Razer has just introduced a Battlefield skin that anyone can access at no cost, and the world wide web followed its usual path by reacting to it. The gaming peripherals manufacturer informed that the players will be able to receive a ‘System Override’ soldier skin as soon as they sign up on their Discord server. This is a promotional partnership between the not-so-great games and EA’s battle royale shooter, and it is inviting the whole community to participate by discussing, debating, and posting tips for redemption through nothing but a typical social media frenzy.
In case you did not see it on Twitter, here is the crux of the matter: Razer published a link showing the players that they should begin by joining the Razer Discord, then redeem the code for the skin, and finally, go into ‘Battlefield’ with their team and with style. The skin comes with a futuristic appeal, with the black and green Razer color scheme, which is more or less the same as the company’s branding. Nonetheless, the crux of the matter is not merely getting something for nothing—the comical responses in the threads are the main attraction.
Let’s go back to the beginning of the skin first before we delve into the details. As this is the point where it becomes really intriguing. The ‘System Override’ skin has never been a freebie. Not in a million years! Initially, it was an exclusive skin for customers who purchased Razer hardware when the Battlefield 2042 was launched. Razer was selling the hardware with codes, thus permitting the customers to claim a new skin and consequently the demand for this one skyrocketed, turning it into a popular item of the secondary market. One user, LordosTV, unreservedly stated, “I feel bad for all the people that paid $100+ for this skin lol.” And He might not be the only one. Another gamer, Stick_Spectre, joined the conversation sharing his experience “Lmfao I paid $40 during the first week. Oh well!” Meanwhile, JoshDhesi revealed that he got it for $8 on eBay and now considers $2 a “steal”. This situation implies that for a large number of gamers, the free skin drop is indeed a win but not for the ones who purchased it? Ouch! Perhaps it’s a bit of a slap in the face.
The influx of comments coming from the social media platform division turned very quickly into a split of a few groups. The first group was made up of individuals who were grateful for the skin. They simply could not be happier that they received a free cosmetic. Commenters like COFun15 wrote “Thanks, got it.” Users like Cruel_In10tions gave a very short and polite “Thank you…”. Then there were the gamers that were completely confused by the whole process of redeeming the skin, which really is, to be honest, somewhat standard practice for promotions of this kind. A lot of questions were posted. OuternationalTV was saying, “I signed up but didn’t receive a code,” and FrOsTx169 was repeating, “Still no code after verification.” This gave rise to the creation of a whole thread where players turned into the “tech support”. One of them, notreallytoxic, was very generous and gave the moment-by-moment account of the whole thing: “All I did was, I pressed the link then the ? Then continue and it takes you to the Discord website not the app then you sign in and it verify’s and then pops up the code.” It was a complete process.
And of course, you can’t possibly discuss Battlefield skins without touching upon the eternal debate about… realism. Yup, even the free Razer skin got entangled in that. Some players find it very appealing. lstrjhndlpn wrote, “it looks sick.” Others… not so much. Vallystic just outright declared, “Looks ugly.” But we actually saw the real back-and-forth between users stocktoaster and ThatDamnRaccoon. Stocktoaster launched on a hilarious rant: “BRUHHHHHHHHHHHHHH NOT THE FORCED REALISM IN MY JUMP OUT OF JET MID AIR AND RE ENTER IT GAME,” poking fun at those players who complain about authenticity of skin in a game with totally absurd physics. ThatDamnRaccoon responded by saying that the devs already made the skin less appealing, he said: “It’s wayyyy more muted than it was before.” Classic gamer argument—did a green-tinged soldier break immersion in a game where you can wingsuit off a skyscraper? The answer is most probably no, but it’s fun to see people bickering about it.
