At the end of last year, Ubisoft gave us access to a preview of Rainbow Six Extraction to play four hours thoroughly. And everyone freaked out, but not in the sense that we liked the game, that too, but because of the extreme difficulty of each game. Ubisoft Montreal did emphasize the need to cooperate with the other two companions of each game to succeed in each mission, to the point of considering an extraction with only one objective fulfilled as a success.
This aspect is what distinguishes it from Left 4 Dead, from which it is inspired only by its spirit and from which we are currently witnessing its second youth with a new wave of proposals with differences to a greater or lesser extent. What is undeniable is that Rainbow Six Extraction is aimed at a more demanding type of public, who knows how to communicate in a group and is not easy on the trigger.
Rainbow Six’s Dark Souls… except for stealth
I cannot resist revisiting the Dark Souls meme resource to make it clear that what has been stated repeatedly throughout these months in relation to the harshness of this shooter it is verbatim. They can kill us with two, three or four touches if we get distracted Even in easy mode, although there is no “easy mode” as such. The lowest difficulty is “moderate”, without mutations that alter the conditions of each game as we have seen with Back 4 Blood.
It must be clarified again that although the trend of these games with a clear cooperative component is followed, it does not mean that it follows the formula devised by Turtle Rock Studios more than a decade ago. The stages in Rainbow Six Extraction are closed and small. What’s more, they are divided into three sections, each with its own objective. An objective that will always be different in each game, being 100% random. And he’s not exactly lame in goals…
We are talking about 13 different types of objectives, which guarantees that we are constantly on the alert not knowing what a new incursion may bring us. Furthermore, this also translates into a fairly slow learning curve
More than failures, it could be said rather overconfidence, eagerness to meet the objectives in the shortest possible time (every mission is against the clock) or simply because someone on the team does not follow our instructions. And here stealth has a lot of weight. If we act silently, eliminating the enemy without the rest noticing, we will have more than half of the game won.
Said enemy is called an archaea and it is a parasite of alien origin that has multiple mutations. A series of variants ranging from humanoids like the Bastaje, lethal with his melee attacks, to the elusive Impelo shooting from a distance, through the explosive Demolisher or the fearsome Torment. Even something as small as Ooze can mess us up brown…
Because when we understand that you can’t go crazy, the game clicks in our heads and what used to be frustration turns into satisfaction by being able to complete all missions in a region. But to get to that point you have to analyze the environment, be careful and fine-tune your aim, of course.
This is how extractions work in this Rainbow Six
Knowing that in the beginning this project was going to be called Rainbow Six Quarantine, its final name makes much more sense when base your game mechanics on extractions. What’s the point of rescuing an agent? We take it to the extraction point and that’s it. That we fail an objective and we are fatal of life? We extract and that’s it, we’ll try it in the next one. That we are lucky enough to complete all the missions successfully? We finished the extraction to get out of there alive. And ready.
Rainbow Six Extraction It provides short but extremely intense experiences where we decide how much we want to risk. If we risk more, there will be better prizes in the form of experience, more life recovered for injured reserve agents or also the possibility of obtaining badges that make it clear to the rest of the players how good we are with the game.
Whether alone or with the help of two people, uncertainty will always invade us, not knowing what each map can surprise us with as the objectives rotate. There will only be one that will have a higher probability of leaving if we were not able to extract a disabled agent, having to rescue him later so that he does not suffer penalties with his experience. Because if, the game penalizes us if we fail, to the point of lowering experience and therefore levels. They are extreme cases that can be avoided, it is not something that happens from the base.
the fear is there, undoubtedly. It makes us better weigh the risk to continue with another objective if we are not doing well in life, for example. Or that we get some kind of more complicated mission with which we don’t feel so comfortable. And it is that some are more “affordable” than others, even though the word “affordable” does not fit at all to the experience that it offers Rainbow Six Extraction
yes this spin-off from Rainbow Six Siege inherits that ability to build improvised walls at specific points on the map, like other elements of this universe devised by Ubisoft. After all, it is an extension of the same one that emerged as a temporary mode a few years ago. For being, until they are 18 Known Rainbow Six Siege Operators, each with totally unique qualities.
The good thing is that the game forces us to try them all as it is almost impossible to get out of any mission unscathed. The reason is none other than the use of first-aid kits does not heal wounds, but it applies a reinforcement, as a shield, to enjoy a small margin before injuries occur and our life as such decreases.
There is no permanent death, but almost. It is something similar to what Ubisoft did with the recent Watch Dogs Legion: if an agent is unconscious, he covers his body with stasis so that we can rescue him in later games without the option to play with him until that specific action does not occur. As for the wounded in reserve, they will replenish their life based on a percentage of the experience obtained by completing a mission. A figure that can range from a very poor 10% (out of 100, by the way) to more than half of life. Brutal.
A gaming experience that goes in crescendo
I never thought I would get to this point knowing how much he overwhelmed me at the beginning due to his high demand, but the truth is that Rainbow Six Extraction hooks bad thing when you know how to play well. In addition, it improves its letter of introduction as you improve, forgive the redundancy, each agent, by unlocking passive benefits based on the unique characteristics of each one.
This progress is ostensibly helped by carrying out studies on the ground, which are a series of secondary tasks that bring a lot of experience and that serve our global progress. Specifically, the milestones, which are the ones that define which regions we can go to (New York, San Francisco, Alaska and Truth or Consequences) and above all to enable access to their endgame, with that Maelstrom protocol that shoots the difficulty to unthinkable heights. There are no longer three objectives per map, but nine. And with more lethal enemies while we have fewer pharmacies or ammunition and less time if possible. A fucking madness.
What’s more, Rainbow Six Extraction saves several surprises in these advanced missions as there is a type of “creature” to majors under the name of proteans. And there the type of tactic to be used differs quite a bit from the one used with the rest of the archaea. As happened with the surprise of Aliens Fireteam Elite, but cubed.
Personally, I have missed greater flexibility when choosing equipment, since it limits us quite a bit by having two firearms and two objects with REACT technology (Rainbow Exogenous Analysis & Containment Team), the company for which we work with the goal of eradicating archaea. I say this especially because of this technology, since two gadgets, as much as I understand that Ubisoft has done it so that the object is not repeated between agents.
Said technology is based on two types: on the one hand, there would be smoke grenades, fragmentation grenades, scanners, claymore mines… Everything that you use and throw away, you could say; while on the other we have reconnaissance drones, revival kits to give you a second chance or even an anabolic accelerant to slowly regenerate health up to a cap of 50. You can’t have everything and each agent should adopt a specific role to better understand each other.
If that consensus is reached, the experience becomes highly immersive and addictive, as well as rewarding when we successfully solve extremely difficult missions for which we did not give a penny at the beginning. It is a video game that conquers you little by little, like that bloody mucilage that does not stop spreading its viscosity around the map if you neglect the nests of any archaea.
Rainbow Six Extraction Deluxe PS5
iGamesNews’s opinion
Definitely, Rainbow Six Extraction is a very consistent cooperative shooter that can overwhelm and especially frustrate at first due to its unfair harshness until you understand how you should approach each mission. It has already become, on its own merits, one of my favorites within experiences focused on rapport with colleagues. And even alone it is enjoyed, eye.
Rainbow Six Extraction
platforms | PS5, Xbox Series (reviewed version), PS4, Xbox One, Epic Store, Ubisoft Store and Google Stadia |
---|---|
multiplayer | Yes, online (three players) |
developer | Ubisoft Montreal |
Company | Ubisoft |
Launch | January 20, 2022 |
The best
- Wide variety of objectives per map
- High number of agents with unique traits
- Each archaea offers a different challenge
- His progress is a joy…
Worst
- … but it can also frustrate at first
- Sometimes it’s unfair if you’re careless
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