EA Play took center stage on Thursday with many reveals across existing and upcoming Electronic Arts titles.
An Apex Legends Collection Event entitled Lost Treasures is coming to the game on Tuesday. The event will include Armed and Dangerous: Evolved, a return of the limited-time mode first seen in Season 2, which limited players to snipers and shotguns. This time around, however, all armor will be Evo armor, and there will be no respawn beacons across the entire map. Instead, users will have access to one mobile respawn beacon, which will allow players to choose when and where to bring a downed teammate back to the battle. There will be exclusive challenges and skins associated with the event, including Mirage's heirloom -- a trophy of himself -- as well as a new Town Takeover, Crypto's Map Room.
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More major news to come out of the Apex Legends presentation is that this fall, crossplay will be enabled across all platforms. The game also will be released on the Nintendo Switch and will be available on Steam. Apex Legends boasts more than 70 million active users as of now, Respawn game director Chad Grenier said on the EA Play stream. He noted Season 5: Fortune's Favor has been the "biggest and best start to a season ever" for the title.
EA also showcased the upcoming Madden 21 and FIFA 21 in a merged trailer. On Tuesday, EA revealed the cover for Madden, which features Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson. No player has yet been officially announced as the face of FIFA 21.
Although there was no announcement about crossplay in either game, it was revealed that through the EA SPORTS Dual Entitlement offer, people who purchase either title on PS4 or XBOX One will be able to upgrade to the PS5 or XBOX Series X version of the games at no additional cost when it is released. The next-gen versions of the games will include features that are not available in the older consoles, though details of just what that means are scarce. Madden 21 will be released Aug. 21, and FIFA 21 will launch Oct. 9.
EA also provided lots of information about the highly anticipated Star Wars: Squadrons. Billed as "the definitive Star Wars pilot experience," the game takes place just after the events of Return of the Jedi. It begins in a single-player mode, and upon completing that, multiplayer will open up, with eight ships available to choose for battle and full crossplay available. Virtual reality will be supported in full from the game's start to finish, developers said. Star Wars: Squadrons will be released Oct. 2.
Finally, in a surprising conclusion to the presentation, EA announced that Skate 4, a sequel to the beloved skateboarding series, is in development. Skate creative director Cuz Parry dropped the bomb in EA Play's final moments.
"We're back! We're doing it!" Parry said. "Skate's happening. We're rolling. We've secretly got together -- it's the beginning. The Skate evolution continues."
Both he and Skate game director Deran Chung noted they are still very early in the development process but the project is underway. The duo pointed to the community's outpouring of support and desire for a new game as the reason the project was green-lighted.
"You commented this into existence," Parry said. "Amazing."