Review: ‘Rainbow Six Extraction’ is a deep but grinding co-op experience

“Rainbow Six Siege” brought intriguing concepts to the tactical shooter. Walls could be broken to create new passages or lines of sight. Drones could be used to scout adversaries. Ropes could offer a way to rappel down, opening up new avenues of attack.

It introduced innovative concepts to the genre, but the only problem was that the demanding aspect of the competitive play didn’t appeal to me. Not one to waste a good idea, Ubisoft crafted “Rainbow Six Extraction,” which takes the “Siege” gameplay and applies it to a cooperative format. Ubisoft previously experimented with the concept in a limited time event called Outbreak in a “Siege” expansion. Ubisoft’s latest project carries over those ideas and explores them as a fully fledged game.

FIGHTING THE ARCHAEANS
“Extraction” follows operators of the Rainbow Exogenous Analysis and Containment Team (REACT), a new unit that was formed after the Outbreak incident. It was discovered that a Russian Soyuz capsule crashed near Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, and created a mysterious epidemic that brought forth alien lifeforms called Archaeans.

That case was a prelude. Soon after, Archaeans began emerging in New York, San Francisco, Alaska and again in Truth or Consequences. Controlling operators from REACT, players enter these hot zones and fulfill incursions in teams of three. Initially, players have access to just New York, but as they level up, they unlock more regions, maps, upgrades and operators.

It’s a divergent premise for the “Rainbow Six” franchise that usually focuses on terrorism and black ops. The sci-fi setup lets Ubisoft be more creative, but the big problem is that the threshold to experience that creativity is fairly high. In fact, there’s a steep learning curve and a lot of grinding as players figure out how to play “Extraction.”

A SLOW AND CAREFUL APPROACH
The game is more methodical rather than a run-and-gun affair. Before entering a building, it’s best to send a drone that scouts ahead and marks the dangers and nests that spawn Archaeans. It’s a game that rewards stealth, teamwork and coordination as players act in concert to clear rooms and advance.

One of the reasons for the caution is that players have a finite amount of health. If players are injured, they can’t get that life back during a mission. At best, they can heal and temporarily boost the life meter, but after the mission is over, heavily hurt operators are unavailable because they require time to be patched up.

Rushing into room is asking for disaster because that likely means a teammate goes down and that drags the squad toward failure. With zero health, operators collapse and a protective foam surrounds them. They become missing in action and unavailable. Players will need to rescue and extract them.

“Extraction” further punishes players by taking away experience points that would raise them a level. It’s brutal, but thankfully, saving MIA operators will let players regain the lost work. Having such a hefty penalty means that players will have to make hard choices during incursions. They can extract at any time if they feel like they may not finish the incursion, but at the same time, leaving means that they miss out on more experience points and opportunities.

STRETCHING OUT REPLAYABILITY
XP is the most important resource because that’s what determines players’ progression. There is a general level that unlocks new maps, costumes, tools and modes, but players also have levels for each of the 18 operators that initially launch with the game. Taking these operators on a mission raises their levels, improving their gear and stats.

That increases the replayability of game that already has a decent of amount of depth and tries to stretch things out by giving players randomized incursion objectives across the 11 areas, which in turn have three subzones. Players will get a preview of the mission goals in each subzone and they can pick their characters based on that.

It’s important to pick operators with the right tools for the job. A commando such as Sledge has strong armor and a hammer that lets him smash through walls, creating new routes through a map. That’s helpful in the Triangulation objective, which requires the squad to activate three laptops within a short time. Players can carve out a fast path to each one. Meanwhile, operators such as Vigil specialize in stealth, which is important in Nest Tracking, which requires players to avoid alerting enemies so that they can mark enemy-spawning points.