The new name of Rainbow Six Extraction was apparently quietly revealed around a month ahead of its most recent announcement. Ubisoft unveiled the official title of the game formerly known as Rainbow Six Quarantine in a new trailer, where the studio also briefly talked about the game and announced the gameplay reveal set for June 12, 2021, during the company’s Ubisoft Forward event at E3 2021.
Rainbow Six Extraction, which spun-off from the limited-time Outbreak game mode of Rainbow Six Siege, was originally announced as Rainbow Six Quarantine at E3 2019, but speculation toward a new name eventually began popping up as the ongoing pandemic hit and the word quarantine quickly became less of an appropriate name. While Ubisoft eventually confirmed a name change back in February 2021, the company didn’t reveal it at the time. One name that was previously rumored to be the new title of the game was Rainbow Six Parasite but Ubisoft eventually clarified that this was only a placeholder.
Axios Gaming editor Stephen Totilo Tweeted about finding Rainbow Six Extraction’s new name in Ubisoft financial documents from back in May while working on an article. In a screenshot shared by Totilo, Far Cry 6 and Rainbow Six Extraction can be seen mentioned in the document as two games that were postponed to “the next financial year.” Apart from the quiet reveal of the Rainbow Six Extraction title, the mention of release date windows for both it and Far Cry 6 is also noteworthy. The release date of Far Cry 6 was just recently announced to be October 7, 2021, which falls under the fiscal year mentioned in Ubisoft’s financial document. So it’s quite possible that Rainbow Six Extraction could be released either later this year or sometime next year.
Ubisoft did not mention directly why and how Rainbow Six Extraction received its new name but it’s pretty safe to say that the ongoing pandemic, which put millions of people in quarantine and similar lockdowns, was a big reason for changing the title from Quarantine. The studio also mentioned in its official title reveal trailer that the game has “grown a lot” since it was originally announced and that players will now be “facing an always-evolving alien threat” rather than something related to a virus, which was supposed to be the original intent and reason for the former title.
Regardless of the reason and process for the name change, it looks like Ubisoft is taking Rainbow Six Extraction in an interesting direction. With only a few days left until the start of E3 2021 and the company’s Ubisoft Forward event, fans won’t have to wait too long to finally see what the studio has come up with since the game was announced two years ago.
Source: Stephen Totilo/Twitter