‘One life’ shooters have become increasingly sidelined over the last few years in favour of the death-happy multiplayer chaos found in games like Battlefield and Call of Duty.
Rainbow Six: Siege hopes to bring back the tension of knowing that if you die, that’s it for the round. Ubisoft explains why in a new blog post.
“When you’re not allowed to respawn during a match,” the developer writes, ”twitch reflexes aren’t the only skills that keep you alive. Teamwork, map awareness, planning, adaptability, communication, and leadership become just as important to win. To be completely straightforward, the game became a lot more stressful… It went from everyone leaning back in their chairs trash-talking, to being on the edge of their seats carefully coordinating tactics.”
During Siege’s testing phase, skilled twitch players who had previously dominated the leaderboards suddenly started falling down the rankings when the ‘one life’ rule was added. Having the fastest reflexes was no longer the only way to win.
”Developers who weren’t as good before played slower, thought carefully about the situation, and ended up doing better on the leaderboard,” explains developer Chris Lee. ”Because One Life rewards this kind of behavior, it puts well-rounded players at an advantage over pure run and gunners, which is what the Tom Clancy’s franchise is all about.”
”They utilize a complete skill set and the rest of the development team really liked that, since going back to its roots is what we wanted to do and the rule stuck. It wasn’t something we predicted, and we were really happy with how it turned out.”
Having said all that, Ubisoft don’t want you sitting there idly while the still living members of your team finish the mission. Even dead players can contribute for their team in the game’s Support Mode.
”Yes, losing boots on the ground creates a disadvantage in firepower, but the player still contributes to the team by becoming a source of information. They are able to use limited visibility tools, like the drone and security cameras, or survey from a chopper above the operation zone to keep their team informed of the enemy’s movements.”
I grew up playing Counter-Strike (badly), so a return to a slower-paced, more tactical form of multiplayer shooting seems like a great idea to me. It’ll be interesting to see how the general gaming audience, hopped up on killstreaks and quick-scoping, welcomes Siege’s more tactical play.
Rainbow Six: Siege is due out next year.
