"Shadow of War’s approach doesn’t seem so much predatory to me as misanthropic"

A detailed look at avoiding buying loot boxes in the Shadow of Mordor sequel. The conclusion:

But never once did I spend “real” cash on a loot box, save to see what happened for the review. (It was crap, honestly.) Never once did I feel the need. I had over 40 legendary weapons and armor pieces at the end. So again, what’s the point? The very fact that I’ve written all these words to show that’s it’s not so bad in Shadow of War demonstrates how thorny the issue is and why it probably shouldn’t have even been implemented in the first place. Yet as we already know from the news of players spending billions on loot boxes and similar items in Blizzard games, someone’s going to buy this stuff.

Shadow of War’s approach doesn’t seem so much predatory to me as misanthropic. It merely makes it easy to get stuff that’s already easy to get, and that, ultimately, is what leaves a sour taste in my mouth.