In 2018, the multiplayer tactical shooter Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege launched the Outbreak time event. In it, operatives from the game teamed up against alien parasites that crawled out in Mexico. These were several fairly simple PvE missions with a sharpening for shooting – you run from point A to point B, and enemies climb on you. But Ubisoft wanted to develop this idea into a separate project – the company saw in this the potential for a “softer” entry into the rather difficult Rainbow Six Siege.
So, four years later, the Rainbow Six Extraction shooter was born. Whether he has become the best version of himself during this time – read in our review.
Plot
The plot remained the same, but the place of action has changed: pockets of alien slurry have become more active in America. Goo is a dark substance that gradually spreads and covers the entire surface. She also creates archaea – humanoid monsters that are extremely hostile. The REACT unit is calling on operatives to fight back against the contagion. And that’s all – there is only a plot, without any development.
The main goal of the team is to study the parasite. There is no ultimate task like “kill the main boss”, “destroy the heart of the swarm”, or at least “come up with an antidote”. Moreover, Extraction is trying hard to be a serious game – records about archaea and a parasite in the local archive are collected in a fairly voluminous lore, but, unfortunately, all this has no development. Go on a raid, kill archaeans, collect data, download a level, repeat – that’s the whole point of Rainbow Six Extraction. And when you look into the list of available improvements in the appearance of fighters and find, for example, a cat’s head or a bear suit, you generally forget about the purpose of all these “serious” operations.
Locations
All progression in the game is tied solely to the experience earned. Thanks to him, the following locations open, access to new gadgets, operatives and weapons for them. Roughly speaking, this is your goal in Extraction. You have a base where you can customize the weapons and gadgets of the operatives. Choosing one of them, you go to one of four locations, arranged by difficulty: New York, San Francisco, Alaska and Truth or Consequences. The more difficult the location, the more dangerous archaean individuals will be there.
Each city has three maps, which you can get randomly or choose a specific one. Interestingly, you can also clear maps alone – the difficulty scales depending on the number of operatives. It will even give you twice as many points, but it will be long and rather boring.
Each map is divided into three sectors with one task for each. Complete all three and evacuate – get the maximum score. The maps are the same, but the sectors and tasks for them are in random order, so the same zone can start and end in different places, but it will look different. But after a couple of hours of playing, you will already know where and where you need to move approximately.
Despite the fact that tasks go from easy (in the first sector) to difficult (in the last), in reality this is not always the case. It all depends on the type and number of enemy in combination with the task. And random is also responsible for this, so sometimes it happens that you have to flee in a panic already from the first sector, since you can evacuate in a special place at almost any moment.
Rules
It would seem, so what? Fly into the location, kill everyone with a firearm, earn points and move on. But the developers came up with an interesting and sometimes annoying mechanics with the loss of a fighter. If you run out of health on a mission, then your operative does not die, but turns into a nugget – he is covered with protective foam (very similar to breading) and he remains “in the clutches of the enemy.” You can’t use this operator until you rescue him in one of the following runs on the same map by choosing someone else.
But after the rescue, the fighter will be unavailable for some time: he needs to heal – just like the operatives who managed to get out alive, but received a lot of damage. The more successful the sortie, the more health will be replenished by the wounded. This was not enough for the developers, and if you fail the rescue mission, then part of the general experience and experience of the operative will burn out, rolling you back. Coupled with the fact that during operations you can’t be treated in any way, but only temporarily improve your health, you quickly begin to value each fighter and not go into hell.
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