Highlights
- Titanfall 2's recent update has brought the game back to life, addressing previous issues and making it a viable multiplayer option once again.
- Recent updates to Apex Legends and hints of a possible Titanfall 3 release suggest that Respawn Entertainment may be shifting its focus back to the Titanfall franchise.
- One feature that sets Titanfall apart from Apex Legends is its popular single-player campaign, and bringing it back in Titanfall 3 could attract a wider audience and make the game stand out.
After years of silence, Titanfall 2 and its servers were recently updated, much to the community’s delight. This marks the end of an era where it was risky to even attempt playing Titanfall 2’s multiplayer thanks to hackers, cheaters abusing bugged locations, and general server instability. Players finally had their beloved mechs-and-parkour shooter back, with a few new modes and features to boot. All of this sudden attention left some wondering if Respawn Entertainment had finally gotten the green light from EA to begin developing the fabled Titanfall 3, instead of focusing all of its first-person shooter efforts into Apex Legends.
Apex Legends is famous for putting Respawn on the map in ways Titanfall never could, despite how outspoken some of the latter’s fans are. While both games share a setting, the hero shooter battle royale has been Respawn’s sole FPS focus since its 2019 launch. However, a recent update for Apex Legends included a mysterious message referencing release dates for every Titanfall universe title, and a leaked teaser, albeit an easily faked one, was found referencing a date in late October. All of these nearby events paint a picture of Titanfall 3 getting another chance, and it could prove its worth by bringing back one feature Apex Legends simply can’t have: a single-player campaign.
Apex Legends Has Strayed Far From Titanfall’s Formula
While there are some obvious differences like the Titan mechs, Apex Legends and Titanfall can seem similar to an outsider. All of these games use their science fiction settings to justify player characters with impossibly advanced tools and, more importantly, extremely high mobility. Even as other big shooter franchises like Call of Duty, Halo, and Fortnite cycle through various movement mechanics, Titanfall and Apex pride themselves on letting players move freely through their environments. It’s this unique focus on parkour and general traversal that really make Respawn’s games shine.
That’s just a few shared game mechanics, however. Titanfall is, first and foremost, designed like a traditional competitive FPS. Its multiplayer gameplay takes place in various modes with teams of players completing specific objectives, or just fighting each other on various maps. Apex Legends is a hero shooter, making each player feel as distinct as their Titanfall loadouts, with squad-based battle royale rules and loot on top of that. And in spite of the larger play space, there’s no room for Titans in Apex Legends. That devotion to a live, shifting multiplayer service doesn’t just mean leaving old modes and mechanics behind, however.
Titanfall 3 Should Bring Back Its Popular Single-Player Campaign
Once, Titanfall 1 tried to merge its campaign and multiplayer together. The main reason why no one remembers this is that it simply didn’t work, as players preferred regular matches if they were playing multiplayer either way. Not to be deterred, Titanfall 2 tried again with a more traditional Call of Duty-style campaign, and this time it became as big of a selling point as its refined multiplayer. To this day, Titanfall 2’s experimental and gripping story mode graces many lists of the best modern FPS campaigns, and serves as a pivotal argument for exploring more of Titanfall’s universe with a Titanfall 3.
Apex Legends can’t do that, and writing Titans out of its peacetime setting is just one reason why. Its own largely trailer-based narrative has already run into the same apathy problems as Titanfall 1, and even adding co-op story missions would just be emulating Overwatch 2’s recent controversial updates. A full single-player campaign with major development resources behind it would sell Titanfall 3 to audiences that otherwise have no interest in multiplayer. Even if Titanfall 3 is never as profitable as Apex Legends, a solid multiplayer suite and meaty single-player campaign is all it needs to make a name for itself all over again.
Titanfall 3 is not confirmed to be in development.
