Apex Legends' Revenant is one of the darker, more serious characters in the game, but that didn’t stop Respawn Entertainment from sliding a joke into his new Ultimate Ability. As many players know,Revenant recently received a rework that overhauled his gameplay abilitiesand his story is now off in a new direction. His new Ultimate Ability, Forged Shadows, jokingly hints at his past, while the game also moves the character forward.
Respawn Entertainment recently hosted a roundtable where Game Rant was able to speak with writer Jaclyn Seto and designer Evan Funnell. When asked if the sly joke hidden in the “Forged” Shadows ability, Funnell responded with a simple “Absolutely” before expanding. For those unfamiliar, Revenant was introduced all the way back in Season 4, and datamines of his abilities and whatnot began much sooner. The belief that Revenant would be theApex Legendsseason 4 character was then undercut with Respawn Entertainment’s announcement that it was actually a character called Forge. The whole community was caught off-guard, and while some were convinced Forge was a red herring, it was confirmed in acinematic where Revenant would kill Forge. It was a fun time forApex Legends, and his new ability is a throwback to that.
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Of course, the joke itself is only part of theApex Legendsability. It lines up so well because Revenant’s new ability gives him some newfound strength and protection, which the big burly Forge was all about. As Funnell explained,
It was very much intentional. Obviously, Revenant has a long history with Forge in the lore, and he’s come up a few times. You’ve seen with his reworked heirloom that we have that Easter egg animation as well. It’s definitely part of his backstory and lore, so in doing so, we had this ability all about protection and strength and giving him this extra shroud of shadows. We wanted something to enable, to give that wording that showed this protection around him. It lined up really well…it just also lined up with Forge’s name.
While this lighthearted touch of humor is entirely meta and can be enjoyed by fans, it seems safe to say thatRevenant’s futureisn’t as filled with laughter. Ahead of the current season, Revenant began glitching and he was worried about what was going on in his head. After all, the last thing he knew about his source code was that Loba sent it off via a phase runner, something she entrusted to her friend Jaime. That didn’t happen exactly, and now the source code has fallen into Eduardo Silva’s hands. What he wants with it and what his motivations behind it are uncertain as thsi time. Some think it’s as simple as Silva wanting a murder bot under his control, while others think the conspiracy goes deeper - perhaps being tied to Silva’s actual son.
The story will continue to develop throughoutApex Legendsseason 18and beyond. The Kill Code story forApex Legendswill wrap up by the end of the year, according to Seto, but that doesn’t mean the bigger story is over. But it’s clear just how excited Respawn Entertainment is for Kill Code and Revenant, with Seto briefly detailing how the studio settled on the finale:
“Revenant has always been a fascinating character for the narrative team, especially with the conflict between him and Loba. We definitely had a lot of different pitches on how their story, and Revenant’s specifically, could develop. However, there was one idea for the finale of Kill Code that we were all excited about and we felt worked really well with his upcoming rework, so that’s the direction we ultimately ended up going in.
It’ll be interesting to see how Kill Code comes to a close and what’s beyond that, as well as how Forge continues to come into play for Revenant. Who knows, perhaps Kill Code ends with Forge coming back for the last laugh. That’s obviously super unlikely, but fans will just have to wait and see what Respawn has tucked away for the Assassin Simulacrum, forLoba, for Silva and the Syndicate, and so much more.
Apex Legendsis available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
