Ubisoft has officially revealed our first look at Rainbow Six Siege: Operation Twin Shells. This is the third season for the game’s ninth year, and somehow, the team is still finding ways to surprise me as a fan who has been playing since the game’s initial launch.
I saw Rainbow Six Siege: Operation Twin Shells early, and what I was shown looks like it’ll have a big impact on the game when it arrives on September 10, 2024. New Operator Skopós, hailing from Greece, is a wheelchair user whose mentor and friend you may recognize as a recent villain in the game’s story. She’s transformed her wheelchair into a base of operations through which she controls not one, but two robotic shells that stand in as her presence as an Operator in a match, and the way they work is really going to mix up how you play as an Attacker and Defender.
You in the shells
Skopós’ shells are named Talos and Colossus, but their names don’t matter as much as how you use them. Skopós’ gadgets are split between the shells, and you’ll pick which one you load up as at the start of the match. When in control of a shell, that machine becomes the active shell. For all intents and purposes, it’s an Operator like any other, though it only packs one of the gadgets you picked, yet it has an advantage no one else does.
The second shell, the one you’re not controlling, becomes your idle shell. The shell crouches down and deploys a shield in front of it, but it’s not shut down. Instead, you can switch between all available cameras and that idle shell to gain more intel. The idle shell will alert you when it’s being attacked, and you can switch control to it if an Operator’s ability is about to fry it or destroy it for the match.
What I think most players will do is use their idle shell as a shield to hide behind while they attack or defend. It takes a while to move that shield, and your second shell is vulnerable while you do so, but if you can perfect moving and switching between them, these shells can make for one extremely deadly Operator.
The shells have been modified so they’re EMP-proof but far from indestructible. To protect them, Skopós enters Rainbow Six Siege with the all-new PCX-33 assault rifle and a P229 as her secondary. She’s a two-speed, two-health Operator, landing her right in the middle and a potent addition to both the Attacking and Defending sides.
Siege Cup Beta and onboarding
Rainbow Six Siege: Operation Twin Shells will introduce the Siege Cup Beta for PC. This is the ultimate form of competitive Siege gameplay, and if all goes well, the feature will be rolled out to all platforms with Y9S4. With each Siege Cup, teams of five players must sign up and clear their schedule to ensure they can play every match from start to finish until they’re eliminated or win.
As you’d expect, the rewards for Siege Cup are going to be some of the most exclusive in the game. Additionally, matches played in both Siege Cup and Ranked Mode will now also earn players Competitive Coins. These can be spent on rare cosmetics, which gives you another reason to hop into the toughest modes in the game.
To keep you limbered up between matches, the shooting range will automatically load up, so you can keep shooting and moving around without getting still while everything is set up behind the scenes. All of this is great for experienced players wanting a top-tier experience, but Ubisoft is also working hard on the onboarding process and keeping the game as free from toxicity as possible.
For example, Versus AI 2.0 is being introduced with Operation Twin Shells, which finally allows players to get some practice as a Defender with an AI team of Attackers hitting them and getting them used to the traditional Bomb gameplay.
The reward and post-game experience are also being refined. Instead of having a few screens showing all the progress you’ve made and experience gained, everything is being simplified into one end screen. Your battle pass progress, profile level, and anything else that you can gain experience for at the time will all be recorded on a single screen. So it doesn’t matter if there’s a time-limited event or you’re grinding for levels to hit Ranked Mode; you’ll see it all and should be able to understand it without missing a thing.
Between Y9S2 and Operation Twin Shells, Ubisoft has reorganized its anti-cheat team to be broader and stand as one of the largest in the games industry. I was told that there are six anti-cheat systems in play at any one time in a Rainbow Six Siege match, and usually, there are more swapping in and out. This is something Ubisoft takes very seriously and is always looking to improve, so you should see less cheating in the game as time goes on.
The first Siege Cup will be somewhat of a Guinea Pig for what you can expect. Its anti-cheat system is akin to moving a book between shelves, bookcases, and floors in a library. Ubisoft believes it will help prevent cheaters from attacking the game or ruining the core experience.
Toxicity obviously hurts any game, and Ubisoft wanted to clarify that its anti-cheat systems are also hitting toxic players. 75% of bans now happen 12 hours sooner, and all toxicity is being taken into account when judging if a player needs to be banned. This includes team-kills, bad language, and general bad behavior. But the good thing is, you won’t be punished if you’re on the same team as a player deemed toxic by Ubiosoft’s processes.
Balance is key
Last but not least, I think it’s important to discuss the balance updates being made with Operation Twin Shells. Solis, Dokkabei, and Nokk are all having a few changes, and I’m pretty excited about Nokk’s. First, Solis’ ability will now only use the center of the screen while active, and can be overclocked to reveal all gadgets in the area with reworked visuals so you know what you’re looking at. You’ll need to wait for the overclock to charge before you can use it again.
Dokkabei now begins the match with 0 chargers and gains one every 45 seconds for up to 2 per round. Ubisoft noticed she was a tad overpowered and needed to be taken down a smidge, which is what it hopes this tweak will achieve. I tend to ignore her ability for the most part, and it never really gets in my way, but I can understand why this needs to happen.
Nokk’s ability is seeing the most impactful change, with a shift from a time-based limit to a movement-based one. So you can activate the HEL device to make her incredibly difficult to see, hide her from cameras, and dampen her footfalls, and just sit there. The ability will go on cooldown after you’ve moved a certain distance, made a number of shots, or a combination of actions.
These balance changes and Skopós make Rainbow Six Siege: Operation Twin Shells a season you don’t want to miss. I’m intrigued to see how players make the most of the new Operator’s shells, what these balance changes will do to the meta, and which Operators are the most played in the game.
