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Ubisoft's plan to save 'Hyper Scape' starts next week

Season 2 kicks off on October 6th.

Ubisoft

The battle royale market is a tough one. Between Fortnite, Call of Duty: Warzone and Apex Legends, players have plenty of free-to-play options to choose from. It’s no surprise, therefore, to hear that Ubisoft’s Hyper Scape has been struggling since launch. Earlier this week, the publisher admitted that it “didn’t fully meet the high expectations of our players” and vowed to improve the experience, especially on consoles. Now, we have some idea of how the company is taking action. The company has released a trailer for the game’s second season, which launches on October 6th and introduces new weapons, modes, locations and unlockable cosmetics.

First, the Atrax. The new firearm can launch “sticky bursts of timed explosives,” Ubisoft revealed in a press release, that appear to work best when your opponent doesn’t have anywhere to run. There’s also a new in-game ‘hack’ ability called Platform which, as the name suggests, lets you create a digital stepping stone anywhere in mid-air. Hyper Scape’s Neo Arcadia map will also be updated with a new landmark called Memorial which resembles a large cathedral or mausoleum. And if you’re tired of the standard battle royale format, you might want jump into the new Floor is Lava mode, which turns everything on ground level into lethal magma.

Unlockables are being reworked, too. Ubisoft has promised a daily gift for Hyper Scape players that will alternate between Battle Points, cosmetics and other items. There will also be two 100-tier Battle Passes — one that’s free, and one that requires real-world money to start — that includes outfits, deployment pods and weapon skins. Finally, Season 2 will give players a rank based on how they perform in the Crown Rush Squad mode.

Will these improvements be enough to save Hyper Scape? Probably not. But the publisher has teased bigger changes, such as reworked combat and better onboarding for new players. “Currently, it is too hard to aim, track and consistently damage players and eliminate them, especially on consoles,” Ubisoft admitted in a blog post earlier this week. The company is also rethinking some of its modes and trying to bring forward the introduction of cross-play support. “We want to add it earlier than planned to help address the current issues of lobby size,” Ubisoft explained.