Originally titled Rainbow Six Quarantine before the global pandemic as we know it, Ubisoft was hard at work at a̶n̶ e̶x̶p̶a̶n̶s̶i̶o̶n̶ a new spinoff. After spending time from the announcement in 2019 to its launch now in 2022, it’s finally here and unfortunately, through our Rainbow Six Extraction review can’t carve out its own path. Stuck in the shadow of its bigger more well-known predecessor, this new zombie shooter game almost fails to meet the mark.
Multiple features have carried over from Rainbow Six Siege but also some new mechanics have appeared. New locations not seen in Siege are also included, featuring the likes of San Francisco and New York. It does its gunplay fairly well with good graphics, but lacks in replayability – you’ll see what I mean in our Rainbow Six Extraction review!
Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Extraction
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Publisher: Ubisoft
Platform: PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S|X (Reviewed), Xbox One
Release Date: January 20th, 2022
Players: 1
Price: $39.99
In New Mexico, a Chimera Parasite broke free and spread contamination to other places around America. The virus changed and evolved into Archæans, parasites that don’t need a human host to survive – and thus a new task force is created to deal with them. REACT (Rainbow Exogenous Analysis & Containment Team) features operators from the aforementioned Rainbow Six Siege list.
Each day that the threat is left to spread, they evolve into something more dangerous. With new and improving tech from the R&D team, you can gather more intel to stop them once and for all. Some operators are captured by the Archæans and must be freed and extracted to aid in the removal of these creatures.
While the story in Rainbow Six Extraction does make for a weird B-movie plot, it doesn’t mesh with almost anything Tom Clancy. The story is mostly always told through cutscenes and nothing more during the actual game. It’s passible and serviceable to a degree but feels almost forced to make an excuse for this to exist.
Gameplay in Rainbow Six Extraction is a bit weird; while it is very similar to gunplay to Siege, it has some more mechanics that make it stand apart from it, and almost not in a good way. Starting out, you get 9 operators to choose from. Each of them has their own progression to give more weapons, upgrade their abilities, and so on.
If an operator is hurt too severely, they’re listed as inactive; if they are completely out of HP and/or don’t make it through the level, they are considered MIA. These specific mechanics to me are not fun or enjoyable, mainly because of the amount of grinding it takes to get to milestones and in turn get more operators. The saving grace is that you will always have at least 3 operators to use to rescue MIA operators.
During missions, you get 3 random objectives which can net you more XP. Even moreso, you can upgrade and unlock tech that can range from non-lethal to explosives. That’s almost everything from a surface level outside of the customization.
A major complaint I have about this isn’t restricted to this game but many. Zombie shooter games are typically more fun when chaos is amok and everyone is on the same playing field (i.e. no upgrades or special equipment). Extraction forces you to be stealthy and punishes you for shooting mindless alien creatures. One could say that ‘Rainbow Six is supposed to be tactical’ and while I agree, however, it doesn’t work in this game.
If you’re familiar with the last Tom Clancy outing, graphics in Rainbow Six Extraction may not surprise you here. They are detailed very nicely and enemies are distinctive as well. You would almost figure with the level layout that some things would have been taken down a bit for the framerate’s sake.
Most areas are dark and require a bit more patience to wade through so you can apply your stealth to creep up on Archæan nests to destroy them. Each location will feel different and present it’s own unique look from San Francisco to Alaska, New Mexico and so on. Cutscenes have a high production value with CG good enough to show the small signs of facial hair.
While most of these are good, they don’t make the game almost any better from that angle. I don’t care much for graphics if the game behind it is clunky in its gameplay. So I give this part a good mark but that’s about it.
A lot of your time in the game will be spent in the quiet. Audio setups will benefit from same kind of footstep tracking you do anyways to hear enemies. In Extraction, you hear the same sounds as you guessed it, Siege. The added bonus here is the creepy, slimy sounds of the Sprawl.
The nests make weird fleshy sounds, a weird form of ASMR that goes beyond females’ fellating earlobes connected to expensive mics. Screeches of the alerted enemies is also somewhat terrifying since you must always check your surroundings and you will get blindsided.
A lot of communications with Rainbow Six Extraction get shared via in-game characters and thankfully aren’t distracting but can be weird when you’re in a containment area and they’re still whispering.
The entire package of Rainbow Six Extraction is decent at best for it’s $39.99 price tag. There’s some positives I can rip out of it if I tried. I like the HUD since it’s similar to the previous entry, the new locations are a maze sometimes and add to the mystery, and objectives change making you try something different each time.
That being said, there’s negatives like the progression system, the act of unlocking operators, loadouts for a zombie PVE shooter, and tacked on story mode. I couldn’t possibly recommend this to someone who is looking for their next Tom Clancy game to make them come back to the series. Rainbow Six Extraction is an expansion – just a weirder, disconnected, and unenjoyable expansion.
Rainbow Six Extraction was reviewed on Xbox Series X|S using a copy obtained by Niche Gamer. You can find additional information about Niche Gamer’s review/ethics policy here. Rainbow Six Extraction is now available across Windows PC (via the Epic Games Store and Ubisoft Store), Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Stadia, and Luna – as well as Xbox Game Pass.
