What I really hate about the microtransactions in the game is that they remove the incentive to play since they're all random.

If certain things were unlocked from beating the campaign on Insane or getting X amount of headshots or whatever, that'd be cool with me, but the fact that everything is random kind of kills any motivation to unlock stuff because you have no control over it. It also destroys the visual element of going online with you customized character, because when you see a guy using a rare character with a golden gun, you can just assume he cracked open a lucky box. It reduces the prestige of all the cosmetics.

I am an adult with a busy life, so I can't really commit to playing hours upon hours in order to unlock countless boxes with game points. Sure, I could spend real money on boxes, and I am not against buying DLC per se, but in my mind I find it really hard to justify spending my hard earned cash on what is essentially a lottery ticket for a chance to unlock something that will allow me to do nothing more than play dress-up with a video game character.

As I don't have the time nor inclination to become the next big eSports superstar, what motivation is there really to keep playing Gears 4 long-term? The crate system kills all motivation. It's really sad too, because I've been a massive Gears fan since the first game, but I feel like once I start to initially begin getting bored with Gears 4 I'll probably just give it up and move on to the next game. Here's to hoping that game doesn't have crates too.