Season six of THE FINALS brought a rework to Las Vegas in the form of the Las Vegas Stadium, which received mixed feedback from players as it seemingly lost some of its glitzy identity.
Las Vegas Stadium is the updated version of the Las Vegas map in THE FINALS that looks a lot like Fortune Stadium now, themed all around the season six sponsors. The rework aims to reduce clutter in the interior spaces, but players immediately pointed out it looks a bit “too empty,” worrying that the developer sacrificed realism for esports. During an interview with Embark Studios on March 20, Dot Esports spoke with the design director, Matt Lowe, about the thought process behind the rework and the approach to designing future maps.
“I think it’s feedback we’ve definitely heard. We love the sponsor identities, and obviously, there’s a lot of passion in the community for the sponsors, but we definitely noticed that feedback when we revealed the Vegas stuff last week or so,” Lowe said.
“As much as the game show and the sponsors will always be there on every map, I think internally, when we look at the maps, there are at least two distinct styles that we have there, and there’s no intent to go away from that,” he explained. The two map styles are the arena maps, like Fortune Stadium and Skyway Stadium, and the other are the traditional maps grounded in real-world locations, like Kyoto and Bernal.
On that note, the latest Las Vegas rework isn’t a sign of where every future map will go because the developer wants to do as much variety as possible, and thanks to the game’s setting, the show can go pretty much anywhere. So, for those of you who prefer maps based more on real-life locations, don’t worry, as that’s still a part of THE FINALS‘s future as much as arena maps.
Apart from the Las Vegas rework, season six shifted some of the Quickplay modes, with Team Deathmatch replacing Bank It. While it may not be everyone’s favorite, Bank It still had an audience, and the dev team explained the reason behind its removal.
“ We felt that Bank It and TDM were so close to each other as gameplay experiences, with TDM being, when we ran the event in season five, considerably more popular,” Lowe said. “ So we didn’t feel it was right for the game to add something that players really wanted in TDM and then just fragment the community further.”
However, Lowe said Bank It will definitely return at some point. He mentioned ideas of doing more limited-time modes, and Bank It might be a part of them with potential rule changes or adjustments and associated rewards. In the meantime, Team Deathmatch is here to stay in THE FINALS, so for any casual run-and-gun gameplay, that’s your go-to mode.
Published: Mar 24, 2025 11:21 AM UTC