Android & iOS. You can read the full report by heading here.
Are you surprised by the performance Apex Legends is bringing to Electronic Arts?
Apex Legends out now for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC; playable via backwards compatibility for Xbox Series X|S & PlayStation 5.
Source: Electronic Arts, (1)
