A day has passed since Apex Legends casually introduced actual loot dragons, and the dust hasn’t settled yet on these flyers. People who frequent the Apex subreddit are familiar with how enthusiastic this community can get. The situation is perfectly summarized by the post below.
The players can’t be blamed. After all, Respawn has a certain twisted love for cryptic hints and surprise reveals. As it turns out, what we saw yesterday might be just the first sign of what’s to come.
Friendly gift-carriers…
The flyers introduced to Apex Legends yesterday appear to be a nice secondary loot delivery system. They circle slowly until shot at, at which point they meekly try to gain some altitude to escape. Shoot them some more and they will drop their loot, packed in a faux-deathbox. These come in blue, purple, or even gold variety.
Some of our readers helpfully pointed out that these deathboxes belong to people from the player’s friend list. If said list is currently empty, the deathboxes instead show the names of Respawn developers, with a unique DEV badge on their banners.
The entire interaction is seemingly about risk and reward. Players can only get to the loot by shooting at the flyers, which naturally draws the attention of nearby enemies. Of course you could try to nail them with Arc Stars, but they are not an easy target. Apex Legends players have also found they can grapple onto the flyers with Pathfinder, although they cannot be ridden. At least not yet.
… or bloodthirsty monsters?
Twitter user That1MiningGuy has another theory for what the flyers are, and it’s not nearly as friendly as what we have right now.
https://twitter.com/That1MiningGuy/status/1141147330508402688
What these larger flyers may be like is uncertain, but they definitely won’t be just an oversized carrier pigeon. If we go by what flyer swarms were like in Titanfall, the new strain will likely be aggressive towards aircraft. Back then, they were capable of ripping apart and destroying dropships.
Currently there are three kinds of ships in Apex Legends. First is the massive ship carrying Legends into the Ring, which will most likely be safe. Then there are the supply ships, which spawn at random locations and slowly drift towards a landing area to deliver new gear. Finally, and this is where things most likely will get problematic, we have the Respawn dropships.
It’s possible that the aggressive flyers would target these ships, as they fly at around the same altitude. Some lines discovered by That1MiningGuy in Apex‘s code indicate they would be aggressive towards dropships. Perhaps their entire mission is to ensure dead players stay dead? This would make picking a respawn beacon an even trickier operation than it is already.
The plot thickens
Just a few hours ago, the official Apex Legends Instagram account released another teaser. Apparently a new kind of flyer has been spotted in Kings Canyon, and one whose presence constitutes an emergency. We know this is a new flyer, because That1MiningGuy has identified that the model is different from the ones currently in the game.
https://www.instagram.com/p/By5iPRDlpml/
Note that the warning message states “System Malfunction,” rather than “Perimeter Breach” or something like that. The flyers didn’t break through; they appear to have been let in. This may just mean the Repulsor has been sabotaged, setting in motion the events behind another community theory.
Apex Legends is still holding secrets
Regardless of which theory — if any — turns out to be true, one thing is certain. The flyers we have in the game right now are just a teaser, like the jump pads around Market before Octane’s release. There is too much in the game’s code that is missing from them currently. We haven’t seen the rumored flyer cages or the dropship attack behavior.
Perhaps most telling of all is Bangalore’s hatred for them. Why would she hate an animal whose entire existence is based around delivering her new gun parts? She has definitely seen a side of the flyers the rest of us haven’t yet. An entirely different animal is headed to Apex Legends, one we will possibly face in the game’s leaked Beast Hunter mode. And all signs point to it being much more dangerous and unfriendly than the flyers we saw yesterday.
