Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Extraction

In a game that succumbs a little too often to 'numbers go up' design, it's much more of a thrill to see them go DOWN occasionally, then have to strive just to get back on an even keel. [Issue#369, p.112]

Rainbow Six Extraction feels more like an expansion for Six Siege than a standalone game. It features a strong foundation that Ubisoft fails to build upon. Extraction can be a lot of fun playing with friends, but not so much if you plan on playing it alone.

Rainbow Six Extraction, while it lasts, is a super solid time, a delightfully warped addition to the Rainbow Six stable of games that is a total blast when played with the right people. It also sweetens the deal that it's available via Game Pass, meaning there's really no reason not to jump in and get down to some good old co-operative strategy action.

Rainbow Six Extraction can offer you a solid gameplay foundation, and many hours of fun tactical action. But beware that you won't get this experience solo - you'll need a group of friends. Another matter is the question of Extraction continued support, because the starting pack of 12 maps can get old really fast.

Rainbow Six Extraction aims to breach the co-op shooter genre without much fanfarre. Supported by the excellent gunplay of Rainbow Six Siege and its range of characters, it has some interesting mechanics, but they are not enough to make it stand out above its peers. Although somewhat repetitive, it is a solid game that guarantees a good amount of hours of fun among friends.

As much as I enjoy the moment-to-moment gameplay of Rainbow Six Extraction and have had a blast with it both solo and in co-op, it's impossible to overlook the glaring balance issues and lack of any kind of appealing endgame it has at the moment. Ubisoft does have a great track record for turning decent games into great ones in the long run — just look at Siege or The Division — so I'm hoping we'll see a similarly impressive evolution here eventually. For now, though, Extraction is undeniably entertaining in the short term, but it's the long game that worries me, and I'd love to be proven wrong. When everything comes together here, Extraction somehow manages to capture everything that is great about the Rainbow Six series while also taking by far the most liberties with its premise and structure. That's got to count for something.

Though the story is weak and the design of the game favors certain characters, Extraction is a good Rainbow Six game that rewards you and your team's ability to adapt to deliver a compelling gameplay loop.

At a price point of $40, Rainbow Six Extraction is definitely a game I'll be playing with my friends.

If you're looking for a solo shooter that will keep your attention, you might want to steer clear of this one. For everyone else, Rainbow Six Extraction is a fairly enjoyable experience.

Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Extraction is an enjoyable game alone or with a squad. Good tactical shooting meets satisfying progression, but the end game has limited appeal.

While I had some grievances with the Threat Levels for solo players, and had wished for a few more objectives to bolster the current roster and help reduce the monotony of playing multiple Incursions in a single session, I kept finding -- and continue to find -- myself eagerly wanting to hop back on and earn level up my Operators a little bit more. Just how long this feeling continues to linger at the back of my mind, ultimately comes down to whether any post-launch updates will come to the progression to make it feel more rewarding and less grinding.

With excellent gunplay, awesome destructibility, a huge roster of playable characters, and a suite of well-designed stages, this experimental entry in the long-running military shooter franchise checks many of the right boxes.

Unless it’s telling me an epic story like God of War, Persona or Halo Infinite anymore I just wanna get in, have some fun and get out. Which you can do with Extraction, again with the right group of friends. Other than that, with difficulty spikes as a solo player, and the unstable randos players will be bound to run into online, I don’t see this being much more…which is a shame because Rainbow deserves better. Pray for Sam Fisher.

A deep case of little brother syndrome.

While it has a few nice ideas, Rainbow Six Extraction is nonetheless a generic first-person shooter that feels more like an expansion, rather than a full-blooded game. I’m not entirely sure Tom Clancy would approve.

In terms of design and level design, Extraction certainly has something nice in its hands. Too bad it's filled with boring assignments, a handful of different aliens and a cringe-inducing progression system. Ubisoft's spin-off doesn't offer more than a few hours of entertainment, unless you were head over heels in love with Siege's Outbreak mode and likes repetition.

Rainbow Six Extraction is a mixed bag of good ideas and weak implementations. It’s unfortunate that the bad manages to outweigh the good, because underneath it all, Rainbow Six Extraction's gameplay approach holds promise. It’ll be interesting to see how Ubisoft supports this title in the weeks and months to come, but it’s really hard to see how it can fix a lot of core issues within the game.