Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Extraction | Taken For A Quickie

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We've got some thoughts on Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Extraction, the latest title from Ubisoft Montreal, in our review series Taken For A Quickie.

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by
​James Michael Parry

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@James_Parry

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I remember this being called Quarantine, what happened?

The game was originally announced back in 2019 at E3, but later changed its name to Extraction in mid-2021 after a couple of delays. It was conceived as a spin-off to Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Siege after a limited-time game mode based in Mexico struck a chord with players.

So, what's it all about anyway?

Rather than terrorists vs operators, Extraction sees you face of against various types of aliens, called Archeons, who have emerged in different areas of, you guessed it, New York, as a result of an agressive pathogen, which causes a grey crust of organic material over surfaces, slowing your moment and making you take more damage in certain areas.

​And what do you have to do?

Not entirely dissimilar from the dark zone in Tom Clancy's The Division 2, you're dispatched either alone or in groups of three to clear the alien infection in various ways.

It might be taking out enemies, or triggering some charges, or stopping seismic activity. If one of the team goes down and is absorbed by the infection they are MIA, and have to be retrieved in a future round, and in the meantime you lose access to that character.

Does going into a heavily dangerous area like that alone sound like a sensible idea?

No, not particularly, and in fact – other than the tutorial mission – generally we found the solo missions particularly lethal, since there are some objectives which require you to do multiple actions simultaneously, or in different places in quick succession.

A string of bad luck can quickly leave you with multiple operators injured or MIA.

How interesting are these operators then? Anyone we know?

Actually yes, since the game has DNA, all the way down to its engine, shared with Siege, the likes of Sledge, Doc and up to 16 others are all here to choose from.

Unfortunately, some of Team Rainbow's powers are a little less useful in this context. Sledge for example, still has his trusty hammer to smash through a wall or two, but because the element of surprise is so much more crucial here, being swing happy could cost you the objective.

Other elements like barricading walls and doorways also make an appearance, but the game doesn't seem to know what to do with them, since there seems to be relatively little cause to defend in the same way as you would in Siege against gun-wielding human opposition.

Not a huge recommendation then?

The concept is certainly interesting, and there's been a fair amount of effort put into the staging of the missions, with full cutscenes and characters debating the approach the team should take, but these moments are few and far between, and aren't enough to sustain a cohesive narrative.

A team of only three leaves you quickly short-handed too, with some objectives having three parts in themselves, without enemies to worry about, and a quick bout of poison gas is enough to quickly take a teammate down to critical health.

There's little chance to revive or save allies either, meaning leaving without a full team is fairly common. At least the titular extraction areas are in each of the three sub-zones per level, so you can bail out with only a third of the stage completed if you need to.

Does it at least feel as good as Siege to play?

Everything behaves in the same way as Siege, and you can steadily unlock new tech items and guns to play with, but really this experience might have gone down better as an add-on to that game rather than trying to be a game in its own right.

If you're a serious fan, and particularly if you've got a good team at your side, then it's worth a try – especially if you have Game Pass – but we wouldn't recommend going in alone.