Rainbow Six Siege has, since its launch, cultivated an air of ‘exclusivity’ around itself, being a high-skill tactical team-based shooter. The general feeling the game gives off is that numerically, it isn’t as mainstream as competitors in the genre such as Blizzard’s Overwatch, however Siege still has a dedicated and passionate community, as well as a professional scene with some wildly skilled players.
However, the idea that Rainbow Six Siege is more of a niche title and not a “mainstream” title can be easily dismissed - Ubisoft is celebrating the game gaining over 30 million players. For comparison, Overwatch, the quintessential “what-comes-to-your-mind-first” game that’s in the public eye hit 35 million late last year, so Siege isn’t trailing too far behind. Siege was launched in December 2015, and has been steadily gaining new players ever since.
The continued growth of Siege can be attributed to the frequent content updates, new operators and periodical Operation events offering new and fresh content for existing players as well as even more reason for new players to take the leap and start playing. In 2018, Rainbow Six Siege’s pro scene also saw a great deal of popularity, with concurrent viewers peaking at 321,000. Further seasons of the Pro League have already been organised.
Ubisoft is planning further content for Siege, and one of the goals they’ve set out for themselves is to buff out the game’s selection of Operators to at least 100. Currently that number sits at 38, so there are still plenty of potential counter-terrorism groups to draw inspiration from and plenty of potential new character builds to experiment with. Two of the newest operators, Lion and Finka, particularly demonstrated how creative the team can get. I’m eager to see what kind of new characters will be added to the roster.
