The mobile versions of Apex Legends and Battlefield are no more

In a move that is surely a weird one, Electronic Arts have announced that both Apex Legends Mobile and Battlefield Mobile are no longer in development. The weird part comes for Apex Legends Mobile, which released in full last year and was reportedly doing quite well.

The team at Respawn did release a statement on the games official site, explaining a little bit about the shutdown. You can read it below.

At Respawn, we aim to provide players with games that are consistently outstanding. Following a strong start, the content pipeline for Apex Legends Mobile has begun to fall short of that bar for quality, quantity, and cadence. It is for this reason, after months of working with our development partner, that we have made the mutual decision to sunset our mobile game. Although disappointing, we are proud of the game we launched, are grateful for the support of the Apex Legends community, and are confident that this is the right decision for players.

Respawn and the Apex Legends team remain excited about mobile as a platform and look forward to new opportunities to serve players there in the future.

In terms of what players can expect from here, today marks the beginning of a ninety (90) day window before we sunset the game. As of 1 PM PST today, January 31st, we will be disabling all real money in app purchases in the game as well as removing the game from webstores. During this period, players can spend their existing Syndicate Gold and continue playing the full game. At 4 PM PDT on May 1st, 2023, we will cease operations in all regions, and the game will no longer be playable.

The full post has a few questions that you can get answers to, regarding refunds and so on, so check that out if you are keen. With the game launching strong, it even took out Apple’s Game of the Year for the App Store, at least in its category, cancelling it seems weird.

Sadly the Battlefield Mobile game getting cancelled is not a surprise. When Battlefield 2042 launched, it didn’t do well as players disliked a lot about the new take on the series. Since then the studio at DICE has pivoted to correct that and Electronic Arts have given oversight of the shooter to Respawn co-founder Vince Zampella. As Battlefield Mobile only soft launched last year in a few small regions, most players will not even realise it was in a playable state, but still a shame to see it go. Here is the full statement on its cancellation.

We've also made the decision to stop the development of the current Battlefield mobile title. As the industry has evolved and our strategy to create a deeply connected Battlefield ecosystem has taken shape, we decided to pivot from the current direction to best deliver on our vision for the franchise and to meet the expectations of our players. We remain highly committed to unlocking Battlefield’s enormous potential. We’re hard at work at evolving Battlefield 2042, and are in pre-production on our future Battlefield experiences at our studios across the globe.

The worst news for Battlefield Mobile is that developer Industrial Toys, which EA bought out a number of years ago, is being closed down.