Doom Eternal cosmetic items are unlockable with experience, not micro-transactions

Doom Eternal’s cosmetic items will be unlocked through experience points and the game won’t have a store for micro-transactions, as stated by its creative director (via DualShockers).

Creative director Hugo Martin broke the news in a Facebook comment, which has been doing the rounds today. He said that Doom Eternal has no digital store and the cosmetic items are purely cosmetic with no extra advantages. “Eternal is a $60 game, not a free-to-play game or a mobile game—we are giving you a complete experience with no store just like you’d expect. Unlocking skins with XP is a part of the experience if you care about that stuff, or you can completely ignore it,” explained Martin. “It’s all free.”

With this news, Doom Eternal dances to the beat of its own drum. Microtransactions and loot crates have become ubiquitous in lots of games, as a method of supporting the game. Not all of these approaches have stuck the landing, however. EA DICE’s Star Wars Battlefront II microtransactions were pulled when players reacted angrily to the gameplay advantages afforded to those who poured real-world money into the game. Rocket League did away with loot crates in favour of a system that told players what they get for their coin before they made the purchase. And finally, the Entertainment Software Association implemented a policy that asks publishers “to disclose information on the relative rarity or probability of obtaining randomised virtual items,” if they’d like their games to be released on consoles. 

Doom Eternal will launch for PC, Xbox One, and PlayStation 4 on March 20, 2020. It’s also coming to the Nintendo Switch a little while after.