Apex Legends Devs Address “Pay to Win” Flatline Sun Squad Skin

Apex Legends players have been left dealing with a "pay to win" skin for the Flatline, giving an unintended advantage to those who paid for the skin.

The recent Sun Squad Collection Event in Apex Legends celebrated everything sunny and warm, adding in a variety of new Legendary skins themed around swimsuits and summer fun. Players saw brand new Legendary cosmetics for the likes of Fuse and Mirage, with even more entering the shop rotation each week.

The event runs until April 11, so players only have a few more days to get their hands on the event's offerings. One such weapon skin on offer is for the Flatline, turning it into a super soaker-styled weapon. This fun design led many players to grab the skin while they could, just for a bit of excitement. But it seems the new skin may have also offered up an unintentional advantage.

The Splash Zone skin for the Flatliner gave the weapon a better sight line than the base model design. Effectively improving the model by unintentionally locking it behind a paywall, something frustrated players were quick to voice.  

Apex Legends Devs Address “Pay to Win” Flatline Sun Squad Skin

On March 28, Respawn said, “the Splash Zone Flatline skin is currently missing a piece from its iron sights, making it appear smaller than it should be. In a future patch, we’ll update it to match its intended design.”

The iron sights previously had a clear sight line, but a new update will add an extra piece that will add in some restrictions.

Of course, the changes didn't go down too well, either. Apex Legends players took their grievances up with the developers, now saying that they changed a skin after players already purchased it. Others asked why couldn’t the better iron sights just become the Flatline’s default sight.

Over on Reddit, the change became a hot debate: “Hear me out. Just make all Flatline iron sights look like this.”

Some users implied that the change was made intentionally, saying, “They knew exactly what they were doing with this one.” Though other players were quick to say the super soaker design was enough to attract players to the skin regardless.