Home Gaming The Rainbow Six Siege season pass undoes the free DLC good will

The Rainbow Six Siege season pass undoes the free DLC good will

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Rainbow six siege

Rainbow Six Siege will be rolling out a year’s worth of free DLC. Yes, a year of free maps, new operators and new game modes. It certainly made Ubisoft look like good guys with their free DLC plans, and I was happy to see that they weren’t segmenting their community. You know, until they announced the season pass.

What do you give the gamers who have everything? Well, if you’re already giving away maps, modes and operators for free, there must be something that you can make them pay for. Of course there is! Here is the video showing off just what you can get from the Season Pass for $30 (R428.41 with today’s exchange rate).

So, for half the price of a new AAA game, or the price of many games depending on the sales you buy through, you can get some aesthetic upgrades, early access to new operators and faster progression. I’m the most concerned about that last point. I don’t mind people paying for aesthetic stuff in games – while it’s not something that I care about, I know it’s something that other people enjoy and it’s nice for some people to show off that they spent money. But faster progression?

Rainbow Six Siege doesn’t have any single player gameplay, so all progression is built by playing well with (and against) others. Unlocking new content and earning more renown in-game is part of the experience – this isn’t like single-player games where if people want to spend money for the best gear early on it doesn’t affect other players.

Does this mean that people who buy the Season Pass will automatically have a better, um, shot at doing well at the game? Sure, you could just not pay and play your way through to get all the renown and unlock all the things, but when you’re playing against other people who have paid to unlock those things and are, therefore, more over powered, doesn’t that change the balance of the game? If this isn’t a pay to win season pass, I’m not quite sure what is.

Last Updated: November 13, 2015

30 Comments

  1. Ottokie

    November 13, 2015 at 08:37

    • Ir0nseraph

      November 13, 2015 at 09:32

      Ubisoft can’t seem to get it 100%, it’s like they make a good game and then have a meeting on how can they **** it up.
      Division is looking good, now I wonder when that meeting will be.

      Reply

      • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

        November 13, 2015 at 09:53

        [inserts SOON meme]

        Reply

      • TWoH

        November 13, 2015 at 22:20

        This is the best season pass from a AAA title I’ve ever seen. Click the link she posted and you’ll see. This is nowhere close to being pay to win.

        Reply

  2. miaau

    November 13, 2015 at 08:39

    Zoe, I think you make a valid point about the “progress faster” portion of the flim flam on offer.

    It does sound a little pay to win in a game of skill. Which I assume it is.

    I just want to buy a few games and maybe get a decent EXPANSION PACK in the future. I do not care about season passes and new maps and hairstyles and beards and stuff. I really do not.

    Example: Civ Beyond Earth, no season pass, fairly expensive (which I have not got yet) DLC, but the DLC truly expands the core game. (Of course, in the this case I think they should have sea cities in already, but that is just me, right?)

    Reply

    • TWoH

      November 13, 2015 at 23:40

      Or you can just not buy the season pass. See how easy that was? Look! You didn’t even miss out on anything except some aesthetics!

      Reply

      • MaestroFIN

        February 3, 2016 at 17:56

        but you see each one operator costs 25k. not even all of the vanilla operators don’t cost that much renown. That’s some bs.

        Reply

  3. Hammersteyn

    November 13, 2015 at 08:48

    $30 for cosmetics, what is this. The Kardashians shopping list? Sure there are other things as well. But you’re supposed to earn those through playing

    Reply

    • Dutch Matrix

      November 13, 2015 at 08:50

      Can you still unlock awesome goodies by skill alone these days?

      Reply

      • Alien Emperor Trevor

        November 13, 2015 at 08:50

        Not if you’re playing Candy Crush.

        Reply

      • Ottokie

        November 13, 2015 at 08:51

        Only if you are skilled in your job and get paid better for that skill 😛

        Reply

      • Hammersteyn

        November 13, 2015 at 08:52

        I miss the old days sometimes. Back when there was no internet for consoles. Everything unlockable was on the disc. No day one patches. No DLC.

        Reply

        • Ir0nseraph

          November 13, 2015 at 09:23

          No one to revive 😛

          Reply

          • Hammersteyn

            November 13, 2015 at 09:27

            XD

  4. Alien Emperor Trevor

    November 13, 2015 at 08:57

    Well played Zoe, you snuck Jason in between “Siege” and “undoes”.

    Reply

    • Ottokie

      November 13, 2015 at 09:00

      huehuehue

      Reply

    • Dutch Matrix

      November 13, 2015 at 09:26

      Huh? No man! That is him to the left of the wall. His mask is visible just above the shoulder of the shield bearer.

      Reply

    • Hammersteyn

      November 13, 2015 at 09:28

      Brilliant

      Reply

  5. WitWolfy

    November 13, 2015 at 09:38

    That free DLC is just a ploy. They shipped an incomplete game and is adding in the other levels at a other time… Kinda genius really.

    Reply

  6. Pest_AWC

    November 13, 2015 at 16:10

    Good job blowing this out of proportion to make a news worthy rant about it.

    It’s a 5 percent boost in how fast you earn Renown plus 8 future Operators unlocked and some cosmetics!

    That’s IT!!! It isn’t “Pay to win” by any means. Even if they gave 50% boost, who cares! You aren’t getting anything more powerful by unlocking new Operators faster, you are just getting more choices. Some of us don’t have 80 hours a week to play video games or live with our parents and may need to pay for the “luxury” of faster progression too.

    I hate how entitled people feel because they spend money on a game and think the developers need to not offer additions in order to make more money. Would you prefer instead of $60 they charge $80 and give that stuff to everyone? If you say you would prefer paying less, well, that’s not how supply and demand works and UBI needs to make money and make investors happy in order to produce any game at all. So, unless you guys are economic majors and have some better solutions to offer where consumers pay less and companies still make more, STFU.

    Reply

  7. Iron

    November 13, 2015 at 16:30

    What the fuck is wrong with all the people who think this kind of thing is pay to win? Pay to win is when you can buy something that the players who aren’t willing to pay for something don’t can get. And even if you would call it pay to win to get things faster then others, it is just 5% … and I played the beta, you could unlock all operators in a few hours. It was so fast that the most people thought the operators will cost more renown at full release. But the operators will cost the same (first of a CTU 500, second 1000, third 1500, last 2000) and the speed you get renown is the same as in the beta.

    So if this is pay to win for you, you shouldn’t play anymore games, because you will just get offended by all future games.

    I’m no friend of season passes or stuff to buy ingame, but in the case of Siege it is the best type of season pass I saw till now.

    Reply

  8. Jason | Deosl

    November 13, 2015 at 16:39

    Lazy “Journalist”, I mean did you even bother doing some research or did you just wing it after watching the video?

    – You can only buy premium skins
    – There is no pay wall for game content! No splitting of the community
    – The permanent renown boost is only 5%!
    – You can unlock renown playing the situations and Terrorist Hunt Solo
    – You only unlock operators, there is no “OP” gear that gives you an unfair advantage over others. (Recruits has access to same weapons, minus special gadgets)
    – The 8 DLC operators will be unlocked instantly for those with the season pass, those without can either unlock them with renwon or R6 credits. Everything that is game play related is achievable for anyone.

    Do you even blink an eye at CoD or Battlefront with their DLC? No, you don’t…Why?

    Meh, this was poor. But I don’t expect much from a site with Lazy in the title.

    Reply

  9. rgwnd

    November 13, 2015 at 18:13

    Did you even bother to learn how the progression in the game works? The cost of the launch operators begins at 500 renown (about half an hour of gameplay). And then scales up by 500 renown per operator per CTU (groups of 4 operators). In other words, even with the base rate of progression you could have what you believe to be the most over powered operator in half an hour or less. If you had bothered to read the very article you link to from your own site maybe you would understand what you are writing about better. Either you lack the desire to be impartial and accurate in your articles or you’re just a lazy journalist.

    Reply

  10. Colby Hoefer

    November 13, 2015 at 19:28

    This is the most generous DLC plan for a AAA title in many years. You are complaining there is too much free shit basically. I would say this is a good complaints. You also assume that all of the new operators are going to be overpowered. Considering right now there is no operator that is picked 100% of the time I think people are going to use different tactics and team setups just like beta.

    Regardless, anything that can help you win in the game or separate the community is either given free or earned with the in-game renown simply by playing. Your article is small-minded and absurd; however, this differs from the massive cost of Battlefield 4 on release (plus the weapon unlock packages which are $40 or more to have all the weapons everyone else which is similar to the capabilities provided by different operators in Siege) and the split community of BF4 and CoD.

    In order to understand where you are coming from could you please detail a bit better how this is play to win and give specific examples of comparable publishers and shooters that have a more generous DLC plan?

    Reply

    • TWoH

      November 13, 2015 at 22:14

      “Complaining there is too much free shit” is right. I think it’s an entitlement thing.

      Reply

  11. Ruben Raymundo

    November 13, 2015 at 20:30

    Clearly this blogger has never played this game (and there’s no signs that she has ever played any tactical shooters).

    Her rant is centered in her strong assumption that the season pass will allow players to unlock “more over powered” operators and therefore it’ll grant them a win.

    Everyone knows that this game is a tactical team based based game that relies heavily in team communication. Success in breaching or defending is based on a lot of factors including skill and even luck! Unless the new operators include Master Chief I don’t see any signs of this season pass being a pay to win.

    Reply

  12. TWoH

    November 13, 2015 at 22:05

    Are you being paid by a competitor of Ubisoft? This DLC will NOT split the community. That’s reason enough for three cheers. Also, the season pass is for those who don’t want to grind, though I would hardly call it that because operators unlock pretty fast.

    I’d say that the season pass won’t quite be worth it to a good chunk of the customers of the game, and that is fine. For those that want extra weapon skins and the new operators a week early, they have the option to buy this. I probably won’t, and that’s fine by me.

    Reply

  13. Dan Spurr

    November 15, 2015 at 05:19

    Prices based on steam UK pricing

    rainbow six siege is not a full retail price game the shear lack of content in the base game is not worth The £50 base price tag so i put it to you that siege is actually having people buy the DLC map content upfront. base game £30 + £20 for DLC Maps then the season pass was an after thought @ £14.99

    because theres no way Ubisoft suddenly makes a decision to give away free stuff. if you look at what the game has before factoring in the “free maps” and “we’re not splitting the community” headline grabs a game with no traditional Campaign/ Story, Multiplayer PvP / Multiplayer PvE focus

    Reply

  14. Ian McGreal

    November 23, 2015 at 10:41

    Um … if you pay the $90 (AUS dollars) for the game, then you’ve already payed for the free DLC … To me, that’s fairly obvious to figure out. So no, Ubisoft are not the good guys here. Hell, they postponed the game to add the situations mode to begin with.

    Reply

  15. TheHaze

    January 22, 2016 at 01:48

    if 5-10 extra renown per game (average of 200-300) makes season pass holders “OP”, then I really think you need to revisit your definition of overpowered. If anything, the season pass is a rip off to those who purchase it, not an advantage to those who do. Thanks for the laugh.

    Reply

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