Respawn Entertainment’s Apex Legends took the world by storm with its surprise release in February 2019, hitting more than 50 million players within the first month. Apex Legends Season 1 introduced a battle pass and new items, but Season 2 brought some radical changes to the game as monsters invaded King’s Canyon, new characters were introduced, and challenges became a regular part of the experience.

Respawn Entertainment released a Year 1 Roadmap for Apex Legends that offers a few clues about what we can expect from Season 3, due out in October, and it includes new weapons, a new character, and plenty of cosmetic items. Ongoing updates that balance weapons or adjust the performance of specific characters will happen regularly, but Season 3 should include much more.

Here’s everything you need to know about Apex Legends Season 3, including the projected start date and time, cost of the battle pass, new characters, and so much more.

When is the Apex Legends Season 2 end date?

In an official Q&A about the game, Respawn wrote, “Each season will run for approximately three months.” Season 1 ended on June 18, one day before the three-month mark — but only because seasons seemingly have to start and end on Tuesdays. That’s when the Apex Legends weekly reset happens, along with significant game updates.

If that trend continues, then Season 2 should end on Tuesday, October 1. The in-game countdown timer, however, indicates that the season will end on September 30, probably at 1 p.m. Eastern, leaving a 24 hour window before Season 3 begins.

When is the Apex Legends Season 3 start date?

Respawn Entertainment released a Season 3 launch trailer on September 27 that confirmed a launch date of October 1.

Season 1 ended on June 18 and Season 2 didn’t start until July 2, leaving two weeks in between the end of one season and the beginning of another. If that trend had held for the transition between Season 2 and 3, then Season 3 wouldn’t have begun until October 15. That, however, does not seem to be the case.

Season 3 will probably launch right at 1 p.m. Eastern, when most updates to the game go live.

What is the Apex Legends Season 3 theme?

Season 1’s theme was “Wild Frontier” and introduced players to a new Legend called Octane. Season 2’s theme was “Battle Charge,” tied to the new character Natalie “Wattson” Paquette who uses electrified fences to damage and slow enemies. What could happen for Season 3?

The Season 3 launch trailer, which takes the Legends to a new battle arena, confirms a theme of “Meltdown” on account of all the lava in the new World’s Edge map.

Will Apex Legends Season 3 include map changes?

The core of rival battle royale game Fortnite’s seasonal battle pass structure rekindles fan interest by changing the map at the start of each season. There have been meteor strikes and volcanic eruptions that destroyed portions of the map, and one time a small iceberg crashed into the main island.

The start of Apex Legends Season 1 didn’t do much, but giant Leviathans began circling the waters around the island and smaller Flyers also started flying around. These many creatures invaded the island in Season 2 and destroyed certain areas, prompting a time jump between Season 1 and 2.

Season 3 truly shakes things up by migrating the Apex Games over to a new arena on an entirely different planet. It’s called World’s Edge on Planet Talos. In this arena, “molten heat and chemical ice collide.” There’s also a train that never stops moving.

Will Apex Legends Season 3 include new characters?

Yes! New characters, called “Legends,” are added to Apex Legends on an ongoing basis separate but simultaneous with each season’s battle pass. Octane was released the same day as Season 1, Season 2 introduced Wattson, and Season 3 will add a new hero called Crypto to the lineup.

Season 3 will introduce Crypto to the game after he appeared in the Season 2 launch trailer. His high tech abilities involve using an aerial drone that can scout the nearby area and even deliver an EMP blast in a wide area.

In his “Stories from the Outlands” video, it’s revealed that Crypto’s real name is Park Tae Joon. He and his stepsister Mila Alexander were hackers who came across a program that could predict the winner of the Apex Games. The Syndicate found out and framed Joon for the disappearance of his own step sister, so he’s been on the run ever since. This explains why he was attacking the disruptor tower back at the start of Season 2, to deal damage to the Syndicate’s operations.

Some leaks posted to Reddit in late August 2019 from a GameStop conference held in Nashville, Tennessee may have also confirmed a Halloween-inspired theme for Season 3 that includes Crypto.

Slides from some kind of presentation show the above image of Crypto, a new weapon called the Charge Rifle (confirmed for Season 3), and a Halloween skin for Gibraltar that makes him look like Frankenstein’s monster.

Because Season 3 should run from October through the end of the year, it’s unlikely that the theme for the whole season would relate exclusively to Halloween. But some kind of limited-time event in late October that’ll include special skins like this feels appropriate.

More recent leaks via data-mining indicate that the next hero in the pipeline after Crypto is Kuben Blisk, a freelance pilot who leads the Apex Predators in the Titanfall games and the man who created the Apex Games after a conflict known as the Frontier War. There’s even data to support an aggressive toolkit as well, but all of this remains unconfirmed at this time.

Will Apex Legends Season 3 Include Events?

We can only assume yes. After Season 1 wrapped in June, there was “Legendary Hunt.” A September event during Season 2 called Voidwalker event focused on Wraith. With Voidwalker in particular, Respawn Entertainment seems to be taking a similar approach to Blizzard with Overwatch by building out the lore of its universe and the story of its characters by producing short animated films.

The “Stories From the Outlands” format was also applied to Wattson’s backstory, so there’s every reason to expect we’ll get even more. Eventually, we might have some kind of theatrical short film for each character.

With Voidwalker, Respawn established an effective formula for generating themed in-game events that launch with story-focused videos. These characters vary wildly, but it’ll be interesting to see what Respawn does with them in future seasons and events.

How Much Does the Apex Legends Season 3 Battle Pass Cost?

Respawn officially confirmed in a blog post shortly before the beginning of Season 1 that the battle pass would cost 950 Apex Coins, roughly $9.50. But for 2,800 Apex Coins, players can get the battle pass and automatically unlock the first 25 levels. This remained the case in Season 2, and there’s no reason to expect it to change in Season 3.

Apex Legends is currently available on PC via Origin, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.