One of the biggest elements that's kept Apex Legends at the top of the battle royale genre for the last few years is Respawn's dedication to delivering consistent free updates. Every few months, Apex Legends has a large-scale refresh called a Season, which also tends to bring a whole plethora of new content to the game, ranging from a new playable Legend, to new maps, new game modes, and a slew of cosmetics. Well, Apex Legends is about to receive its 14th Season, named "Hunted," and fans are very excited.
Apex Legends's 14th Season drops in just a week's time, beginning on August 9. Along with a new battle pass, Season 14 adds the new sniper-focused Legend, Vantage, and some pretty significant changes to the iconic Kings Canyon map. But aside from the new content, Apex Legends Season 14 is actually making some pretty big changes to the gameplay overall. As well as some serious weapon mechanic changes, Apex Legends Season 14 is increasing the game's level cap massively, which fans have been asking for since the game first came out in 2019.
Apex Legends' New Level Cap
When Apex Legends first released in February 2019, Respawn set the level cap to 100. This meant that by the time players hit max level, they should have unlocked about 30 Apex Packs, giving them a decent chance of earning some top-tier loot. Eager Apex fans quickly hit this cap within just the game's first few months, and Respawn made the smart decision to increase this level cap to 500, allowing players to unlock 200 Apex Packs by the time they'd finish their competitive journey.
However, it's been three years since then, and for those who have played Apex Legends since day one, even that increased level cap had been hit a long time ago. For years now, long-time Apex fans have been very vocal about the need for an even higher level cap, and on August 9, these fans will finally get their wish.
With the introduction of Apex Legends Season 14, the level cap is finally being increased once more, and this time, it's by a staggering amount. Technically, the max level cap is still set at 500, but now, once players have hit that max level, they can now choose to start again from the beginning, in a similar way to Call of Duty's Prestige system. Players will be able to prestige their account a total of three times, meaning that the new level cap is actually 2000.
Of course, with this increase in levels also comes an increase in the number of Apex Packs able to be unlocked through progression. A whopping total of 345 additional Apex Packs can now be unlocked through this new Prestige system. This means that by simply progressing through every level of the game naturally, players should be able to unlock a total of 544 Apex Packs. An extra cherry on the cake is that for every 500 Packs unlocked, an Heirloom is guaranteed to drop, so dedicated players are guaranteed to unlock an Heirloom at least once during their Apex Legends career.
While this level cap increase may only appeal to the most die-hard Apex Legends players out there, it's great to see Respawn finally include a feature that some fans have been desperately asking for for years, as it shows that the developer does listen closely to its fan-base. With a new playable Legend, map changes, a range of weapon mechanic tweaks, and this new level cap, Apex Legends Season 14 may just turn out to be one of the game's best yet.
Apex Legends is available now on Mobile, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
