While the battle royale craze continues to fight for dominance, it appears that one of the major players in the genre has been hit with a bit of a losing streak. Case in point: EA and Respawn Entertainment recently announced that their popular battle royale Apex Legends underperformed last quarter and failed to meet internal expectations. Adding insult to injury, Apex Legends Mobile was canceled after only one year after its initial launch, and a secret single-player Titanfall game was shelved before it could even see the light of day.
In short, it’s not the best time to be a fan of Respawn’s kinetic first-person shooter series. But what makes things even worse is that we now have, thanks to Giant Bomb alum Jeff Grubb, a handful of deets all about this unrevealed shoot-’em-up. Grab your tissues, folks, and get ready to press X to pay respects.
So, firstly, the canceled Titanfall game was purportedly going to be a mash-up of Titanfall and Apex Legends. Ostensibly, it would’ve been a single-player campaign integrated into the Apex Legends formula in a seemingly seamless way. Furthermore, everyone’s favorite Vanguard-class titan BT-7274 was going to show up, along with a handful of other renowned characters in the beloved sci-fi shooter series.
As for the game’s protagonist, players would apparently step into the shoes of Kuben Bliss, which was one of the main antagonists from Titanfall 2, and Legends would appear at certain points in the story to give you special powers. Finally, it would take a leaf out of DOOM: Eternal’s book and lean into frenetic arcade shooter action, and there would’ve been wall-running, which has become a bit of a signature feature for the franchise.
Unfortunately, as we said up top, this secret Titanfall follow-up has officially been canned, so we’re pretty bummed out right now. While it’s hard to believe, Titanfall’s original announcement at E3 was almost ten years ago, and as you may remember, the game absolutely stole the show. Not only did its official reveal win over 60 awards, but it also won a record-breaking six ‘Best of Show’ accolades from various different outlets. EA and Respawn couldn’t have hit the ground wall running any faster.
Despite the buzz, an excellent 2016 follow-up, and a successful free-to-play battle royale, here we are. Does this mean we’ll never get a proper fully-fledged Titanfall 3? Well, never say never. But it’s fair to say the writing’s on the wall for the popular series, and it’s looking increasingly likely that the well is slowly drying up for EA and Respawn’s fast and fluid sci-fi FPS.
