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To celebrate Veterans Day in the United States, EA has teamed up with the veterans’ charity group National Ranger Association and released a new cosmetic bundle in Battlefield 6 honoring Army Rangers. It looks a lot like a charity bundle, but some fine print makes it clear that’s not the case, as none of the proceeds from sales of the new pack are being donated to the veteran charity group.
On November 11, EA released the “Lead the Way” cosmetic bundle in its hit multiplayer FPS Battlefield 6. The pack costs $12 and includes gear inspired by Army Rangers, including a new weapon skin, character outfit, and camo parachute. It’s a pretty grounded, realistic cosmetic pack, the kind of thing Battlefield 6 fans love. And if you head over to the Battlefield 6 store online, you’ll see a preview image with text that states: “Join Battlefield in our support of the National Ranger Association.” That seems to imply this is a charity pack, and the store listing’s most prominent text does nothing to indicate otherwise. But if you scroll down far enough, in small text, you’ll find that EA clarifies that the “Lead the Way” pack isn’t directly supporting vets.
“No portion of the Lead The Way pack sales is donated.”
Now, to be clear, EA did explain this pack isn’t benefiting vets more directly in a blog post on Monday. In that article, EA explained that this isn’t a charity pack way at the bottom of the post. Here’s the text included:
While proceeds of the Lead the Way Pack are not allocated to charity, our independent donation to the National Ranger Association helps advance their important work for the Ranger community. We encourage you to learn more at their website and consider supporting their mission.
Still, it’s very strange to obfuscate the fact that this pack, which looks a lot like a bundle dedicated to supporting real-life vets, won’t directly benefit those people. Kotaku contacted EA and Battlefield Studios about the bundle and donation, but didn’t receive a response.
Sure, EA donated money independently to the group and is sponsoring the charity’s “Best Ranger Competition.” That’s nice and all, but it seems a bit scummy to sell a Veterans’ Day cosmetic pack that is directly connected to a charity organization, but not make it extremely clear that the proceeds aren’t going to that group or toward helping its mission. Compare this to Activision’s Call of Duty Endowment organization, which sells cosmetics in-game to support vets finding new jobs after service and donates 100 percent of the proceeds to the group, and it makes EA’s bundle seem much worse.
