Apex Legends Netcode Lags Behind PUBG, Fortnite, and Call of Duty: Black Ops 4: Report

Apex Legends may be the battle royale game of choice for many, but it's far from perfect. According to a new report from YouTuber Battle(non)sense analysing the Apex Legends netcode, it appears that the game lags behind PUBG, Fortnite, and even Call of Duty: Black Ops 4's Blackout mode. No surprise considering the server and matchmaking issues Apex Legends had faced during its launch week despite garnering over 25 million unique players as well as Battle(non)sense's own track record with accurately analysing other games too. It seems that the delay between damage, gunfire, and movement for two players on the same server and ping was a lot higher in Apex Legends versus other games.

For example, the maximum delay in PUBG for gunfire was 88 milliseconds, but in Apex Legends the maximum delay was almost two and a half times more, at 250 milliseconds. Furthermore, lag compensation in Apex Legends impacts gameplay tremendously. Those with high ping can still register shots on low ping players even if they're behind structures like walls, making for a subpar experience. Thankfully, Apex Legends developer Respawn has made it clear it's looking to improve stability and performance and we should see these hit future updates of the game. You can check out the video below.

For what its worth, we felt Apex Legends has a lot to improve upon beyond its netcode. Apex Legends has some interesting innovations like the Ping System while its weapons are fun to use. However, its lacklustre characters and dull traversal prevent it from being a must play title in the genre.

In an official EA blog post, the studio's chief Vince Zampella revealed that since the game's launch, it has raked in 25 million players and has touched a peak 2 million concurrent players in that span. Not too shabby for a game that is just a week old - it was released on February 4. And if that was not enough, Apex Legends might soon hit the mobile platform too.

During EA's recent earnings call, EA chief Andrew Wilson indicated that the company is exploring the opportunity of porting the game for mobile and also introducing cross-play in the future. “As I said earlier, we are looking at how to take the game to mobile and cross-play over time, and I also expect that this game will have tremendous value in Asia, and we're in conversations about that”, Wilson said.

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