Flush with cash? Here’s what $100 will get you in game.
If you’ve been playing Apex Legends and have yet to part with any of your money, we’ve saved you the hassle of trying to figure out what’s what by spending 100 dollars in Respawn’s battle royale shooter.
Because Apex Legends is free-to-play, microtransactions are inevitably going to be a part of its ecosystem. For consumers who are unclear with how mictrotransactions work in Apex Legends, don’t worry: all of them are 100% cosmetic, which means you can’t get an edge in the game if you fork out cash.
You can actually see every unlockable cosmetic if you head over to the legend and armory tab. There are over 1900 total items with 4 tiers of rarity: common, rare, epic, and legendary. Players will have unlocked 45 total apex boxes once they reach level 100 and with 3 items per loot box, that means you are getting access to 135 free items.
There is duplicate protection and a guaranteed legendary item every 30 packs so you’ll at minimum get 1 legendary item and 135 unique items if you don’t shell out any cash. If you do decide to spend money, you’ll be buying Apex Coins, the in-game currency you use to purchase the apex packs.
Straight up, each Apex pack is 100 Apex Coins which is basically 99 cents. However, if you purchase one of the Apex coin bundles, like the $99.99 bundle, you’ll receive bonus coins. Breaking down each bundle, the $99.99 bundle gets you enough coins for 115 boxes which essentially makes the cost per box 87 cents.
The $59.99 bundle gets you 67 boxes at 90 cents per box, the $39.99 bundle gets you 43 boxes at 93 cents per box, the $19.99 bundle gets you 21 boxes at 95 cents per box, and the $9.99 bundles gets you 10 boxes at the standard 99 cents per box. In my 115 boxes, I received 166 common items, 138 rare items, 32 epic items, and 9 legendary items.
My 9 legendary items included 3 legend skins, 3 weapon skins, 2 banners, and 1 finisher move. This is all subjective but I was definitely disappointed in seeing my legendary drops turn into a banner, so you have to factor in that every legendary you get might not even be worth it to you.
Statistically though, at a 24.8% chance at an epic item and 7.4% chance at a legendary per pack, I was supposed to open 28.5 Epics and 8.5 legendaries in 115 packs. Since I opened 32 epics and 9 legendaries, I actually did better than what I was supposed to receive. There is a secret rarity called Heirloom that has around a 1% drop rate per pack or guaranteed after 500 opened packs. The Heirloom set gives you an ultra-rare voice line, banner pose, and a melee weapon which is purely cosmetic and can be seen if you run around with no weapons. As of now, only Wraith has an Heirloom set but we can probably expect one for each Legend in the future.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get this exclusive drop but I can totally see this being a driving factor for players to purchase hundreds of packs for a chance at it. Overall, I have no problems with Apex Legends’ microtransaction system, as they are all cosmetic. Some people might argue that the two legends Mirage and Caustic are pay-to-win to unlock, but I don’t think this is valid because anyone can grind for those two characters and all of the Legends are so well-balanced.
I do, however, have an issue with the common in-game statistics that are in the loot pool: there are some stats I would love to display on my banner and tying that to luck is unfortunate. I don’t play Apex Legends because of the progression in unlocking cosmetics, though, I play it because it’s an absolute blast of a game.
For more on Apex Legends, check out our character guide, guide to crafting metal, and strategy tips.
Steven Ryu is a producer at IGN. Follow him on Twitter.
