Rainbow Six Siege: An Analysis On Operation Outbreak

Ubisoft wants to enter ‘Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege’ third year of release with a bang. As usual there are 2 new operators and a new map. But something new is being given to us, a new gamemode, with three unique maps.

First let’s talk about the gamemode itself. What exactly is it? Well the story goes, according to the post made on the official Rainbow Six Siege website is “A mysterious space capsule crashed near Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. It turns out it was carrying an exotic parasite, The Apex.” So what we know so far is that it’s extraterrestrial. Also the name ‘The Apex’ indicates that this parasite is powerful, and maybe the first of its kind. Another thing, the Synopsis says “A mysterious space capsule” but if you watch the trailer you can see on the capsule that it’s a USSR probe. So once again the Soviets bring us some good stuff. Continuing on in the article “Which infected the area and turned the populace into monsters.” So it’s not going to be a zombies type mode like there’s been rumors of, but it’s going to be a survival type gamemode. The first thing i thought of when i read this was the extinction mode in Call of Duty: Ghosts. “The Quarantine Zone is the only thing keeping it contained but it will not last for long. If the parasite gets out, it would be a disaster of global proportions. Millions would die. Rainbow’s mission is to enter the devastated town and destroy the parasite’s roots before this happens.” This is the last sentence in the Synopsis category of the article. So no one in rainbow is stranded, they were sent in to destroy The Apex and save the world basically. That’s what's in the article written, but if you watch the trailer it reveals more. It opens up with a shot of something falling from the sky then a walk through of an old barn and someone calling out for their neighbor, at the end you see the old USSR probe and it ends. So obviously The Apex got here because of us.
There’s a second trailer which shows some standard military members trying to combat the monsters and obviously failing. Then a far away shot closing up on Ash, talking into a phone asking for some operators from launch. That’s about as much as we know, we do get a couple seconds to see the monsters, but not too much. They just look like taller, more slender and nimble humans.

Now let's talk about the gameplay mechanics. First things first, not all of the operators that have been released will be playable in this game mode, there is a small list. This list includes: The two new Chimera Operators, Smoke, Ying, Buck, Kapkan, Ash, Doc, Tachanka, Glaz, And of course the recruit. With this limited list of operators it’ll force a certain, but unique play style upon the players. And a mix of Attackers and Defenders should be fun to play around with. The maps that will be in circulation will also be a curated selection of maps custom made for this game mode, which will be more linear, bigger, have more spaces of open, and designed for coop fun. However the multi approach feeling that makes R6S so unique will still be there. And this won’t be like a weird buffed version of Terrorist Hunt, the website says there will be ”Five archetypes of infected will challenge players in Outbreak, each with their own distinct abilities” and “From exploding monstrosities to hulking horrors.” So we won’t deal with the same two AI types and there will be a lot more variation in the approach they’ll take to you, and that you’ll have to take to them. The maximum squad size that you’ll be able to take into a match is 3, hopefully enough to get the job done. There will also be new alpha packs, called Outbreak packs, that will reward you with Operation Outbreak specific cosmetic gear, and as usual, no gameplay improving items.

That’s all the information that is available to the general public at this time. The update will first launch to TTS February 20th, then to everyone else March 6th. This special event will last for a month, up until April 3rd. After that we should still have all Operation Chimera Operators, but not the gamemode itself. I’m very excited for this update, and will be sure to play the absolute hell out of it. I’m hoping that Ubisoft will do things like this in the future and continue to make R6S the continually evolving and fun game that it is.