At first I was just playing Rainbow Six because my boys are into it and it was a way for me to play a game with both of them. After a week or so of playing I was honestly ready to give up. To say that this game has a steep learning curve is a criminal understatement. I was dying constantly, usually within seconds of the round starting and most of the time I never even saw my killer. I felt like not only was I not helping my boys, I was actively dragging them down. In fact I told them at one point I had no business playing this game. I was trying to decide if I should keep trying or just give up.
Playing with my boys reminded me of when Halo first came out. Jerry and I were invited to go down to the Redmond Microsoft campus every Thursday night to play with the folks who worked there. Each floor of the building had a meeting room with a giant projector and they would network them all together for huge Halo LAN games. There were white boards covered with player stats and a lot of time was spent trying to optimize the various teams. Jerry and I were referred to as “the bricks” during this process. Like handicaps, we were placed on teams to help weigh down players who were considered too good. It was shameful but Microsoft also had refrigerators with free chocolate milk and soda on every floor so we didn’t mind too much.
I was having a terrible time with R6 and felt like I was ruining the game for my boys with my poor playing. I was so overwhelmed with trying to learn all the maps, operators and strategies that I was ready to throw in the towel. Instead of quitting though I decided to start playing more. Rather than just playing a few games each day with the boys I stayed up late playing on my own. I needed practice and the only way to get it was to play through the pain so to speak. I sucked and the randos I played with let me know it. I was told I was “SPED” (special education, thanks Google). I was cursed out for not knowing maps or how to avoid certain gadgets. I placed wall reinforcements in the wrong places and barricaded the wrong doors. I simply can’t be hurt by trash talk though and so I discarded the abuse and took the lessons they were inadvertently teaching me to heart. Slowly I went from getting zero kills per game to getting one or two. I started learning the spots attackers were most likely to come from and the best places to watch from. After a couple weeks I finally felt like I was starting to, if not contribute to my team at least not ruin their game and I was having a lot of fun.
Yesterday I was told by my teammates that I was “Goated bro” after being the last person alive on my team but managing to kill the three remaining enemy players with some truly spectacular shots and saving the win for us. The level of strategy and skill required to play R6 is simply not like any other first person shooter out there. If you play it like Doom or Call of Duty you will die. It's as simple as that. You have to play it like Rainbow Six and doing that takes time and practice. I’ve got the bug now and I play every day with or without my kids. If you are able to meet R6 where it wants you to be you’ll find a game that is unlike anything else on the market even here 9 years after its release. You’ll also find a community of players who are just as likely to accept you as a fellow brother in arms and hype you up as they are to call you slurs you’ve never heard before. I don’t mind some good old fashioned shit talking and I can teabag with the best of them so none of that bothers me but your mileage may vary. It’s not an easy game to start in the year of our Lord 2024 but if you can push through the hard parts you’ll find a rewarding tactical shooter with incredible replayability.
-Gabe Out
