The year in loot boxes

[Administrator]

The great Star Wars debacle - and I'm not talking about The Last Jedi's second act here - dominated video game headlines in the last quarter of 2017. But in truth the year was packed with depressing stories about loot boxes, so many in fact that it has at times felt like our beloved hobby was more about the chance to win a rare item than it was about the chance to play.
It all began with For Honor, Ubisoft's excellent but troubled melee combat game. Soon after For Honor came out in February, a redditor worked out how much money it would cost to unlock all 12 heroes in the game and their associated aesthetic items (2017 would see enterprising redditors work out how much things cost to unlock in a lot of games). It turned out it would cost an eye-watering £585. Ouch.
Ubisoft, sensing a growing resentment among players (growing resentment was a running theme of 2017), said it never intended for players to unlock everything in the game. That was a PR line that didn't go down well (PR lines that didn't go down well was another running theme of 2017).
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