Dauntless Plans To Ditch Loot Boxes

The latest update for Dauntless added a bunch of stuff to Phoenix Labs' monster-slayer F2P game. Perhaps more significantly, something's going to be removed in the near future.

Currently, Dauntless loot comes in the form of Chroma Cores, which contain a random mix of cosmetics and other items -- your typical randomized loot boxes. Perhaps sensing the recent anti-loot-box sentiment that's going around, Design Director Chris Cleroux said in a recent roundtable that the Chroma Cores would be removed from the game in the near future.

"We're going to be moving away from that as our primary monetization to more of a bespoke model like Warframe and Path of Exile, where you'll be able to choose and pick the things you want to purchase rather than go through the gotcha-box method. We feel like it's a lot more player-first in how it works, and it also reflects a changing interest in the community."

According to PCGamer, Cleroux and Executive Producer/Phoenix Labs Co-founder Jesse Houston were inspired by an Ars Technica article decrying loot box implementation in Forza 7 to remove Chroma Cores from Dauntless.

"We were just like, yeah fuck, this article is kind of right ... I do not want to build a company that is known for being able to extract capital, or some other bullshit, out of [players]."

Using expletives to describe your distaste for loot boxes? I can't say I'm upset by that.