Rainbow Six Siege is about to kick off Season Three of Year Seven, in Operation Brutal Swarm launching 6 September. With the test server already live, you are free to try out the latest features on yourself.

THE GRIM BEEKEEPER

Charlie Tho Keng Boon is the latest Operator to join the game. Codename Grim, the Singaporean joins the Nightaven faction as a 3-speed, 1-armour Attacker. His brief bio is as follows:

• D.O.B.: April 5th (Age 39)
• Birthplace: Jurong, Singapore
• Height: 1.79m
• Weight: 89 8kg
• Training: Combat Diver Course (CDC), Clearance Diviing Group (CDG), Combat Survival Training (CST), Pasir Laba Camp; Frogman School (FMS), Naval Diving Unit (NDU), Reconnaissance Commander Course (MINDEF), Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) , Muay Thai, Silat

He is designed to be perfect for recon, pushing forwards towards an objective for an attacking team. He packs the 552 Commando assault rifle, as well as the SG-CQB pump-action shotgun, and the P229 as a sidearm with options for a standard breach charge or a claymore as his generic gadget. Thanks to his Kawan Hive launcher, he can keep defenders on his toes with a swarm of bots that track opponents who walk through it.

The Kawan Hive works like this: it shoots projectiles that sticks to surfaces. On landing, a projectile opens up to deploy a canister on the floor, which itself opens to deploy a swarm of robotic bees that hover in the area for a set period of time. Opponents will still be pinged a few more times even when they move out of the swarm. Swarm can track everyone including Caveira and Vigil, so you’ll need to be quick.

Alternatively, you can try striking back. Should the device land next to a Mute jammer, it will not activate until the jammer is destroyed. Running up to a jammer after moving out of a swarm will also stop the pings. Other ways the bees can be countered are through Aruni’s laser gate if you try firing your device through it, Jäger’s ADS if it gets too close, or getting deployed too close to any surface affected by Bandit’s CED-1 shockwire.

You’d never want to have your location revealed, with Grim all too happy to upset your plans. His skillset will allow him to help his team clear out rooms ahead or guard their backs by deploying the bees to cover the routes. Knowing to exploit that opportunity could be all the Attackers need to push ahead and gain the advantage. We’ll have to see if his scouting capabilities will cause him to be banned outright. Players will be able to unlock Grim through the Brutal Swarm Battle Pass, unlockable with Renown or R6 Credits.

BEE AMAZED

In line with Grim’s lore and the perhaps somewhat ‘silly’ sounding Kawan Hive, the Brutal Swarm event also took us to the Bee Amazed Garden to get an up-close-and-personal experience with, well, bees.

Located in Kampung Kampus, the place was decked out with standees, posters, and visuals for the event. One or two bees would certainly be easy enough to skirt around, having 20,000 of them can be quite nerve-wracking, more so if you’re not a typical fan of flying insects. Bee Amazed’s owner, John, had us don the protective suits to much more safely meet our new hive of friends.

The demoplay session was at Reality Rift at Bugis+, which was also where the community event would be at. Much like Bee Amazed, the place was decked out in the game’s standees and posters, truly signalling your arrival at the right place.

STADIUM, RETURN

The Stadium map returns from 2021, entering the permanent competitive pool. Now known as Stadium Bravo, it’s no longer limited to the Road to SI event, that built up to the Six Invitational, Siege‘s biggest esports event. As full-blown maps, it’s definitely a missed opportunity to have them be limited only for a limited time.

Stadium Bravo combines Border and Coastline, offering both sightlines and close quarter options. Features are now colour-coded for easier communication, allowing for both familiar and unfamiliar feelings, more so if you played the map lots during the event. Stadium Bravo will also be available in Team Deathmatch.

SEASON UPDATES

The new season also brings improvements. Both the console and PC versions have gotten more impactful weapon recoil to make it harder to maintain accuracy over prolonged fire bursts. Press longer, harsher recoil.

For those who spray and pray – or covering fire – with something like an LMG or weapons with bigger magazine capacities, the restrictions have mostly remained the same. That said, these weapons now have a 4th stage of recoil to make it even more difficult to control, so you will need to adapt to firing in shorter bursts for better effectiveness. The recoil on console will be tackled differently to the PC version so that the modifications can be done more precisely.

Excessively toxic players now can be hit with a new reputation penalty. Last season punished abusive friendly fire, while this season will address abusive text chat. Players will get muted in text for 30 matches and thus not be seen by other players unless they decide to ‘unmute’ the offending player.

Rainbow Six Siege Operation Brutal Swarm is slated for a full launch 6 September.