Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment announced that Middle-Earth: Shadow of War will have microtransactions, a microtransaction store, loot chests, war chests, and a currency designed to benefit from the cash shop items called… gold.
TechRaptor picked up the news from a forum post over on the WB Games website, where the publisher proudly announced the microtransaction marketplace.
Mirian is one type of currency that can be acquired in the game defeating Orcs, scrapping gear in exchange for Mirian, or destroying Orc followers in exchange for Mirian. The Mirian can then be used to buy XP boosts, loot chests, boost chests, war chests, and other gear.
The chests are identical to the random loot chests found in other games like Overwatch, Counter-Strike or Payday 2. They contain a variety of gear that ranges in quality from common to legendary.
If you’re having a hard time acquiring Mirian, you can use gold instead to buy microtransaction items. Gold can be acquired by participating in community challenges, completing milestones or spending real money to own a select amount of gold through the PlayStation Store, Xbox Store or adding it to the Steam Wallet.
Warner Bros., also wanted to inform gamers that Mirian and Gold purchasables aren’t behind a paywall. You can acquire all of the microtransactions by grinding in-game…
“Please note: No content in the game is gated by Gold. All content can be acquired naturally through normal gameplay.”
They attempt to demonstrate the benefits of the cash shop items in a live-stream style video you can check out below.
Some people began to defend Warner Bros., using the typical defense “it’s only optional”…
The video itself has an ample amount of downvotes, however. This is mostly due to people who are not fond of having a typical free-to-play, pay-to-win style monetary system in a full priced $60 single-player RPG.
There are plenty of white knights defending the microtransactions, though. So we’ll see if people cower in the face of peer pressure and continue to support microtransactions in a single-player RPG or if they stand their ground and hold the wallet when Middle-Earth: Shadow of War launches on October 10th for PC, PS4 and Xbox One.
