It looks like the next weapon entering the Apex Legends arsenal is another Titanfall classic: the Charge Rifle. Yesterday a leak on Reddit showed promotional images for the weapon. According to the leaker, the images were displayed at a GameStop Manager’s Conference in Nashville. Daily Esports readers may recall that Respawn had teased the weapon a while ago, right at the start of Season 2.
You can see the Charge Rifle art shown below. According to the leak’s source, it will be introduced to Apex Legends in Season 3.
In Titanfall, the Charge Rifle was a powerful anti-Titan weapon that could one-shot pilots. After pulling the trigger, the weapon takes a slight delay warming up before it actually fires. This adds a degree of skill requirement to using the weapon effectively. Apex Legends players would notice immediately that this design makes it very similar to the Selectfire Havoc.
In order to distinguish the Charge Rifle as its own animal, there are a couple of ways Respawn could change it from its predecessor. First, they could make the Charge Rifle a legendary drop-only weapon like the L-Star. If that is the case, the weapon will most likely be just a souped-up Havoc with some frills.
However, this is likely not going to be the case. The original Respawn teaser, which you can see below, very deliberately shows the Charge Rifle as a normal spawn weapon. They also conveniently placed it next to a couple of stacks of energy ammo. To be frank, a normal weapon is also what most Apex Legends players would prefer, since they would get to use it much more than a legendary.
As a regular weapon, there are a lot of nuances it could possibly have to warrant use over the Havoc. For example, it could break doors or have no damage fall-off; more likely than not, it would use different hop-ups.
Then there’s the distinct possibility that Respawn introduces a new gameplay or map element for the Charge Rifle to interact with. We will have to wait until the start of Season 3 to find out, or at least until the next leak.
Stay tuned to Daily Esports for more Apex Legends news and content!
