What is it?
Respawn Entertainment continues to add new features to its hit battle royale game to keep the community entertained and engaged. Last month, they announced the competitive Global Series, with a $3 million prize pool. This month, they’re giving us a group of limited-time modes described as collectively as the Grand Soiree Arcade Event.
The “refined mayhem” will include seven LTMs that rotate through a defined schedule:
- Golden Duos Rush
- LIVE.DIE.LIVE
- Third-Person Mode
- Always Be Closing
- Armed and Dangerous on World’s Edge
- Kings Canyon After Dark
- DUMMIEs Big Day
The announcement trailer gave brief one-lines to describe each mode but Respawn didn’t go deep on what to expect from each of the Grand Soiree LTMs. This article explores what I expect we’ll get from each of the different modes!
Gold Rush Duos – gold weapons only with you and a friend
This one is pretty self-explanatory. Last November, we saw a duos mode LTM which allowed legends to queue up in pairs of two.
Now that a new year has rolled around, we’ll a repeat of duos where all the guns are gold. In Season 3, this means we’ll get to the VK-47 Flatline, EVA-8 Auto, Triple Take, G7 Scout and Charge Rifle in their golden glory. From the video, legends will also be able to pick up legendary weapons, which typically spawn in supply drops, as floor loot.
I think the Mastiff-G7 loadout will be a very powerful combo that gives you versatility and devastating kill potential. The G7 could also be replaced with the Flatline, which has great mid- to long-range damage with the anvil receiver.
Given the popularity of the first duos mode, I see Gold Rush Duos being well-received by the Apex community.
Third-Person Mode – a classic out-of-body experience
In late October, we began seeing reports of players glitching into third-person mode. Soon after, people started showing how you can intentionally enter this view in the training grounds. Then began the speculation about this being a future feature.
Well, here it is!
For the first 11 months of Apex’s existence, it’s been a first-person shooter. This means that the player’s screen shows the perspective from the eyes of the avatar. Conversely, third-person shooters, like Uncharted and The Last of Us, have a camera perspective that is behind the character.
One of the biggest differences is that you can corner-peak in third-person mode. This allows the player to look around a wall by rotating the screen without exposing their legend to danger from incoming bullets.
I have two concerns here:
- The game will feel more campy, with hiding in buildings then poking their head up to murder an unsuspecting enemy
- The time to kill in open-field gunfights will go up because there’s more variability to where the bullets land
Point 2 isn’t terrible but I’m curious to see if the developers make any changes to the gameplay to prevent camping season from starting.
Armed and Dangerous: World’s Edge – shotguns and sniper rifles with limited armor
Another straightforward mode. Fortnite did something similar back in the day but you could only use snipers. I think Respawn is smart to add shotguns to this LTM to make close-range fights more viable.
My prediction for strongest loadout: peace keeps plus G7. You heard it here first!
Kings Canyon After Dark – play on King’s Canyon at night
The Respawn description here says all you need to know. We’ve already seen this map in the dark during the Fight or Fright event.
Put on your darkest legend skin and get ready to creep through the shadows. Pathfinder is especially helpful here to zip to high ground and snipe down on your foes.
Dummies Big Day – this game ain’t gonna test itself
Another feature in the training grounds allows players to turn the dummies into attack bots. They don’t move around much, but they can take you out with their gunplay if you aren’t careful.
This mode will likely have swarms of dummies roaming World’s Edge, bloodthirsty for revenge against the legend oppressors. We see a few different colored dummies and I’m guessing each will have its own personality.
In the video, I see the green dummies running aimlessly without firing and the yellow one shooting from the top of the stairs. Greeny also lands a melee hit on the character so maybe they are programmed to only do damage via punches.
Dummies Big Day looks to be a nice change of pace from the PvP madness and I think it will be very popular!
LIVE. DIE. LIVE – automatically respawn on living squadmates when the ring closes
This sounds like a nightmare. How many times have you landed, lost the battle to pick up a weapon and then been punched to death by multiple enemies? LDL mode is prime for this scenario.
The video shows respawned teammates flying into the safe zone with reckless abandon. Now, teams will need to check the skies as they run away from the storm.
Respawn doesn’t go into detail how the revive mechanism will work though. My guess is that dead squadmates will drop from the sky as though they redeployed from the dropship. They’ll need to find a gun quickly and pray that their on-the-ground friend(s) have health packs.
The last couple of circles will be very interesting as people drop into a confined space with a limited number of available weapons.
I vote this mode most likely to yield funny videos on youtube.
Always Be Closing – keep on the move, avoiding big damage from a ring that won’t slow down
I’m really hoping that the ring actually stays moving for the entirety of this game mode! It would need to move much more slowly to prevent games from only lasting a few minutes, but would really force the action as players move to safety.
The description also mentions “big damage”, so I imagine that the storm will be pretty devastating to your health if you get caught in it.
Always Be Closing will be fast-paced and see many people dying to the ring. I can see this being one of my favorite LTMs and expect to see some highly concentrated areas in the middle of the map that result in very high-kill games.
Other Things to Know
The Grand Soiree will run from January 14 through January 28, 2020. Each LTM will be available for two days, then move on to the next mode for 48 hours.
Completing Soiree challenges can earn you free skins, both weapon and legend skins. Each LTM will have three new challenges worth 1,000 points.
Additionally, we’ll see a Bonus Scoring Weekend from January 17-20. That weekend will have challenges worth a total of 500 points.
As usual, you can spend some real cash at the Grand Soiree store to purchase legendary skins. Respawn added six new legendary skins to the mix, including a very dapper Pathfinder costume.
Overall, the Grand Soiree has some great content for the Apex community and I can’t wait to get in on the new LTMs!
What game mode are you most looking forward to? Will you be shelling out some money for the new skins? Leave a comment below and let us know what you think!
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