Apex Legends' new hero is five-time Hyperfighting Federation champion Forge

Apex Legends is almost a year old, and developer Respawn will be celebrating its free-to-play battle royale game's first birthday on 4th February by ushering in a new season. And now, in preparation for the big day, it's outlined a few of the additions coming to Season 4 - subtitled Assimilation - including a brand-new Legend going by the name of Forge.

Forge, as his beefy demeanour and hefty championship belt might suggest, is a five-time Hyperfighting Federation champion, and the first Legend to have a (fictional) corporate sponsor in-game, thanks to Hammond Robotics. Respawn isn't going into much mechanical detail about Forge just yet, but hints that he's an "up close and personal" brawler with a mean left hook.

As part of Forge's introduction, Respawn is teasing "big map changes" for World's Edge, similar the Kings Canyon update in Season 2.

Also new to Apex Legends' fourth season is the Sentinel, a bolt-action sniper rifle that "feels really powerful". Again, Respawn is being coy about specifics, but teases that the weapon is a little different to other sniper rifles in-game, thanks to its new charge mechanic.

Rounding out the Season 4 details for now is news of some significant changes to Ranked mode, which will soon embark on Series 3. Most notably, Respawn is overhauling Apex Legends' current Apex Predator tier and introducing a new Master Tier in its place.

While the latter will be the new home for all players with more than 10,000 RP, Apex Predator isn't dead. Instead, it'll be a new elite rank for the top 500 players on each platform, with players being "demoted" to Master Tier as new contenders climb the ladder.

The purpose of these changes, says Respawn, is to give the most competitive players "a little extra kick" to maintain their position.

Ranked play will be split into two halves over Season 4's battle pass (which promises 100 exclusive items including Apex Packs, Legendary skins, Loading Screens, Music Packs, and more). Not only will the start of each half usher in a rank reset, both will unfold in different locations. From 3rd February until 23rd March, Ranked players will duke it out on the World's Edge map, while Kings Canyon will return from 24th March to until season's end on 5th May.

Full details of Apex Legends' Season 4 will be released ahead of its 4th February launch on Xbox One, PS4, and PC. And as a special birthday treat, players that log-in during its first week (that's 4th February to 11th February) will receive a Year 1 Origami Flyer, a Year 1 Loyalty Badge, and 10k XP for their first match each day until the event ends.