Apex Legends Converted Me, A Solos Hater, To Playing Alone (2024)

None of my friends play Apex Legends, my favourite game for chilling out. I log on, play a few rounds with strangers, and relax into the bloodsport. I put some tunes on, pick up an L-Star, and start blasting.

Playing ranked as a solo queuer is certainly an experience. When your random teammates aren’t shooting off on their own quests to head back to the lobby in record time or spamming the in-game chat with abuse, their quality can vary greatly.

Sometimes you get carried by a former Apex Predator, other times my average ass is hard carrying two players who have just picked up a controller for the first time in their lives. That’s the solo queue experience. I don’t resent having worse players on my team – everybody’s gotta learn – but there’s nothing more frustrating than waiting for an Octane to respawn you for ten minutes while they loot. Quitting times you out for ten minutes, but you could spend longer just watching someone else fumble their way through a Bronze match.

This has been my Apex Legends experience for years now. But I was staunchly against Solos. It didn’t work back in Season 2, so why would it be any better now? Apex Legends is a game about team fights and Legend synergy, it just doesn’t work as a series of 1v1s.

How wrong I was. My experience of Solos in Apex Legends Season 21 has been nothing short of invigorating. After last season’s FOMO-filled reward trackers, this is a mode that actually encourages me to play the game because it’s fun.

Apex Legends Solos Is Great

Solos is rapid. It’s dropping hot and immediately battling an opponent. It’s dying and immediately queuing into another match. It’s clinching that victory and feeling like you are the winner, not just that you’ve been a part of a winning team.

My favourite thing about the mode is that the Kraber feels brutally strong again. There’s no better feeling than nailing a headshot from across the map and watching your opponent immediately dissolve into a death box. Pop. There’s no teammates to pick them up again, no nearby Lifeline to regenerate their health. You get hit, you get hurt.

That’s an unintended side effect of reintroducing Solos, but there are a few ways Respawn has ensured that the mode feels fun this time around.

Respawn Is Learning

Respawn has taken liberally from the past two limited time modes, which were huge hits with players. From Three Strikes it has introduced the respawning mechanic. You’re granted a Respawn Token in every Solos match, and if you die before a certain point, you fall from the sky to try again. Three Strikes offered three respawns, but Solos gives you just one, which is the perfect amount to ensure you have confidence to aggressively push, but not enough to make it a complete fightfest.

Straight Shot introduced kitted weapons of varying rarities to loot bins. This meant less time lootin’ and more time shootin’. These return in Solos, which makes complete sense, as spending time dropping cold, looting up, and rotating strategically into zone can be fun with friends, but when you’re truly on your tod, it’s not how you want to play. Kitted weapons in the loot pool allow you to forget the usual game strategy and just pick up and play.

In addition to this, there are a few other additions that make Solos great. There’s a pop-up which tells you if an enemy is within 50m, meaning that you can’t (really) be surprised now you don’t have allies looking out for you. This also eliminates ratting, the scourge of any Apex match.

Rings have also been adjusted, as have Evo Caches and Harvesters to balance everything for 1v1v1v1v1v1(x10) gameplay.

Everything has been tinkered with and perfected over the most recent LTMs to make Solos great again. I’ve never been happier to eat my words (and I’ve done it plenty in the past), and I’m loving jumping into rapid fire Solos matches whenever I get a break at work. Hand me a Kraber, I’m going for the win on my own.

Next: “Opposites Attract”: How NiceWigg And Greek Made Competitive Apex Legends Fun Again