@IlIlIIllIlIlIl it certainly is! In practice people who don't want to play on the map they don't want to play on will simply log off and wait for the maps to rotate or simply play something else. Essentially they've put what they've perceived to be a Bandaid on what is a much deeper issue.
TL;DR: Apex has been on the decline due to abysmally slow development and nonexistent communication that's been compounded by the developer's track record of how they view us as their players (see Iron Crown event) which has lead to many players, not just pro or casual, quitting the game simply due to it being not as polished as you'd expect from a game that's had over a year to be as good as the hype made it out to be, not to mention the developer's main focus of generating income and interest in the game itself rather than creating a quality product.
Here's my experience on what's going on. Firstly, the developers are having problems with player retention, AKA, people coming back to play the game over and over. They've been having these issues for a while. That's why recently they've been adopting gimmicks such as the ranked split, the ranked rewards requiring a higher rank for the same rewards we've always gotten, why they changed Predator to be demoteable instead of static like it used to be, why we have a rotating map roster instead of being able to select a map, and why instead of pushing out QoL changes like improvements to hit-reg for everyone, or fixing the persistent audio issues that have plagued the game since Worlds Edge's arrival, they have more NEW content instead of polishing existing content.
In short, the declining (yes it's declining, no the game isn't dying) player count has changed the developer's (and also EA as a publisher) priorities from polishing and creating a much more refined game, to pumping out as much content as possible to continue to generate interest in the game. This is, once again, a Bandaid for player retention that runs much much deeper than you'd think.
In my mind, the REAL reason they're having player retention issues, is simply because the developers started on a very high high, and failed to live up to even the most BASIC of requests. They've consistently proven that they don't listen to the community on big issues, and simply shotgun whatever updates, gamemodes, balance changes, or events that they see fit to generate interest in the game. NOT TO MENTION they've consistently failed to communicate with ANY of the community on quite literally anything. Other games do it so much better, Warframe, League of Legends, Deep Rock Galactic, Gunfire Reborn, Curse of the Dead Gods, Enter the Gungeon, Borderlands 3, Arknights, and the list goes on and on. NOT A SINGLE ONE OF THOSE GAMES DOES A CHANGE GET PASSED WITHOUT AN ANNOUNCEMENT / DEVSTREAM / NEWS UPDATE ON STEAM PAGE / COMMUNITY UPDATES ON REDDIT / ETC. ETC. What do we get? We get one devstream every 3 months that talks about the upcoming season changes, and a forum post for changes that have already happened. No addresses to community concerns, and certainly no replies from devs themselves after Iron Crown since they just proved they see us as walking wallets than appreciating interest. On their Youtube channel, the last Devstream was 3 months ago, AND IT DOESN'T EVEN TALK ABOUT THE UPCOMING SEASON CHANGES EITHER. Which begs the question, why is it that so many games, some of which who pertain to the same style genre, can communicate with their community frequently, effectively, efficiently, concisely, and constructively, but the developers here can't?
Once again, and I've stated this in a different post that I can't seem to quite find despite going through my post history, I do 3D modeling as a hobby. I am nowhere NEAR as good as the skin designers and effects team that they have. But I understand how much work goes into creating those skins, and it's no knock on the people who make those skins. But to see how high quality those skins are, and to understand how much work goes into making them, and then seeing the events that are paired up with them? How most if not all are just lazy re-hashed content with minor changes (best example? See Grand Soiree event.) that are expressly designed to sell the skin rather than create an event that's fun and engaging? It's pathetic, plain and simple.
If you'd like me to source info to back up my claims, please feel free to let me know. If you didn't bother to read this, don't worry, I'm not offended, I love to talk and it doesn't really matter to me either way if you read this or not.
