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Respawn Entertainment have an exciting surprise prepared for Apex Legends players, perfectly timed for festive season. Fans of this game's highly fluid movement will be pleased to discover that an innovative traversal feature is being implemented when the Amped season launches on November 4th.

Unveiling Mantle Boosting

Named "Mantle Boosting" by the developers, this feature provides gamers a surge of forward momentum when scaling obstacles. According to lead battle royale designer the design lead, Mantle Boosting has unofficially been a feature of Apex Legends for quite a while, often called as "mantle jumping." However it's no easy feat for casual gamers, and typically employed by competitive players in competitive play or tournaments. This season, Respawn simplifies the process for players of all skill levels to successfully perform these tricky speed-boosts.

"This technique existed in the game for some time, but executing it isn't easy to perform and a player would never know it's possible without outside knowledge," the designer states. "Now including a visual cue so users can clearly identify the timing to activate the high-octane movement ability, making accessible the feature and adding new ways to play for more players."

Why Opening Up Advanced Mechanics

Why make a once niche movement quirk accessible to everyone? Lead Legend designer the development lead explains the team aims for gamers to experience empowerment — even those who are new.

"Our community is doing other crazy stuff like super-glides and tap-strafing, and we looked around at our competition, looked at what our players execute, and we said, 'How can we provide these capabilities to more players?'" the designer clarifies. "Because right now, some of these advanced [movement] mechanics are somewhat awkward to use — it requires to change controls and hit one-frame windows. So we said, 'What if we create a more official implementation?'"

Season 27 Movement Focus

Mobility is primarily the central theme in this season, with characters the gravity mage, the defensive specialist, and Valkyrie all getting enhancements to maintain them in motion. Recovery time on her tactical ability has been decreased, and this skill will boost players upward faster than it used to. Her defensive walls now include a roof and capability to grant speed boosts to those nearby. But the spotlight is on aerial Valkyrie who's getting significant improvements now, with multiple tweaks implemented to make her stronger, quicker, and deadlier.

"I think many agree that her moment has arrived," states character developer Ian Holstead. "Certainly that she's been dominant in the past, but with the introduction of other characters, mobility perks, and Evac Towers, it felt like she's not very relevant in current the game. This presented a really great opportunity for us to reexamine a bunch of aspects in her abilities and essentially bring her back to former prominence."

Valkyrie's Upgrades

To reclaim Valkyrie's relevance in current strategies, Holstead says Respawn evaluated each of her abilities and introduced significant changes. Her jetpack have been upgraded, boosting velocity while airborne, and this equipment regenerates three times faster, allowing the player to remain longer aloft. Now she won't be harmed from her ultimate ability, which was enhanced to tag enemies who are hit from the missiles. Her squad redeploy ability — which lifts her entire squad into the air for repositioning or escape — now takes reduced delay to fire up. She's also getting recently added Legend Upgrades that players can select to reduce fuel consumption, widen the area of her rockets, or accelerate her ultimate takeoff time.

"Valkyrie's equipment fulfills that jet-fighter fantasy," he comments.

Map Changes

Additionally, the lone airborne map, Olympus, receives a movement-friendly facelift, with major changes that opens up choke points and renders claiming the high ground a bit less daunting. Respawn state Apex Legends this update is all about giving players the tools required to keep up with the competition.

"Really, we examined Apex's core identity as a fast-paced FPS," explains lead Legend designer Josh Mohan.

The battle royale Season 27: Amped launches November 4th at the specified times.