Gaming

As Rainbow Six Siege begins the first step in its Year 4 content road map with the release of Operation Burnt Horizon, Ubisoft believes this is the game's "year of change."

The change has less to do with the two new operators and map coming in the new operation, or any of the future plans previewed for the rest of the year. Instead, Ubisoft views Year 4 as the "year of change" because the Rainbow Six Siege organization itself is changing.

Detailing a sweeping set of organizational changes coming to the team as part of their content roadmap reveal, Ubisoft announced a myriad of new "cells," teams built with a mono-focused goal to tackle some of Rainbow Six Siege's most important features, including player behavior, events, playlists, and map and operator reworks.

"We have dedicated teams and dedicated people to work on these issues," Rainbow Six Siege brand director Alexandre Remy told Bleacher Report. "This is new. This is us looking at how we've done things and learning there has to be another way for us to create and produce better and faster. Year 4 is our attempt at tackling that."

With Rainbow Six Siege's consistent growth since release and its unique place as a genre-fluid game—combining the traditional elements of first-person shooters with other genres like multiplayer online battle arenas—it makes sense that Ubisoft found themselves in need to re-evaluate how the Siege team operated.

Rainbow Six Siege's complexity meant that, more often than not, the development team was going from fire to fire, putting them out as quickly as they could only to find more have started somewhere else.

"We reached a point where there were too many things piling up, and we realized that if there wasn't drastic changes, we could collapse," Rainbow Six Siege game director Leroy Athanassoff told Bleacher Report.

As such the goal of the teams in addressing specific areas—where they can dedicate time and channel enthusiasm into focused projects—is to "fireproof" Rainbow Six Siege, to really begin the process of refining Ubisoft's four-year-old game.

Player behavior, in particular, is one fire that has been a huge source of focus for the company since the beginning. But Ubisoft's deep reflection on itself in Year 4 reignited the commitment to making the Rainbow Six Siege playing experience a more positive one, something Ubisoft feels it has a responsibility to protect and own.

"We are responsible," Athanassoff said. "When you have a bad experience in Siege, it affects our ecosystem and platform. It's not the responsibility of the people but our responsibility."

.@Rainbow6Game's Year 4 roadmap is here 👀pic.twitter.com/OECMYCZDsf

— B/R Gaming (@BRGaming) February 17, 2019

While improved agility and efficiency in shipping new content updates is the main prompt for Ubisoft's introspection, its belief in its own responsibility for parts of the game like player behavior speak to the heart of the company's change. It doesn't come solely from a place of organizational and structural need. Instead, at the heart of Ubisoft's decision is that sentiment of duty and commitment to the Rainbow Six Siege community.

"This is the time we deliver the game [the community] deserves," Athanassoff said. "They have been patient enough and we don't want to reach a point where they have to keep waiting. You all cared enough to keep playing; it's our time to show we can deliver what we have promised."

Athanassoff continued: "With this new system, in the next year or maybe next two years, you'll see as much difference [in Siege] from its release to now. In this next year, we're going to release more content than the last three or four [combined]."

Rainbow Six Siege's Year 4 starts Wednesday, with the release of its first operation, Burnt Horizon. It marks the beginning of Ubisoft's bold picture for Siege's future, one the team isn't afraid to face and is backed by a reinvigorated sense of self and invested growth.

"The journey of this game is never-ending," Remy said. "It's fascinating, and my most profound wish and dream is for this to never stop—to keep growing and to keep having players enjoying the game and challenging us in what we do and what we know. That's the best."

First there was Fortnite, now there is Apex Legends. Electronic Arts' new battle royale is taking over the gaming world and breaking Fortnite's previous download records. Watch the video above for more about the next gaming sensation.

                 

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Fortnite Battle Royale received its first major changes of Season 7 on Tuesday with the release of the version 7.10 patch notes' third content update, which feature the addition of a suppressed sniper rifle and significant adjustments to the X-4 Stormwing plane.

The suppressed sniper rifle is a silenced version of the game's bolt-action sniper, which will allow players to take long-range shots without opponents knowing the direction of the bullet.

Fortnite's newest weapon is available in either epic (100 base damage) or legendary (105) variants.

Popular Twitch streamer DrLupo showcased the gun in action:

New sniper. 🎯 pic.twitter.com/tgV4rJUaVP

— DrLupo (@DrLupo) January 8, 2019

Other weapon changes include the six shooter being vaulted and the return of the dual pistols, which were vaulted in an early November patch. Epic Games also vaulted the common, uncommon and rare versions of the burst assault rifle, leaving only epic and legendary versions of that AR.

Planes have been one of Epic Games' most controversial additions to Fortnite, perhaps behind only the Infinity Blade sword, which was massively overpowered and removed after just five days last month.

Although the X-4 Stormwing added a much-needed way for long-distance movement during a match, its ability to destroy builds, shoot and send opponents flying off mountains made it virtually impossible to defend against when being piloted by an experienced player.

The latest patch makes an effort to reduce the plane's power. The knockback of being struck was reduced by 70 percent, which should decrease the number of fall-damage eliminations, and the plane will take 50 percent more damage when it hits a structure.

Epic Games likely doesn't want to remove the plane, which does serve a purpose with the larger map introduced at the beginning of the season. That said, whether Tuesday's changes are enough to create more risk for pilots aggressively attacking opponents is unclear.

Finally, the newest community creation to take over The Block—the named location that replaced Risky Reels on the north portion of the Fortnite map—is the DM Arena. It has the look of a sports stadium with a multitude of bouncers, items now only otherwise available on the side of a Port-a-Fortress.