Call of Duty: Black Ops IIII's latest patch adds pay-to-win lootboxes

[AnotherGills 25]

The latest installment in Activision-Blizzard’s first-person shooter franchise, Call of Duty: Black Ops IIII, has received a new patch on June 25th. While most of the changes in Update 1.19 pertain to weapon balance, an unsavory addition was found for Blackout, the game’s 100-player battle royale mode.

The new feature, referred to as “Blackjack’s Stashes”, locks certain new weapons behind RNG lootboxes. In-game, players can now find special lockers. Opening these lockers will award players with a random weapon from their personal pool of lootbox-unlocked weapons. Another issue players have with this addition is the inability for other players to pick these weapons up. If a player were to engage in a firefight against a Blackjack Stash-equipped player and emerged victorious, they will still be unable to take the weapon from their opponent’s dropped inventory.

Black Ops IIII is no stranger to lootbox-related backlash. The competitive multiplayer mode was also impacted in a previous patch having weapon variants with XP-boosting multipliers locked behind a similar lootbox system, referred to in-game as “Reserves Crates”.  Further causing issue was the introduction of a Battle Pass-esque system, which locked certain weapons exclusively to the pass making it harder for players to have an even-playing field.

While many players are displeased with these updates, Activision-Blizzard and Treyarch have done nothing to address the criticisms.