Apex Legends hacked by Titanfall fans unhappy about hacking

Lifeline looks into the camera with a smirk — (Image credit: Respawn)

An unhappy Titanfall player (or group of players; it's unclear how many people are involved in this) has hacked into Apex Legends in order to plead with developer Respawn to address hacking and cheating in the original Titanfall game.

Screenshots and videos have appeared online today from Apex Legends players showing that many cannot access any of the shooter's usual modes, and instead can only see a message that directs players to visit a website called savetitanfall.com.

Initially, it was thought only PC players were being affected, but reports on Reddit now intimate it's affecting console and Switch players, too, right across the world.

A subheader that usually describes the game mode says "[Titanfall 1] is being attacked so is Apex", while other players are also getting a message each time they complete a match asking them to "visit and repost savetitanfall.com".

"Titanfall is a beloved franchise by many, and hacker issues have been at rise [sic]," explains a statement on the website address that's been advertised by the hack.

Players are being given this "Important Message" after finishing a match. pic.twitter.com/SGKvduO95pJuly 4, 2021

"The Titanfall community has been begging Respawn to fix this issue for over three years, but to no avail. Today this game is still being sold, while being completely unplayable. It's time we speak up.

"Titanfall 1 is currently unplayable on PC due to hacker(s) using exploits that prevents players from being able to play the game," the statement goes on to add (thanks, Apex Legends News). "This issue has been happening for years and Respawn is willingly pretending that they do not know about the situation.

"To this day, Titanfall 1 is still on sale on the Origin, and more recently Steam, even though it is unplayable. Respawn, the developers, have been contacted about this matter numerous times in many ways. Even when the developers have been directly contacted, as soon as the topic of the Titanfall 1 problem is brought up, they stop replying. Electronic Arts, the parent company of Respawn and publisher for Titanfall 1 are aware of the situation, with countless reports to their client support and forums over the years."

At the time of writing, neither developer Respawn nor publisher EA have publicly commented on the hacking on any of the teams' usual social media channels. A thread discussing the issue has been upvoted nearly 13,000 times.

ICYMI, Apex developer Respawn recently committed to fixing cheating in ranked, but in turn, has sparked a community hashtag that has trended on Twitter.

Cheating in the higher-tiers of Apex Legends ranked has been an ongoing heated issue for the game's community, and it recently appears to have spilled past boiling point. In response to a tweet by developer Respawn, professional Apex Player Chris "sweetdreams" Sexton responded with a statement of their own.

"We are so done with it, it's to the point where we literally DO NOT know what to do, we just sit around month over month and nothing changes and it's demoralizing. Please take initiative and #SaveApexRanked, before it's too late."

Have you ever wondered why Apex Legends' Wattson runs about "a bit awkwardly" whilst carrying her weapons? Principal animator Moy Parra recently explained that it's because the team "wanted to capture this natural innocence in all of Wattson's move sets".