Ubisoft shares first details of Operation Grim Sky, Rainbow Six Siege’s next season

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Our first look at two new operators, their gadgets, and descriptions.

The next season of Rainbow Six Siege officially has a name: Operation Grim Sky. Ubisoft shared the first details for the season on the Siege blog, reminding players to tune in to the full reveal during the Paris Major from August 17 to 19.

While Ubi didn’t reveal the names of the next two operators, it did share a short description for them and teased their appearance. The two operators have joined Team Rainbow as part of its Urban Tactical Response Team, codenamed Grim Sky. The post describes the British defending operator as “a tough police officer who’s an expert on mob behavior and snatch-squad tactics. She knows she belongs on the front line and she won’t tolerate any nonsense.”

We also got a brief teaser about the new American attacking operator, a “specialist with a remarkably sharp mind when it comes to tactical operations. He has seen the worst in Kabul. Despite it all, he fell in love with the city. Legendary for his surgical precision, he remains an enigma within Rainbow Six.”

We can unpack a few things from these sparse descriptions. First, our defender is an expert in snatch-squad tactics. This refers to a police formation meant to quickly penetrate a crowd of people and apprehend a single target, similar to a kidnapping. Operator backgrounds don’t always give us hints to their gadget, but the reveal image above and her riot control experience may point to her wearing the heavy armor of a 1-speed defender. Her gadget appears to be some sort of deployable tool with electricity, but it’s hard to tell. Leaks from May do refer to “hole blocker” and “audio alarm” gadgets that have been in the game’s code for a while, so it’s possible that’s what we’re seeing here.

Thanks to the same leak, we knew there was a strong possibility that the attacker would be a new hard breacher that uses some sort of blow torch. The attacker in the Grim Sky image is clearly wielding a blow torch, so it’s safe to confirm that much. Perhaps they'll be able to cut asymmetrical holes in reinforced walls? That sort of utility would distinguish them from Hibana and Thermite.

The description mentions the operator’s love for Kabul, Afghanistan. This might not be good news for fans hoping Ghost Recon Wildlands’ Nomad would be joining the team. Nomad’s biography does mention that he has worked all over the world, but the connection here is looking less likely. You can’t make out too many details in the image, but the mystery operator doesn’t look much like his default look from the game.

Grim Sky will also bring a complete map rework for one of Siege’s old classics: Hereford Base. This will rebuild the structure and layout of Siege's cube-shaped base and shift the art style of the map to a WWII theme. 

A new recoil system that has been in testing since last year will also finally be implemented with the hope of fixing the game’s aim misalignment issues. More teasers will inevitably be dropped by Ubi in the next week leading up to the finals streamed live on Twitch, so stay tuned. 

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Morgan Park
Morgan Park
Staff Writer

Morgan has been writing for PC Gamer since 2018, first as a freelancer and currently as a staff writer. He has also appeared on Polygon, Kotaku, Fanbyte, and PCGamesN. Before freelancing, he spent most of high school and all of college writing at small gaming sites that didn't pay him. He's very happy to have a real job now. Morgan is a beat writer following the latest and greatest shooters and the communities that play them. He also writes general news, reviews, features, the occasional guide, and bad jokes in Slack. Twist his arm, and he'll even write about a boring strategy game. Please don't, though.