Paladins Reddit Protests Against Loot Boxes with Terrible “Fan Art”

Subscribers to the Paladins Reddit page have adopted an unusual method of protesting the game’s loot boxes, with them filling up the subreddit with hilariously terrible fan art.

The fan art has emerged as a result of Paladins developer Hi-Rez Studios’ loot box-esque card system, with it being criticized for being “pay to win” as a result of improving character abilities. The system has been compared to EA’s Star Wars Battlefront 2, with it offering tiered boosts to abilities that make characters more powerful after they’re unlocked.

While the Battlefront 2 subreddit expressed its frustration more directly, publicly calling out EA and admonishing the game for its microtransactions, Paladins players have opted to take a more light-hearted approach to the controversy. The subreddit is now littered with crude illustrations of Paladins‘ heroes, some of which you can view in the gallery below:

Though it’s unclear exactly when this trend of responding to Hi-Rez Studios’ microtransactions with bad fan art began, it is now gaining more traction thanks to a video from prominent gaming critic Jim Sterling, who recently posted a video sharing the fan art.

The video can be viewed below:

It remains to be seen whether or not Hi-Rez Studios takes these criticisms on board or responds to the fan art, but it seems that many Paladins players are already very disillusioned by the changes made to the game. Hopefully, Hi-Rez will seek to find a happy middle ground sooner rather than later.