$15 Rainbow Six Siege PC Starter Edition Launches on Steam

Ubisoft has released a Starter edition for Rainbow Six Siege on Steam for a limited time. For $15, it gives players full access to the game, while providing a different system for unlocking Operators.

Buying the Starter edition instantly grants players up to four of the original Operators. The first two Operators that get unlocked are randomly selected from Rook, Sledge, Ash, Fuze, Mute, and Smoke. Starter edition players then get 600 R6 credits, which can be spent on two more Operators or additional content. Otherwise, the full game is available, including every mode, map, and weapon. There's no level cap on the progression system, either.

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The remaining original 16 Operators require additional grinding to unlock, as they cost more Renown than in the standard, full-priced game. It costs 12,500 Renown or 300 R6 credits to unlock a single Operator in the Starter edition, as opposed to the standard edition's 500 to 2000 Renown. Ubisoft says it takes about 15 hours to unlock a single Operator with Renown. Post-launch operators, however, cost the same in both versions. Additionally, the season pass is compatible with the Starter edition.

Players earn Renown through playing the game, but can make a little more by playing daily and weekly challenges or purchasing Renown Boosters. Players who don't want to grind for additional Operators can purchase the $35 R6 credits pack to unlock all of the original characters. Unlocking all of the operators this way would bring the total cost up to where Rainbow Six Siege's standard edition sits.

The Starter edition is only available digitally through Steam and UPlay for two weeks. It was originally offered for a limited time a couple weeks back in June before recently returning to UPlay.

According to a leaked survey, Rainbow Six Siege could be getting another season pass. In the survey, Ubisoft tests people's interest in things that could be included "in the future season pass."

The latest Siege update fixed a weapon attachment that wasn't functioning properly after its addition in a previous patch. The muzzle brake "was not intended to reduce the recoil of automatic fire, which it [had] been doing since its introduction," Ubisoft says.

Rainbow Six Siege received a score of 8/10 in GameSpot's review. Critic Scott Butterworth said, "My experiences weren't always perfect, but when Siege works, there's nothing else like it. It's not designed to appeal to all players, and that's exactly what allows it to be something special. With so much strategic depth, those periods between firefights actually become some of the most rewarding, while firefights themselves are made all the more intense by the knowledge that you're fighting for your life, not just your kill/death ratio."