Apex Legends heat map reveals most popular locations for players
Apex Legends has areas that a lot more popular than others, as is the case with any battle royale, but now we know exactly what those spots are thanks to a heat map.
If you’ve spent any time playing Apex Legends with random players, then you’ve no doubt hot-dropped at Skull Town once or twice.
This location has pretty much become the Apex version of Fortnite’s Tilted Towers but there are many locations that players like to frequent in Apex. However, this internal test map shows you that Skull Town isn’t the only popular drop spot.
Where do you drop in Apex Legends?Apex Legends features high loot areas randomly each game so it helps players have more varied drops but it’s still easy to see what’s the most popular.
Surprisingly, much of the map does light up in a bright yellow, showing players don’t really discriminate. The only parts of the map that aren’t lit up are pretty much the edges so this is actually a good thing.
During development, we use heatmaps to look at where players land, move through the map, die, etc. We use this data to draw conclusions on map flow and balance.
This is a heatmap of Legend movement from about 6 months of testing internally, before we shipped. It's… so beautiful pic.twitter.com/s9yVd10qGI— Jason McCord (@MonsterclipRSPN) July 26, 2019
When a fan pointed out they were surprised Skull Town wasn’t more lit up, the developer did have to mention it wasn’t as popular of a location internally.
“Skull Town was not such a hot drop internally,” Respawn developer Jason McCord wrote. “We can’t queue back up as fast (not as many players in-house) so each early death means you’re sitting in the lobby longer. Made people play more carefully.”
Yeah – but Skull Town was not such a hot drop internally. We can't queue back up as fast (not as many players in-house) so each early death means you're sitting in the lobby longer. Made people play more carefully.
— Jason McCord (@MonsterclipRSPN) July 26, 2019
It would be interesting to see an updated heat map now that the game has been out for nearly six months and has millions of players that have dropped in.
Skull Town would almost surely be as bright as the sun but it would be nice to see where other players frequent.
The developers have been open to changing the map up and it’s possible they use internal tests as a way of reworking more unpopular locations into something a bit more viable.
In the meantime, they have to find out how to stop players from breaking off and dying in the opening seconds on a match at Skull Town.