Respawn Entertainment, the developers behind the popular battle royale game Apex Legends, is adamant about removing tap strafing from the game.
Note: You are reading an old article from 2022. So, the information may not be up-to-date.
Apex Legends was Respawn’s first foray into the highly competitive battle royale genre of video games. Following its initial release back in 2019, it amassed a massive dedicated player base. Aside from the quality of life updates, Respawn brought world-class first-person shooter gameplay and movement mechanics to this genre.
Respawn used the old source engine to build this game, and as such, it probably has one of the most intuitive movements of any first-person shooter that is out there right now, apart from Titanfall, which is also set in the same universe.
As this game was built on top of the source engine, savvy players figured out advanced movement mechanics to get an edge over their opponents. For example, wall jumping, super gliding, and tap-strafing are all the results of continuous experimentation from the dedicated Apex Legends player base.
However, tap strafing, a movement technique that allows players to make quick 180-degree movements in all directions, has been a hotly debated topic within the Apex Legends community.
While many PC players feel it levels the playing field against controller players with aim assist, a lot of controller players feel this movement tech is unfair as it is really unpredictable. Even the developers at Respawn decided that this movement tech needed to be removed from the game for the sake of balance.
Consequently, Respawn has already developed a version of the game without tapping strafing in it. They invited professional Apex Legends players to test it out to see if the removal of tap-strafing had any unwanted penalties for another movement tech.
Respawn’s first try at removing tap-strafing from the game affected other parts of movements in Apex Legends. As such, the developers released a statement claiming they are going back to the drawing board.
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Respawn Still Intends on Removing Tap Strafing
C9 PVPX, a professional Apex Legends player, asked Respawn to add tap-strafing support on the controller to make both inputs a bit more balanced.
In response, John Larson, who is the Live Balance Designer at Respawn, explained that Respawn hasn’t forgotten about tap-strafing. And they are still pretty much against this advanced movement tech that lacks readability and counterplay.
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So, Respawn is still in the process of removing tap-strafing from the game altogether. However, they haven’t revealed any official timeline as to when this change might occur.
