Apex Legends is getting a boost of new skins with the new solo event Iron Crown. However, the way to obtain them is currently frustrating the community.
How can you get the new skins? Since August 12, the new skins from the Solo Mode event Iron Crown have been available in Apex Legends. However, unlike the first major event at the end of Season 1, you cannot earn all the skins in the game.
Instead, there is a dedicated item shop in the game until the event ends on August 27, which sells special Iron Crown loot boxes. These, in turn, contain one of 24 skins for legends and weapons.
There are no duplicates; you will always receive a new skin that is at least epic. However, each box costs 700 Apex Coins, which equates to about 7 euros. By comparison, the regular boxes that you can buy in-game only cost one euro!
On the other hand, 7 euros for an epic or legendary skin is cheaper than if you deliberately buy one of the legendary skins in the daily shop, where they cost 18 euros each. You do get exactly the skin you want, though.
Can you also get the boxes in-game? In the game itself, you can only earn 2 such boxes. One for completing 20 random dailies from the challenges and another for dealing 25,000 damage.
This means that players who want all 24 skins must pay at least 154 euros to purchase 22 boxes. But that’s not all.
This is what you need to pay to get the ultimate skin: Those who have all 24 skins from the Iron Crown event can purchase a special heirloom skin for the character Bloodhound for 3,500 additional coins. That’s another 35 euros you need to pay after you’ve cleared all the loot boxes for 154 euros.
In total, you need nearly 190 euros to collect everything from the event. With that money, you could buy at least 3 full-price AAA games!
Fans are angry about EA’s loot box policy
This is how the community reacts: As expected, fans are furious about the method how EA is bringing the infamous loot boxes back into the game. Most players agree that all the skins are very well done. But many players only want two or three of them for their favorite characters.
Since the loot boxes still run via a random generator, there is a worst-case scenario where you might buy about 20 boxes until you finally get the skins you want. And the fact that you can hardly unlock skins from an event during the event itself does not make sense to many fans either.
Therefore, Reddit is currently full of angry reactions from the community:
- “I’m out. I would like to buy one or two skins, but this terrible one-armed bandit sucks!”
- “I would buy a skin for 7 dollars, but not the chance to get a specific skin!”
- “Loot boxes are crap, but if I can earn them in the game, I can tolerate it. But putting time-limited items in loot boxes that you can only get with money? F*** you!”
- “I want to support the game and put money into it to ensure its long-term success. But this is just ridiculous! The double regular price for loot boxes, i.e., 200 coins, would be okay, but 700? That stinks.”
One player articulated it particularly poignantly by paraphrasing EA on the subject: “These are not loot boxes, these are “surprise mechanics” and you love that!”
According to many fans, this event action is clearly a test by EA to see how far players will go to obtain a few cool skins.
